Page 30 of A Very Beary Christmas
Chapter 16
Chloe
“Best Christmas ever.” I sighed softly and snuggled against the man beside me.
He pressed a kiss to my forehead and rubbed my back.
The amazing thing was, both gestures felt every bit as intimate as the sex we had just had. I was floating on a cloud, my body still humming, my heart whole. I had never felt as good as I did at that moment.
“Are you okay?” he asked softly.
“Better than okay,” I answered truthfully. I knew he worried. It had been the first time for us both. There had been some fumbling, some uncertainty, but in my opinion, that only made the experience that much sweeter. We listened to our bodies and found our way together.
“Do you feel up to Christmas dinner?”
I felt gloriously boneless and languid, content to remain exactly where I was. I wasn’t sure I could summon the energy to walk to the bathroom, let alone the lodge. I would much rather spend the rest of the day, and the next, in bed with Sam. However, I also knew how important family was to him, and since I was now part of his family, I couldn’t be selfish.
“Only if you promise we can come back here tonight and pick up where we left off.”
His eyes burned with heat, and I felt him harden against my hip. “That’s a given, baby.”
I shivered in anticipation, wincing when I felt the pull at my neck.
He gently stroked along his bite mark. “Does it hurt?”
“A little, but it’s okay. I’ve felt a lot worse, believe me.”
When he stilled, I realized my mistake. Thus far, we had avoided talking about my childhood. I had seen the questions in his eyes. If he asked, I would answer, but I wasn’t going to volunteer the sordid details. That part of my life was over, and I didn’t want to sully our new beginning by dredging up ugliness best left in the past. Besides, I could pretty much guarantee that, no matter what he had imagined, the reality was far worse. I had made my peace with it. As far as I was concerned, that part of my life was, like my father, dead and buried.
I cupped his face, needing him to understand that the slight discomfort I felt as a result of his loving wasnothinglike pain inflicted out of malice and hatred. “Stop it. You didn’t hurt me, not like that. This was part of the process, right? Besides,” I reminded him, “I marked you, too.”
Right after I had felt his teeth sinking into my skin, I had been overcome with an urge to bite him, too. Since my teeth weren’t nearly as sharp as his, I was sure what I had done to him had hurt a lot more than what he had done to me.
“I can’t help it, Chloe. I don’t know exactly what happened with your father, but I know he hurt you. The thought of anyone hurting you, myself included, destroys me.”
My heart swelled. “There’s no comparison, Sam. What we did, we did out of love. What he did was done out of hate.”
“How could a father hate his daughter?”
I shook my head. I had asked myself the same question a thousand times, but had never come up with an answer.
“I don’t know,” I told him honestly. “All I know is it had something to do with my mother.”
He stroked my back soothingly with his big hand, setting off a contented rumble from deep within my chest. “What happened to your mother?”
“I don’t know that either. I don’t really remember her.”
“Is there a chance she might be alive?”
“No, I don’t think so. I have a vague memory of standing by a grave when I was very little. I’m pretty sure it was hers.” I didn’t tell Sam that the images in my head of that day were of a hole my father had dug in the woods himself, not in any consecrated ground. Instead of a marble headstone, the only marker had been the pile of leaves, twigs, and pine cones I had gathered and piled upon the loose dirt.
“After he took you away,” he said quietly, “we tried to find you, but it was as if Jack and Chloe Lewis never existed.”
“That’s because we didn’t, not really. He changed our last name every time we moved. That made it harder for anyone to track him down, I guess. When we moved on, it was usually for a reason.”
“Do you even know your real name?”
“No,” I admitted, lowering my gaze.
