Page 62 of Take My Breath Away
Hands fall to my shoulders and I jump, before my body does exactly what it wants, which is to lean back into James’ touch.
“You’ll wear a groove in that bottle if you dig away at it any harder.”
James’ voice is deep and soothing, as his fingers begin to knead and massage, smoothing out all those knots that have tied up my muscles in just a couple of minutes. A soft kiss lands on top of my head, but James lingers and I sigh as he nuzzles into my hair.
“What’s the matter, Perry, because something is. You going to tell me, hmm?”
Another nuzzle before he pulls back, but his hands are still working their magic on me.
“We’re back, to our normal lives. To how it was before.”
His hands still, just for a beat, before they resume their firm work.
“Not quite as it was before, wouldn’t you say?” His hands slip from my shoulders and he sits down opposite me. Leaning back in his seat, his eyes narrow as he studies me before he sighs, long and deep. “What’s wrong?” His eyes, always so clear and confident, cloud with uncertainty. “You regret it.”
It’s not a question but a statement.
“No, but…” My nervous fingers gather up the paper I’ve shredded from the beer bottle, rolling and rolling and rolling it into a smaller and smaller ball. “I know you can’t offer me any kind of… anything long term. I know it’s not what you want. I realise that, and accept your life is how you want it…”
No commitment, no strings, no entanglement, all the things I want and he runs from. My words have dried up on my tongue. I swallow hard, because I owe it to myself to say them.
“I don’t want to just be a notch on a bedpost. I’ve been that, too many times. Somebody to fuck and forget.”
James’ brow scrunches into a hard frown, so hard it’s as though he’s fighting a real and physical pain.
“I’d never treat you like that. Ever.” His tone’s quiet yet hard, and brimming with vehemence. He drags his hands down his face, and when they drop away, his expression’s softer, and his wry smile’s back in place. “So many have been notches. I won’t deny it because I can’t lie to you. But not you, Perry. You could never be that. But what you say, about long term…”
He shakes his head slowly, and his gaze shifts, but not before I see something in his eyes that if I let myself I could call regret, or sadness. But he’s told me the kind of man he is, he’s never lied to me, just as he says.
“Can’t we just enjoy each other, for now?” he says, bringing his focus back to me. “And I’m not just talking about sex. It’s you I enjoy, Perry.You. Your company. Spending time here, or meeting up after work, I’ve loved every moment of it. And I think you have, too.”
If I say no, he’ll accept it, the same as if I’d said no when he first took me to bed… and just like then, I can’t shake my head and walk away. I know exactly what it is he’s offering me, which isn’t any kind of forever. It’s the here and now, it’s for the next few days, weeks, maybe a month or two. It’s until I go and never look back. It’s everything I don’t want, everything I’ve become determined to avoid because it’s everything that will break my heart when it’s been broken too many times before.
But this isn’t any man. This is James. The man who rescued me, the man who’s cared for me, the man’s who’s treated me with more respect than I’ve ever been treated with before. If I can have that, if only for a short time more, I’ll take it.
“I think we can be those things. For now, until I go.”
He nods and smiles, though his jaw tightens. Just a tiny, minuscule fraction.
“As you say,” he says quietly, “until you move away to fulfil your dream.”
All those complications I’ve told myself I have to avoid, they’ve wound themselves around me and tightened their hold.
I don’t know if I’ve made the best decision in the world, or the worst; all I know is that I’ve made the only one I can.
* * *
On the surface, life carries on much as before. I go to work. I meet James for a drink or a meal, or I cook when I get home. We watch the TV together, or stream films or box sets. He goes running, I — don’t. None of that has changed, but unlike before I’m woken up each morning not by the cheery chat of the radio show presenter, but by a long and leisurely blow job.
“Oh God, James,o-hhhh…”
My post-release slump back into the mattress is accompanied by a salacious smack of a pair of wet lips and a throaty laugh.
“So much more satisfying than a cup of tea first thing, don’t you think?”
James inches up my body, his face hovering over mine so close our noses brush against each other’s.
“Get off me. You’ve got cum breath.” I do my best to look fierce, but as I’m still in an early morning post-climax fog, I very much doubt I’m succeeding.
