Page 114 of California Wild

He disappeared. Came back carrying more shit than he left with. And when she reached for him, he pulled away without meaning to. Not with his hands, not with his body—but with silence. With everything he didn’t say.

She didn’t push. Didn’t press.

But she didn’t have to.

Because Jesse saw it in her eyes.

That flicker of doubt.

And god, he fucking hated that.

She was thinking about all the other times. The times he hadn’t shown up. The waiting. The drinking. The silence. How she used to fall asleep staring at the ceiling, wondering if he was alive or just too fucked up to call.

His jaw tightened, his hand tightening against the curve of her waist.

Why was this so hard?

Why couldn’t he just say the goddamn words?

But he didn’t know how.

What he did know—what he’d always known—was how to make her feel.

That, at least, he could still do.

He rolled her gently beneath him, his hands firm, steady. Not rough. Just there. Grounding. His body pressed into hers, heat-to-heat, chest-to-chest.

She gasped, breath catching, her fingers sliding up into his hair.

“Jesse—”

He silenced her with a kiss. Slow. Deep. Consuming. The kind that anchored. The kind that meant something.

A kiss that said everything he couldn’t.

I missed you. I never stopped. I don’t know how to do this, but fuck, I’m trying.

Her arms tightened around him. And for one brief second, he let himself believe that maybe it was enough.

Even if the words never came.

Even if the ink on his skin said the rest.

His hands roamed, tracing every inch of her like he was trying to carve himself into her skin, into her bones, into the very air she breathed.

Because maybe words failed him.

But this—

This, he could do.

Jesse slid lower, his lips trailing fire down her throat, over her collarbone, his hands gripping her waist, holding her in place. He could still see it in her eyes—the hesitation, the unspoken questions—but he wasn’t ready to give her answers. Not yet.

So instead, he focused on what he did know.

How to make her feel good.

How to make her forget.

---