Page 18

18

GROWING PAINS

FULTON

S omething tickles the side of my cheek—a sheet-stripping kind of heat concentrated near the curve of my body. Peeling one eye open, I glance at the small figure curled into a ball next to me, and my belly fizzles with early-morning butterflies. Shiloh’s soft, silky hair is strewn over my bare chest, and the part of her mouth that’s visible from her position leaks with the tiniest bit of drool.

I haven’t slept this well since I accidentally consumed one-third of a melatonin bottle after mistaking them for fruit gummies. And her touch… her touch is the most comforting thing I’ve felt in a long time .

I know it’s creepy to stare at people while they sleep, but I can’t help it. I never thought this day would ever come. Shiloh Nguyen is sleeping next to me, and my heart feels like it’s about to burst out of my chest. This girl means everything to me, and no matter how many times I tell her, she’ll never know the true extent of it. If I passed away tomorrow in a freak accident by slipping on shower water and cracking my head open on the side of the bathroom counter, I’d die a happy man knowing I got to hold her in my arms .

She shifts a little and rolls around in the welter of covers—which subsequently sends some of her hair flying into my mouth—but I’m not about to wake her up.

Last night was unbelievable. I’m still not entirely convinced it was real. For the first time in my entire life, I felt wanted . Wanted for who I was, not for my connections or my fame or my fortune. It’s going to sound stupidly sappy, but everything was perfect. Our bodies just knew they were made for each other. All the anxiety and the awkwardness that had been leeched to my side just… disappeared . I could be myself around Shiloh. She created a space where I felt safe enough to trust her with my heart, my soul, my body . And for that, I’ll forever be grateful.

With an adorable noise and a stir, Shiloh awakens from the throes of sleep, blinking sluggishly before realizing that she’s left behind a pool of saliva on my chest. “Oh, God. I’m sorry,” she murmurs underneath her breath, hastily wiping up the drool with the heel of her palm.

I don’t say anything—and no, it’s not because I’m still half-asleep. I feel a smile dance across my lips at the blush sprawling over her cheeks like a California sunrise, her weighted touch fanning the flames of adoration licking up my sternum.

“Don’t apologize,” I tell her.

She opens her mouth to say something, then her nose scrunches and she holds her hand up for a quick breath test. “Oh, wow. That’s…rank. Let me brush my teeth.”

My hockey reflexes come in clutch because I grab her arm before she can beeline for the bathroom. Without so much as a word, I nudge my nose against hers, lightly brushing our lips together to show her how insignificant a little morning breath is. She smells fantastic, like she always does.

When she doesn’t pull back from me, I inch a bit closer, and she tentatively lowers her guard enough for me to go in with a full-fledged kiss. It bolsters my over-the-speed-limit pulse, and the fact that I’m raw dogging the covers right now isn’t going to bode well for the state of my—thankfully still flaccid—dick.

“I don’t care what you do, Sunshine. Just please don’t get out of this bed,” I beg, wrapping her naked, lithe frame in my arms and hugging her close to my chest.

Shiloh squeals as I practically smother her with my body heat, but she melts like caramel on a hot summer’s day into my embrace, burrowing her backside against my crotch. I bite back the moan that lingers on the cusp of my lips, and my brain ferrets through the memories from last night—the way she screamed my name loud enough for the whole hotel to hear, the way her sweet, silken walls pulsed around my cock.

Humor sweetens her tone. “Are we going for round two?”

Even though I love that idea, the only thing I need right now is to hold her. “Actually, I was hoping you’d let me hold you for a while.”

A brief silence follows, and then she turns around in my arms to face me, her tenebrous eyes shimmering with something I can’t name—a happiness so profound that it’s mired in an equal amount of sadness, like she’s not used to being the sole inhabitant of someone’s heart.

“Fulton Cazzarelli, you’re such a hopeless romantic,” she whispers, and I don’t miss the shaky strum of her vocal cords.

I thumb the vibrant apple of her cheek, still coming to terms with the fact that this girl is real—that she’s made of flesh and bone, and that she’s spending her precious time with someone as undeserving as me.

