Page 58 of Heartbreaker
“Exceptwhoit was!”
Savannah pushes off the wall, stepping closer to me, but doesn’t close the distance. “I did what I had to do, and it was just business. I thought you, of all people, would understand that.”
My hands clench at my sides. Even though I know she’s right, I need a few more minutes to cool off. I don’t want to say something that will make things worse.
“I’ll go,” she says. “I’ll let you get dressed, cool off a little, and we can talk more later…I wanted to check on you before I left.” Finally, she closes the distance between us, kissing my cheek, and I relish in the feeling of her lips on my burning skin. When she pulls away, her fingers glide over my skin, pushing away the hair from my forehead to examine the cut before her gaze meets mine briefly. The whole interaction lasts less than ten seconds, and it leaves me wanting more when she steps away.
One final question pops into my head, and I have to ask before she’s gone. Savannah looks over her shoulder when I call out to her. “Did you always know?”
“They told me yesterday, but Tim said it was always part of their plan.” She shrugs, a soft smile gracing her lips before she leaves.
I slam my palm into the concrete wall at my side and immediately regret it as a sharp pain shoots up my arm. “Fuck!”
“That looked like it hurt,” a voice says from behind me.
A humorless chuckle passes through me as I try to rub out the pain in my wrist.You’ve got to be kidding me.This is the last fucking thing I need.
“That’s gotta sting, huh?” he continues.
“What do you want, Drake?” I ask between clenched teeth.
“You and I have a debt to settle, or did you forget?”
I kick off my shoes, leaving them by the door, when I walk into our room over an hour later. The air smells like vanilla and coconut with a hint of warm wood. It’s thick and humid, even out here in the living space, from the hot shower she must have taken when she got back. I find her in bed with a book in her right hand. Her left toys with the end of the damp braid hanging over her shoulder. I drop my bag on the oversized armchair in the corner and sit on the edge of the bed. Warm, chocolate eyes lift from the page, and when we make eye contact, the book closes instantly.
“I’m sorry,” I say quickly, and she looks taken aback. “I shouldn’t…I know how this works, Sav, probably better than most. But in that moment…being in the middle of that ring, being on the receiving end of your attack, I forgot, and I took it out on you.” I cautiously reach out to her, and a wave of relief washes over me when she doesn’t pull away. “I’m sorry,” I say, pressing a long kiss to the warm skin of her hand. “You are the most important thing to me, Savannah. You and you alone. Fuck the belt. Fuck the titles, the notoriety…Fuck it all. If I don’t have you, then it doesn’t mean anything.”
“John, you don’t mean that.”
“Yes, I do. I love you, Savannah. I know we haven’t been together that long, but I don’t know how else to describe it.”
“You love me?”
“I think I loved you since the moment I met you.”
“Okay, now you’re just sucking up,” she says, and her laughter strikes a chord in my chest, making me smile.
There’s no other way to describe the way I feel about her, and it’s incredible, but also absolutely terrifying. There have been only a few women in my life I’ve loved, but getting to know Savannah has made me realize none of them ever came close to this.
“I love you, too, John.”
The words draw my gaze up, and I don’t waste another minute, pressing my lips to hers in soft, gentle pecks that are soon not enough. She must think the same because Savannah pulls my mouth to hers, and I push her back onto the mattress. I reach behind my back, fisting the fabric of my shirt and pulling it over my head. Her fingers ghost up my sides, sending a shiver down my spine, tracing over the black ink on my side.
“What is your tattoo for?”
“That’s a loaded question,” I say with a small huff, but it doesn’t seem to faze her. Rolling to her side, I prop my head up on my elbow, and Savannah’s left hand comes back to trace over the skin again, where the three railroad spikes form a cross. “It’s part faith, but also part…survival. I’ve told you about my father. A good and faithful Christian on Sunday mornings, but the rest of the week, you never knew which version you were going to get. Watching him play the role, but not live the life, turned me away from my faith for a long time. When he kicked me out, I didn’t understand how someone—how a father—could do that. And he told all of my friends’ parents not to help me, made up some bullshit excuse to persuade them. It was one thing after another, and it made me hate him. Made me hate God. But then I worked my way across the country to Texas, got a job, found a wrestling promotion that would take me, and the rest, as they say, is history. As I got older—met more people—I realized sitting in a pew on Sunday morning, pretending to be someone else one day a week, isn’t what faith is about. And while I’ve forgiven my father for everything that has happened, I’ll never forget it.”
“I’m sorry,” she whispers.
“Don’t be, Sweetheart. We all have crosses to bear. This just happens to be one of mine. Maybe one day, I’ll get closure on everything, or maybe I won’t. Who knows?”
“Well, when that day comes, if it comes, I’ll be right there to help you through it.”
Savannah cradles my face in her hands and presses a gentle kiss to my lips that turns hungry when she opens her mouth in invitation. I oblige, letting my tongue slip inside to tangle with hers in a desperate embrace. I hook my fingers into the waistband of her sweats and pull them down her legs. She gasps when I glide my finger over her slit.
“Shit,” I hum, and part her with my fingers, watching her eyes roll into the back of her head. “You’re so fucking wet already, Sav.”
“Stop teasing,” she demands. “I’ve waited long enough.”
