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Her head drops. “It’s really silly, just… Just another bad review about the lack of facilities… and a guest was yelling about bad signage. I know, it’s nothing…” But her breath hitches.
“Ah, Julie, come here.” I pull her into my embrace, and she comes willingly, melting against me.
“I just hate confrontation.” She sniffles.
“I know, people can be so insensitive.”
It feels good to have her in my arms, to push my own worries and needs aside and focus fully on another person. It’s what I’ve always done. It’s why these last months have been so hard.
I’ve been alone.
“There will always be bad people, Julie, but as long as you do whatever you can to be good, you’ll be fine.” I rub my hand up and down her back.
“I-I don’t feel fine right now.”
I cup her cheek and tilt her face up to me. “Maybe not, but you are going to be fine. And that guest who yelled at you, he’ll have a punctured tire on his way home. Karma’s a bitch.”
A laugh bursts out of her mouth. “Thank you, Jamie,” she whispers, her teary eyes heavy with gratitude.
My thumb skates over her cheek. Her gaze drops to my lips. I swallow hard. Before I have a chance to move away, she pushes up on her toes. Her lips meet mine.
No, no, no….
I want to pull away, but I know the rejection will crush her after the bad morning she’s had. So even though the voice at the back of my head is screaming for me to stop, I hold still. It’s a relief when her eyes – the same colour as her brother’s – flutter shut. Her lips move, opening…
I pull back.
“We better stop while we can,” I mumble and press a kiss to the top of her head, a little lie to make sure I don’t crush her feelings. I’m always in control sexually, I can stop any time I like. But Julie is flustered by the little kiss, her chest already rising and falling rapidly.
“O-okay,” she stutters.
“I need to shower before Adam gets tired of watching TV.”
6
Letting Go
Julie follows me out the front door.
“You’re going to be okay, Julie,” I promise.
I grab her hand, squeezing it gently. Some of the confidence is back in her smile.
Yet my smile drops as I turn and walk away, my chest filled with guilt. I hadn’t meant to kiss her – didn’t want to kiss her. I’ve broken the promise I made myself yesterday, that I would stay away from Trevor’s sister. Although I never intended for the kiss to happen.
“What the…!”
A big, callused hand grips my shirt and hauls me through the door of an outbuilding. The air in my lungs is knocked out of me as I’m pushed up against the wall. My shower bag drops to the ground.
“What the hell are you at?” Trevor’s blue eyes are dark, stormy, and the words are snarled. Dust is dancing in the air, lit up through cracks in the wall.
“Jesus Christ, Trevor! You scared the living daylights out of me.”
“What the hell were you doing in my house, with Julie?”
“I was… I… She’s letting Adam watch cartoons while I shower.”
His gaze flicks between my eyes, a slight hesitation before his next growled words. “Then why were you holding her hand like that?”
