Page 44 of Come Back To Me
“You’re right. We have to go there. I’ll call Leo and—”
He grabs my face. “Baby. Listen to me. None of this will do either of us any good. This gift was obviously not from me, so how about we let the rest go? Go have fun. Grab us some pumpkins we can decorate together.”
“But—”
“But nothing.” Taking the broken pieces from my hand while cutting his own on the edge of the glass, he moves around me and hits the garage door open. Then he steps outside, tossing everything he’s holding into the large black trash can.
“There.” He pretends to dust his hands off, ignoring the blood dripping to the ground. “All gone. It can be like it never existed.”
But it did. There’s a similar one sitting above where Arkansas thinks his body still lies too. He went to visit him. He’s beenthere when I haven’t. “That’s easy for you to say when—” My words get stuck midway when I have to grab the wall to catch my fall. My knees are giving out, and Gareth rushes my way, helping me lower myself to the wooden chest next to two bins holding more Halloween decor.
“Careful, love. You lost a lot more blood this time.” He touches my forehead with the back of his hand. “You’re a little clammy and pale. Stay here and I’ll get you some orange juice.”
“Yeah . . .” I press my back to the wall, resting my hands in my lap. “Yeah, okay.”
He kisses my forehead and rushes back inside, closing the garage door before leaving me alone. I can’t stop thinking about the snow globe in the trash and the one at the cemetery. He left him a bear and roses. Why did he go there? Why is he still chasing after my husband, knowing he’s gone? He loved him, didn’t he?
Gareth hurries back, shoving the cup at my lips and encouraging me to drink. He’s not satisfied until I empty the entire glass, and then he carries me inside, balancing me on his hip as he opens the door that leads us into the kitchen. Setting me on the counter, he kisses my lips and then reaches behind me, grabbing a piece of paper towel to hold to his hand.
“My blood is turning red.” His eyes lower to the red seeping through the thin paper. “It was black before.”
“What you think that means?”
“You make me more alive,” he says, sounding so sure of himself.
“You don’t know that.”
“I feel better every time.” He looks down at my thigh. “Not only then.” His fingers brush over my cock and slip down to beneath my balls. Dragging me closer to the edge, he rubs at my entrance. I’m naked. He opened the garage door when I was standing there with zero clothes on. No one was out there, butthey could have been. Lucky for them they weren’t. Who knows what he’d do if someone else looked at me. My stomach flips.
“You look better. Better than me too,” I say between chuckles.
“We’ll have to fix that. We don’t need to switch places.” Turning, he looks around, and then as if remembering where he put something, he goes to the microwave. He heads toward me with a small bowl and a plate of sandwiches. “I wanted it to be ready for when you woke up. I can heat the soup up.”
“It’s fine.” I grab the food from him, taking a bite of one of the sandwiches as soon as the plate rests in my lap. “Man, that tastes good.”
“Wish food tasted good for me too. I miss ice cream.”
I laugh. “It is pretty good.”
“I can always see if I can taste it on you after you eat it.”
There’s a zinging sensation rushing up my back. “Yeah. It wouldn’t hurt to try.”
“It never hurts to try new things,” he says, licking cheese from the corner of my mouth.
Gareth loads the washer and folds the laundry from the dryer as I eat my food. When I’m done, he sets the basket on the couch and walks me to the shower. His clothes come off as I’m stepping under the water, and he’s there helping me stay up right as I wash my body, occasionally offering a hand. It’s nothing sexual, but it feels almost more intimate. He scrubs his nails into my scalp and I melt against him. His hand slides down my belly and he nibbles my shoulder, biting off a small sliver of my skin. He licks at it and sucks it until it stops bleeding.
“We should get out before your skin gets too wrinkled or the water turns cold.”
“I don’t mind the cold so much anymore.” I twist my neck, standing on my tiptoes to kiss his tangy mouth.
“I prefer the warmth myself.” His tongue attacks mine and the water stops pouring over us seconds later. I shiver from the air sticking to my wet skin, and he wraps me in a large towel.
“I don’t want to go anymore.” I look down at him as he dries off my legs. His lips press to one of the globes of my ass.
“You wanted to yesterday. You love this kind of stuff.”
“It’s not the same without you.”
