Riveted

Church

She was a little bit drunk and a whole lot turned on, which in turn had me battling my desire to take care of her and the burning need to fuck her. I wasn’t sure yet which instinct was going to win out.

I could feel it in the way she stumbled and used it as an excuse to hold on to me as I hauled her sweet ass out of the rollicking honky-tonk. Her hands held me a little tighter than they needed to and her lips landed right below my jaw on the side of my neck. Instead of one of her bubbly little laughs brushing across my overheated skin I felt the wet flick of her tongue as it lashed its way up along the throbbing vein that lived there. I couldn’t hold back the groan when her teeth nipped into the lobe of my ear. I slid a hand around the curve of her waist and walked her backwards until her back hit the bricks that lined the outside of the bar. Her pale skin was bathed in the blue and red lights from the sign advertising PBR tall boys and her eyes were at half-mast and darker than they had ever been with warm desire. I wanted her so bad it made my balls hurt and my insides feel like fire.

“Told you I didn’t want to play, Dixie.” Her hands were crawling across my abs and up the wall of my chest under the fabric of my shirt. She touched me like she was making it a point to leave her fingerprints on every inch of my skin. I wanted to take what she was offering, it’s what I’d wanted from the start, but I knew if I took it without giving anything back it would be one more sin that I had to atone for and frankly I had enough to repent for without adding this sweet, considerate, and effortlessly tempting girl to the list. Everything inside of me demanded that I take her back to the room, spread her across the bed we were going to share, and get inside of her as fast and as deeply as I could but there was that lingering wistfulness shadowing the heat in her gaze as she continued to stroke me and kiss along my jaw.

I put my hands on either side of her face and bent down so I could press my lips to hers. It was the same kind of soft kiss she had given me. The kind of kiss you gave to someone that mattered. The kind of kiss you shared with someone you didn’t want to hurt. She tasted like the promise of dirty, hot sex and smoky tequila. She tasted like all the best things men stuck at war dreamed about and told themselves they were fighting for. She tasted like potential heartbreak and the good things I knew I was never meant to have. I bit into her lower lip and rubbed my tongue along the supple flesh I trapped between my teeth. I felt her entire body shudder against mine and her palm flattened over my heart where it thundered and roared into her touch.

I put a hand next to the side of her head and braced myself over her. We were around the side of the building, the side that wasn’t visible from the road, but there was a door a few feet away that anyone could come out at any time and burst the sensual little bubble the two of us seemed to be trapped in.

Her hand that wasn’t tapping along to my furious heartbeats made its way around my waist, her fingertips taking the time to track across every raised mark, to memorize every scar and imperfection that marred my body. She was reading my history, my story that was written on my skin, and I could see that it wasn’t one that she was particularly enjoying.

“But I didn’t get my turn, Church.” Her voice was quiet. “I want those two truths.” It grated that she felt like she had to taunt and pull them out of me. I gave her more truth than I had given anyone else in a long time. I’d kind of hoped it was enough but apparently not. She wanted more.

I lowered my forehead, and then dropped it down some more until it rested against hers. “Fine then, I’ll tell you three things that are absolutely true because I promised I would never lie to you.” She made a little noise in her throat and the fingers of her hand that was resting on my chest curled into a fist.

I shifted my head so I could kiss her on the ridge of one of her freckled cheeks. “Number one; I miss the army. I miss knowing that every single day I’ll have something that feels important to do. I miss the regimen and at the same time the unpredictability. I was a damn good soldier and that mattered to me because I wasn’t a very good son or brother.”

Her eyebrows twitched and the fingers of the hand she had curled around my side dug into my skin. I felt the bite of her nails and could feel the way she sucked in a breath as I leaned to the side and let my lips land on her other cheek. “Number two; I hated the fucking army. I hated watching my friends die. I hated being in a place where it was so easy for kids and women to get killed. I hated the way it felt like no matter how much effort any of us put in, the impact we had on the people were there to help was minimal. I hate the way it’s so hard to leave the battles in the places they were actually fought. You bring all of that shit home with you and it’s up to you to figure out where you’re going to store it. There is no handbook, no instruction guide, and too many people end up letting that baggage overrun their entire lives. Every day I try and make sure my shit is sorted and stored in a safe place. Sometimes I do a better job at keeping it on a shelf and out of sight than others.”

Her softly whispered “Oh, Church” brushed across my lips as I planted my third truth directly on her parted lips. “Third; if I could promise you all the things your eyes promise me, I would. I’m not that guy, I don’t have it in me to pretend that I am even if it means you want to turn around and walk back into that bar so we don’t tear each other up wanting the same thing but with different outcomes. I can take you to bed and guarantee it’ll be worth your while, but nothing else I have to offer is, mostly because I don’t have anything else to offer … anyone.” I knew what it looked like to love and to lose and I wasn’t strong enough or brave enough to ever put myself back in that position even if this sunny, sexy woman tempted me to throw caution to the wind.