“Shiloh Nguyen, you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Anyone who wouldn’t be hopelessly mesmerized by you is an idiot.”

Her lips gape, her gaze rivets, and her chest rises and falls at a quickened pace. There’s moisture in her eyes when she looks at me—moisture that forewarns the first integral crack of the dam inside her.

“Nobody’s ever understood me like you do.”

The pad of my thumb catches a wayward tear, halting its well-trodden path down her face. I never knew someone could look so beautiful crying.

“I see you, Shi. I have ever since that Tuesday in January four years ago. You’re impossible to miss.”

She snorts. “It’s very possible to miss me.”

It’s mind-boggling that she can’t see how incredible she is. “It’s not. And let me show you just how wrong you are.”

With a shuffle of the covers, I position myself above her, watching as she scoots fully onto her back and glances up at me with the most irresistible bedroom eyes in existence. When she bites her bottom lip, a stab of lust cleaves through me, gutting me from head to belly and redirecting my attention to the vulnerable pulse point of her throat.

I lower my head to the delicate arch of her neck, sucking on the thin skin with voracious lips and a possessiveness that I’m starting to think is a two-in-one with her. The muscles in my biceps tense to suspend my weight, and the ones in my back shift when I litter my new workplace with half bites and half kisses.

Shiloh groans, gouging her fingernails into my back while lifting her hips to meet mine, my cock growing harder against the soft swell of her stomach. I tried to refrain from giving her hickeys last night—to cushion the blow of the truth when my teammates find out I lost my V-card—but any false chivalry I had then is long gone.

I lick a thick warning up the length of her throat. “I want your perfect breasts in my mouth, Shi. I want to suck your nipples between my teeth and leave my mark for everyone to see. Just say the words. Please say those sweet fucking words. ”

Spine arching, lungs heaving, she gives me the golden key to the goddamn kingdom. “Suck my tits, Fulton.”

Like a good boy, I do as I’m told, taking that pert bud into my mouth and hollowing my cheeks. If I thought Shiloh was loud last night, she’s already proven me wrong in the span of a second. And considering the sun’s barely up, I’m guessing that the whole floor can hear just how well I pleasure my woman.

While my lips tease her nipple, I add my hand to the mix and give her boob a few squeezes, which promotes the faint sting in my back to a near-painful laceration courtesy of her nails.

Then a ringing sound splits the air, but I’m so preoccupied that I don’t pay any mind to it.

“Oh, Fulton,” she mewls, hooking her leg over my back and baring her mouthwatering pussy to me.

There’s a second heartbeat in my skull. I can’t think straight. I’m so turned on that it’ll only take me two minutes to drench her stomach in cum—and those are rookie numbers, alright?

I pop off her breast. “You gonna give me an orgasm this morning, Sunshine? I mean, I was planning on having breakfast in bed, but this isn’t what I had in mind. Though I’m sooo fucking good with it.”

“If you’re lucky,” she taunts, bending my head back down to my favorite meal in the entire world.

That obnoxious ringing continues, and judging by the twist of her torso, it’s just stolen her attention away from me. Therefore, I hate it, whatever it is—an alarm, an amber alert, next door’s room service. She screeches, sits up, then throws me off with an alarming amount of strength.

When I gather my bearings, she’s holding her phone. “Shit, shit, shit. It’s the bank.”

The bank? Why would the bank be calling her?

I’m terrible at hiding the growl that rumbles through my chest. “Don’t answer it. ”

“It might be important.”

She quickly jumps to her feet, yanks the sheets off the bed so she can fashion a makeshift toga to cover her body, and mouths an apology to me before disappearing into the bathroom. The door slams shut loudly, and even though most of the walls here seem to be wafer-thin, her hushed tone doesn’t make it easy to eavesdrop. I know it’s morally wrong, okay? But I need to know that everything is alright.

So, I lie on my back in a starfish position with nothing to cover my aching dick, and I stare up at the ceiling like a complete idiot. The conversation must be tense given how long Shiloh’s on the phone, and with what little I can hear, the nature of the call is serious. Muffled shouts, frantic pacing.

