Page 6 of Caught By the Chief of Staff
Slowly, at first, he tips his hips back and slides almost all the way out of me before plunging back inside in one long, sure movement. His hand flexes on my thigh as he slides out and back in. I’m lost to him. I’m lost to the slick push and pull of our bodies, to the biting grip of his hand on my thigh where he holds me just a little too tightly. I’m lost to it all.
He holds me tighter as he pumps harder, faster. I can’t catch my breath. There are no words spoken between us, and there don’t need to be. Everything to be said between us right now is in the physical. Back in the day, Rick would worship my body with his, and I knew exactly how he felt without words.
His mouth hovers over mine—it’s almost a kiss but not—as he moves faster and faster, his hips erratically meeting mine. And then he plunges in one more time, and I tip my head back as I fall over the edge. Rick thrusts once… twice… and then he growls as he finds his own release.
I hold him tight in my arms as he holds still, rooted deep inside me. I think this is it; maybe everything happened just the way it was supposed to. Maybe, after everything, Rick and I have finally found our way back to each other by chance and we’re going to be okay. Maybe I can trust him with the truth once and for all.
“Why?” he asks softly. When I don’t answer him right away, he hits the front door with the flat of his hand. “Why?”
“I can’t tell you,” I whisper.
“I just need one good reason why you would take everything from me,” he says, and the words sounds tortured, like they’ve been ripped from his chest. He pulls out and lets go of me faster than I was prepared for, and I stumble to keep my feet underneath me.
“Rick,” I plead as I take a step toward him. I can make him see reason; I have to make him understand.
“I loved you,” he says quietly as he tucks himself in his pants and zips them up. “I would have given you everything.”
“Rick, please.”
“But not anymore,” he growls before pointing to the stairs. “I’ll see to it that she has everything, but you will never have anything from me ever again.”
And then he skirted around me, slamming my front door behind him without a single backward glance. I flip the locks on the door before tumbling to the floor, where I hold my face in my hands and cry and cry. I cry for Rick and me, and I cry for Rachel and all the things that were taken from us all those years ago.
When the early-morning light starts to seep through the curtains, I pick myself up and slide my pajama shorts up my legs. I make my way up the stairs to my room and climb under the safety of the covers of my bed. But nothing feels like it will ever be safe again. I close my eyes, but I can’t find sleep. I do find an acceptance in the way things are, and will always be, because of the path I’ve chosen.
And then I let every hope I ever had shatter into a million pieces and drift off into the wind.