AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He’s studying me with an intensity and his eyes move towards the stone
in my hand. His eyes narrow imperceptibly and then he’s moving towards me, slowly.
I stare up at him, blankly, nothing coming to my mind. I have no idea what to say.
He reaches out, carefully and plucks the stone from my hand, his words deliberate, “That belongs to me.”
I don’t say anything, and he sits down next to me, silently, waiting for me to find the words.
At some point, I do, my eyes on his legs, not brave enough to face him. “Why did you keep it all these years? It’s just a stupid stone.”
Caleb-Harry rolls the stone in his hands, his voice so very gentle, “It was the first gift I ever got. And you were so proud of it when you handed it to me. Do you remember what I did after you gave it to me?”
My voice is a mere whisper, hollow as I answer, “You bandaged my hands.”
A low chuckle that holds an emotion that I’m too lost to understand.
“Your little hands were nicked and bleeding. You’d been working on it for weeks.”
I don’t reply, the memory as clear as today in my mind, the hesitance in his eyes, the strange look in them as he stared at the stone, the careful manner in which he tended to my injured hands.
“You left me,” I say suddenly, helpless fury rising in me. “You left me and then you never came back! You were supposed to wait for me!” I strangle the choked sob in my throat.
Caleb’s hand tightens on the stone, and then I feel his other hand on my chin, lifting it, forcing me to meet his anguished gaze. “I went to prison for a crime I never committed. Three years, Kendall. You were all I thought about. And when I was released, the first place I visited was the home. But they wouldn’t tell me anything. My entire life was in tatters. I had to fix it before I went looking for you.”
I wrench his hand away from my face, pain forcing me to be unreasonable, the girl who had waited for letters, day after day, howling her misery, wanting him to see what it was like to have your heart crumble every day till there was nothing left but gnawing emptiness, a hollowness that nothing could fulfill. “You had all these years and now, you show up, and you don’t even tell me who you are! You expect me to buy that you were concerned about me or wanted to find me. What changed now?!”
His jaw is tight. “I saw you. I had given up hope by that time, but I was acquiring a firm and I saw you exit the building from the third floor. I tried to ask around about you but no one seemed to know, then I saw the man you had been talking to a few months later and I asked him and he said that you had been let go from the Flour Industries.”
There’s a look of frustration in his eyes, a glimpse of the boy I knew, inside. “I knew you were in the city. I knew you were jobless, hopefully, so I changed tactics. I took over a failing company, brought in a CEO to fix it, so that I could provide a position for you and create a job for you. In the meantime, I looked everywhere I could. Job agencies, phone books, every place I could think of. It was only by chance that I found your name in a stack of applicants and then I got the dice rolling.”
My chest tightens at the anger on his face, the helplessness, the devotion that he’s not even trying to hide. He grasps my hands and brings them to lie flat on his chest. “Kendall, everything I’ve built is for you. So that you will have everything that your heart could dream of, all the comforts at your fingertips.”
My head hurts and so does my heart, like someone has taken a knife to it and is shredding it slowly piece by piece. My voice shakes as I feel wetness trail down my cheek, and I mumble, “I just wanted you. I could have lived without all of this. I just – I just only ever wanted you.”
Caleb’s touch is tender and yet his eyes are blazing as he vows, “You have me. I’m never walking away from you again.”
I want to pull my hands away from where he’s now kissing them, and yet I can’t bring myself to do it. “I want to slap you,” I say, dazedly, overwhelmed by sensation, as he presses his lips to each fingertip in a way that has my brain clouding. “I want to hit you so bad. And I want to hurt you. I want you to feel an ounce of what I’ve felt over the last few years.”
Caleb makes a sound of agreement, his eyes dark, ravenous, and he presses a kiss to my wrist, and I let him.
“I want to show you what it’s like to feel like the person you loved just walked away, like you’re nothing.” My voice is low, my lips parting at the way he’s kissing his way down my arm in a way that’s both seductive and heady.
I’ve never felt like this before.
“I’ve carried a piece of you on me since the day we parted and I swore I’d find a way back to you, no matter how long it took,” he whispers against my skin.
In his eyes, I can see nothing but a reflection of myself. It’s as if he’s lost himself in me and I’m slowly, losing myself in him.
We are blurring together, and I can’t stop it.
This isn’t going the way I want it to, but I’m starved for his touch, for his presence, and out of nowhere, I want his hands all over me, consuming me. I want to give him a reason to never leave me again.
I’m still angry, upset over this deception, and I know there’s more to his story, but for now, everything is fading into the background and I’m craving Harry and Caleb, one and both, the man I loved and the man I’m falling in love with.
“Kendall…” His voice is thick with desire. “Fuck. Don’t—”
But my mouth is seeking out his, not caring about the way I fumble, inexperienced as I am. “I-I…” All I can think and see and hear is him. “I haven’t…” The words are torn from me as a few tears spill out, the grief of losing him and finding him too much to handle. “…Not with anyone.”