“But I don’t understand. I was really counting on this,” she mumbles.

My gut clenches, and bile surges up my throat when I try to swallow.

What is she talking about? Does this have to do with work?

Then, like the firing of a gun in a remote forest, pealing through the silence and the pine trees and the rustle of a thousand wings, the talking stops. The pacing stops. Everything is unnervingly still, so much so that I don’t even want to risk moving. I wait a few beats to see if she emerges, but she never does.

I know I’ll probably have my genitals mutilated if I open that door, but I don’t care. I need to see her. I need to understand what’s going on.

Moving at the speed of light, I pull my boxers on and tread carefully, easing the partition open only to find Shiloh sitting on the closed toilet, her head in her hands and tiny sniffles pouring from her small frame.

“Hey, hey. Shi, hey.” I rush to her side and squat in between her legs, running my hand up and down her thigh—whether it’s to console me or her, I don’t know. “Talk to me. I’m right here.”

Trembles unmoor her veneer of steadiness, the permanence of a frown reshaping her mouth. The cry that spills from her isn’t the same as the one I heard minutes ago. This one is guttural, dredged from deep within her soul, and it sounds like the wail of a wounded animal begging to be put out of its misery. I never knew I could feel something so viscerally. Seeing her like this makes me sick to my stomach.

When she eventually drops her arms, her eyes are overrun with burst capillaries, and tears stain her beautiful face—ones I wasn’t there to brush away. They soak into her now-pale skin, and no matter how quickly I try to catch them, they reappear at double the speed and quantity.

“The bank denied my family’s business for a loan.”

“What loan?”

“M-my parents. They used up all their savings and nest egg to pay for my college degree. Now the shop is having a hard t-time. We only have a couple of months left to pay rent and make payroll, or we’ll…we’ll go out of business.”

Oh my God. The signs were all there, especially after our heart to heart that night. Why wasn’t she honest with me from the beginning? I can’t imagine how much stress she’s under right now, and I fucking proposed that she go on a vacation.

“Oh, Sunshine,” I coo sympathetically.

Shiloh’s unbreakable focus remains on the bathroom tiles, and the purple bags underscoring her eyes stand out starker than before. It’s like I’m finally seeing what’s behind her fortified defenses—the other half of her that she’s hidden out of shame.

“It’s my fault. All of this is my fault. My parents gave up everything to get me through college, and now I can’t even save our business.”

Each sob has a fumbling dismount off her tongue, echoing off the walls in shrill droves. I don’t know how to comfort her. I don’t know what I could possibly say to make this situation better.

I’m surprised when I even manage to form a facsimile of some commiserative response. “It isn’t your fault. You know that, right? You’ve done everything in your power to keep your family’s business afloat.”

When she finally raises her head, her gaze is as sharp as a rifle’s scope, an imaginary red dot aimed right between my brows with every intention of taking the kill. “No, Fulton. Doing everything in my power to keep my family’s business afloat would mean that I stayed with them in Riverside instead of running away with you to fucking Cabo,” she hisses.

Ouch.

My knee-jerk response is to say something stupid along the lines of “You don’t mean that,” but I know that wouldn’t be productive in mending the situation. She’s already upset. It doesn’t matter what I feel right now.

“Let me help. Let me cover the expenses,” I blurt out, hope a timid thing that keeps evading my desperate clutches, slipping through my fingers each time I overextend myself to try and reach it.

She flinches away from me, rising to a stance so she can limit physical contact with me as much as possible, and I think it would’ve hurt more if she’d just outright slapped me. “I’m not some charity case,” she growls.

“I know. Fuck, I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant?—”

While the tears still bubble in her eyes, the drizzle is lighter now, and they snake down her features like rain droplets filling shoe-carved gulleys in sodden concrete.

“I don’t want your money. This is my problem, and I have to figure it out on my own. The last time I accepted help, my parents lost all their savings because I wanted a stupid business degree. ”

I watch as Shiloh storms out of the bathroom to ditch the sheets, and I stumble upon her angrily rifling through her clothes, messing up the very organized system that she’s been so diligent about keeping.

