Page 49 of Challenged By You
My fingers, which had been tangled in the ends of her hair, tighten. I’m speechless. This is what I’ve been looking for. For years I thought what I was missing was the life I had when Mom was swept away from me and Julian. But it’s the fierceness of a woman who would do anything for those she loves. And with a shocking clarity, I realize I began my first step onto the path with Trina the day she slammed into me after her confrontation with Chef Spencer.
“Shocked you?” Her voice is brittle.
Jolted out of my thoughts, I become cognizant of the fact she’s stiff as a board in my arms. “I wish you understood everything you’ve done for Annie and Chris is the way love is supposed to be.” I don’t mince words.
“By subjecting them to the same life I led with a mother who’s never around?” My heart cracks open as her words catch. Her small fist pounds against my chest. “Maybe my mother’s right.”
“Excuse me?”
“What right do I have to this—to you—when I claim I want to give them better? What am I doing letting myself be distracted by you when I should be focusing on giving my kids everything?” Tears drip from her eyes as she confesses her deepest pain to me.
I press her fist against my heart. “Is that all I am, Trina? A distraction?” Her answer is either going to cause all the walls between us to crumble or throw them back up with steel reinforcements.
Her fist unfolds, hand splaying across the width of where my heart beats frantically beneath. I feel her shallow breaths wisp across my skin. We’re doing little more than cuddling, and I’m more enraptured in this moment than in any other in my memory. “T?” I prompt her, my voice a hoarse rasp.
I need words to let me know I’m not in this all alone, that the surge of passion between us wasn’t temporary but a beginning.
“You’re not just a distraction, Jonas. You the kind of man a woman changes her life for. And frankly, that terrifies me,” she whispers almost soundlessly.
But I still hear her.
“Fuck,” I hiss. Rolling Trina over to her back, I bury my head into the curve of her shoulder and just inhale the scent we made between us that seems to cling to her right there.
“Just promise me something.” Her words are a mumble against my neck.
I pull back just enough so our noses brush against one another. Her breath catches, causing my pulse to trip. “Anything.”
“I can handle anything, but Annie? Chris? Please don’t…”
I cut off her question by crushing my mouth down on hers, frustrated she feels she has to voice her concerns because even after what we’ve shared, part of her is still linking this with her past relationship. The rest of my emotions are wiped away by the undercurrents of her unspoken words conveyed through her kiss. The rest of the world fades away except for the magic of this kiss. It’s the longing of two hearts realizing they found their match to fill the holes in the other.
When I pull back, Trina’s lips are puffy, cheeks flushed. My hands are gripping hers on either side of her head, but despite knowing I already gave her my reply, I still tell her, “Those children of yours are just like their mother.”
Her eyes, which had been staring up at me languidly, clear before they narrow. “Oh?” A few weeks ago, the single word would have caused my balls to shrivel up in fear.
Now, I just grin down into her ferocious scowl. “Yep.” Plucking a kiss from her mutinous lips, I list out Annie and Chris’s attributes. “Smart.” Kiss. “Loyal.” Another brush of our lips. “Retaliatory.”
Trina bursts into laughter. “Sorry, not sorry,” she giggles.
“Shh. I’m debating if the french toast outweighs the freaking mac’n’crap,” I sigh. Sliding to the side so I don’t crush her, I slide my hand over her face without actually touching it. “Beautiful,” I whisper. “From the inside out.”
“Jonas,” Trina whispers. “Maybe they are, but—”
“You are the most beautiful, strong, opinionated, hardheaded woman I’ve ever met,” I muse. “And I want to introduce you to my family so you can learn all about the only other woman I’ve…cared…about in quite the same way.”
Then my eyes bug out. Shit, Julian would have my head. What kind of an idiot brings up a woman while in bed with another. I brace for the explosion. I should have known better.
With a mother’s eyes, Trina reaches up and smooths a lock of hair away from my face. “Who?”
With a sharp exhale, grateful Trina just gets me through the exterior I’ve held as a shield, I say, “My mother.” I wait for the judgment, the commentary about an Oedipus complex. Some snark that will shatter the emotional bonds wrapping around my heart.
Then she surprises me again when she says thoughtfully, “That explains so much about how you are with Annie and Chris. You understand their hearts may be missing something with only one parent, but you’re so careful with them.” Tugging my head closer, she brushes her lips against my jaw which I know is slightly unhinged. “Be careful, Jonas. I might begin to like you more than I already do. And I’m really starting to do that.” The expression on her face tells me it’s a hell of a lot more than like, but life has taught her to not leap before she looks.
Just like it handed me the same lessons. Inside, there’s something changing within me. I can’t name exactly what it is, but even as I slide my arms beneath Trina to tug her to me before I roll us both over so she can rest on top of me, I blurt out, “Apples,” before I know what I’m doing.
“A sweet edible fruit,” she smarts. “Grown worldwide and found on a deciduous tree. Some people in this room think they’re disgusting.”
My lips quirk. Trina’s the only person I know who could take a dark confession and make me want to laugh. “I hate apples for a reason,” I tell her, but instead of my voice coming out sinister, there’s a vein of laughter through it.
