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Chapter Eighteen

Sarah

When I wake up in the morning, I know exactly where I am. Dallas’ bed, in Dallas’ arms. I want to cry. I’m not sure why. I feel small and delicate, nice. I kiss his wrist and then slip out of his arms. I have to get ready for work. He has to take me, but that’s just going to have to happen.

I sneak off to my room, and choose the dress that I’m going to wear today, then I slink back down the hall toward his room.

When I, he’s just sitting up, the covers fallen around his waist, his body…

Oh, his body. It’s so nice to just be able to look at him, openly.

It’s so amazing that I can. I’m not carrying this big weight on my shoulders anymore.

This thing I haven’t done. This thing I haven’t been able to get past. I did it.

With Dallas. Twice. It was amazing, and I loved every second of it.

I want to do it again as quickly as possible. But sadly, I have to get ready to go .

“Keep looking at me like that and there’s going to be trouble,” he says.

I smile. “Well, I like a little bit of trouble.”

“Don’t you have work?”

“I do,” I say piously, holding up my clothes. “I’m just going to take a shower. In your shower.”

That turns out to be not the best idea (except it’s an awesome idea) and Dallas joins me, and derails the whole thing.

I have every intention of taking him into my mouth and making him mine, swallowing him, but instead he drops to his knees, drapes my leg over his shoulder and eats me out until I am screaming.

My voice echoes off the walls, and I feel like I should be embarrassed.

Embarrassed that he is eating up every bit of evidence of my need for him, making me into his creature, but all I can do is enjoy it.

When he’s done, he licks his lips. “You are delicious,” he says.

I suddenly don’t care as much that there have been a lot of other women. Because he thinks I’m delicious. And he’s mine.

I’m a possessive, wild creature. Rabid, as I’ve always known. So, this doesn’t really surprise me. Because I was always like that with him. I wanted everyone to know that he was mine. That maybe he was nice to them, but he would never really be theirs. Not in the way that he belongs to me.

I guess I still cling to pieces of that. At least where he’s concerned.

I get my clothes on, and I find my dress laughably demure in the face of everything we’ve just done, and then I slip into the truck, buckling before Dallas gets in. He’s frowning at his phone. He grimaces, sending a text before getting into the driver’s side.

“What?” I ask.

“Oh, my dad was wondering if I could help with something over at my aunt Jamie’s ranch. They’re all going to do something with some of the horses there. But I need to pick you up. My mom said that she could do it…”

“That’s okay,” I say.

I’m trying to weigh whether or not that’s going to be embarrassing. She does know, after all, she must, considering we got caught on the camera last night. But there’s also something I want to talk to her about, and that would be a good time. An organic time.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” I say.

I’ve been staying with him for a minute now, and we’ve had a few dinners with his family. His stepmom is really nice. A quick drive back from the store with her will be totally fine.

“All right,” he says. “I’ll arrange it.”

When he pulls up to the curb, I almost get out immediately, but he grabs my arm and pulls me in for a kiss. I’m dizzy by the time we part. “Wait there,” he says.

He gets out of the truck, and rounds to my side, opening the door for me.

I have that same feeling that I’ve had a few times since he came back into my life.

Part of me wants him to stop. Because if we’re ever separated again, if ever we’re not like this, I’m going to miss it.

I would almost rather not know how nice someone can treat you.

I would almost rather not know that things could be like this.

It’s weird and sad, I grant, but I’m a little bit weird and sad.

But right now, I don’t have the capacity to tell them to stop. I just want to enjoy it. For a little bit, I want to enjoy feeling like I’m special to somebody. In every way.

He puts his hand on my lower back and walks me across the street to the store. “I’ll see you around dinnertime,” he says.

I nod. “Okay.”

Then I open up the door and step into the store. The air conditioning is welcome, as is Allison, who is standing behind the jewelry counter looking at me. “So, you two made up.”

“Oh,” I say. “Yeah.”

“I take it he was jealous.”

I smile, slow and wide. “Yeah,” I say.

I have a friend. That makes me giddy. I have a friend and I can tell her about this.

“I had sex with him,” I say. Then I realize that sounds weird. And I’m not sure people say it like that. “I hooked up with him?” I frowned, trying that instead.

“Oh,” she says.

“The Hobbit and chill?”

“Well, that’s… Nice.”

“I think it was nice. It was… I wouldn’t call it nice, actually,” I say. “It was more intense than that.”