I’m not above begging her to let me help. I’m not above falling to my goddamn knees and begging her not to shut me out. I won’t survive if she pushes me away. I’m trying my best to weed out the more incriminating responses, but I’m afraid that whatever I say, she’ll find some way to twist my words.

The current’s becoming too tumultuous. She won’t survive if she doesn’t hang on to me. I can’t let her drown. I won’t.

“You don’t have to carry this all by yourself. I care about you, Shiloh. If I can do something to help you and your family, I want to. Nobody’s going to think any less of you for asking for help.”

“But I don’t need your help! I don’t want some magical fix to this, because that’s not how life works, okay? Not all of us make seven figures a year.”

She’s just lashing out. She doesn’t mean any of this…right?

When I speak, my voice cracks under an invisible pressure, and a miasma burns in my sinuses. “Shiloh, please. Money doesn’t mean anything to me. I need to know you’re taken care of. I need to know that your family is taken care of. Let me help, just this once.”

“No, Fulton. I’ll never be like those girls who take advantage of you for your generosity.”

“You’re not like them. Not even close. Stop being prideful. Why won’t you just accept that there’s someone in this world who wants to genuinely help you?”

“What is it, huh? Do you think I’m not capable of earning my own money? Do you get off on pretending to play knight in shining armor with your bottomless bank vault? Do you pity me? The sad, pathetic girl who still works at a coffee shop when she’s in her mid-twenties?” she snaps, wadding up one of her nighttime T-shirts and throwing it at me.

The ball unfurls against my chest, but it’s her words that leave a lasting mark on my body—a gnarly, infected wound that’s all putrefied tissue and blackened skin. Moisture laves at my burning eyes as phosphenes begin to whirl in my vision like snowflakes in a snow globe.

“That’s not what I think at all, and you’re putting words in my mouth. Why are you punishing me for wanting to help you? Would you rather me just sit here and do nothing?”

I can’t believe this. Why is she making me out to be the bad guy? I didn’t force her to come on this trip with me.

Shiloh shimmies into a pair of sweatpants and aggressively yanks her head through the hole of an oversized hoodie. I can’t believe I’m even thinking about her outfit preference at a time like this, but if she goes outside, she’s going to overheat.

“We’re not together. It’s not your job to do something!”

That’s right—we’re not… together . I’m the idiot who’s been playing make believe this entire time. We barely know each other. I thought I knew her. Did I seriously think four years of small talk would lead to a flawless happily ever after? Maybe this is the reality check I needed.

Fuck. FUCK!

She has my heart in a firm grip, and she’s just crushed it like it was nothing more than rotting fruit, the juices of my labor dripping through her sharp, gnarled fingers.

“That’s not fair. You’re pushing me aside like I don’t even matter.”

I don’t have any fight left in me. It’s obvious now that she’s not going to listen to anything I say. I want to implore her to stay. I want to figure out a solution where she doesn’t feel indebted to me. I want to work something out, but she just wants to run away.

Though I shouldn’t be surprised, should I? Maybe running is always going to be Shiloh’s way out—out of her obligations, out of our relationship.

“My ex asked me for more than I could give. This is all I can give right now.”

“I’ll take it, Sunshine. Whatever you’re willing to offer.”

Shiloh sucks in a shaky breath, blinks away the residual tears encrusted on her lashes, and stumbles over to the door. “I…I need some time alone,” she says quietly, but even at the near-inaudible volume, her words howl in my eardrums with enough force to blow them out completely.

My lips part around a counterargument, but she beats me to the chase, one hand wrapped around the doorframe in a show of finality. “Please, Fulton…please don’t follow me.”

“You’re walking out. Just like everyone does,” I whisper.

She doesn’t respond, but she doesn’t need to—her silence is loud enough.

And when she leaves, slamming the door behind her, I get this sinking suspicion that I’ll always be the second choice, no matter how much I beg to be the first.