“In my experience, sex is…” She scrunches her face up. “I don’t know. Fine?” She shakes her head. “I prefer the romance part.”

I’m suddenly intrigued, because clearly she has more experience in this than I do. Well, most people do.

“There hasn’t really been any romance.” But then I think about him wrapping me up like a burrito, and feeding me dinner. Putting on a movie that I love. Bringing me to bed with him. All of that felt pretty romantic. Oh God. I don’t love that. It scares me. I don’t think I want romance with him.

I did the thing that I wanted to do. I chose to have sex, I enjoyed it, I ripped the Band-Aid off.

And he’s Dallas, so it was special, and I can’t imagine being with anyone else, but that doesn’t mean that…

That doesn’t mean it’s romance. He’s my Dallas, and it is what it is, but it’s not…

He wants to get married someday. We’re too young.

And I don’t even know if I want to get married.

I really don’t know if I want to have kids.

I would almost say that I don’t. Pretty aggressively.

“Well, we’re not… I told you already, we have a very specific relationship. It’s trauma based.”

Allison’s forehead pleats. “That doesn’t mean that’s all there is to it.”

She’s not wrong. That isn’t all there is to us. It’s never been all there is.

“I know,” I say. But I don’t know what else there can be, and eventually, I have to have an actual life and not live off of him. Not be fully codependent.”

“Didn’t you spend ten years away from him?”

“Yes.” But I was never as happy.

Is that just loving somebody? Is that actually okay? I don’t know the answer to that.

“I think I want to stay here,” I say. Which is the first time I say that, and maybe Allison is the person I should say it to. Except she’s my friend. I really want her to be my friend. “I like it here. I like… You, and him and… His family.”

I’ve never loved a place this much. I’ve never loved people this much. But I’m so very aware that Dallas is my connection, and if I fuck it up in some way then… I’m not going to have anything .

I’ve had him ripped away for me before. I’ve had the only source of stability I’ve ever had ripped away from me. And just when I thought I was settling in – I wouldn’t say I was filled with joy or anything, but I was settling in – in Sisters, Chris appeared and…

I’m spiraling a little bit now. Which is understandable considering I just had mind-blowing sex, and things felt good for a minute. I really don’t know how to let things feel good. In fairness to me, life has a pattern of being kind of a bitch.

It likes to punch me in the face when I feel like everything’s going to be fine.

“Was it the best you’ve ever had?” Allison asks.

“It’s the only one I’ve ever had,” I say.

She looks at me, wide-eyed. “Really?”

“Yeah, I… Again, it’s the trauma of it all.”

“Oh,” she says. “I thought I should just get sex over with, kind of like ripping off a Band-Aid. Because I… I just used to have a stupid crush on someone I can’t be with.

And I figured if I could demystify the physical act then it wouldn’t be that big of a deal.

And I did. It was really good for me, because now I know that it’s not going to change my life to have a certain man in bed, you know? ”

I don’t know. Because my life is changed. I feel sad for her. Sorry. Also, I’m not stupid, and I’m pretty aware that she’s talking about Colt which…

I get why it’s impossible. And I get why she doesn’t want to admit it.

“I was going to do that,” I say. “Rip the Band-Aid off, I mean.”

“With Colt,” she says.

So we’re both thinking about him. That makes me feel pretty solid in my assessment on her feelings for him .

“Yeah. With him. But honestly, that just seemed like it wasn’t fair. I didn’t really want to. Also, I actually think he’s a really nice guy, and I didn’t want to use him.”

“I don’t think he would’ve minded being used for that purpose. Believe me when I tell you, Colt Campbell is for the streets.”

“Well. Yeah. I won’t doubt your judgment on that, considering that you’ve known them a lot longer than I have. But you should… You shouldn’t sleep with people that you don’t actually want.”

She smiles. “It’s not like I’m sleeping with everybody . But I like relationships. They’re nice. I haven’t been in one for a bit. School is keeping me too busy.”

“I’m here to tell you that window-shattering sex does exist.”

She scrunches up her face and frowns. “I don’t know that I like that information.”

I blink. “Why not? I’m telling you that orgasms exist that can make the sky break open and rain down upon you, and you’re mad about this?”

“I already told you I…”

Right. She wants to minimize it. It makes her feel more comfortable. I worry for her then, that her person might be Colt. Might be the one person that she’s not going to allow herself to have.

“The person… Why can’t you be with him?”