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“Yeah.” She sighed and focused hard on the screen. Why was she scared all of a sudden? Denying the sides of Justin’s nature she didn’t want to know about wouldn’t make them go away. “Only for a little while. Then we’ll have fun. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, after all. I hope you have something we can scrounge up to make a decent meal.”
Something special. Thanksgiving was a family holiday, and if she and Justin were standing in as each other’s, she wanted tonight and tomorrow to be about more than fighting and mistrust and bruises.
Her body warmed as she glanced at the simmering fire and remembered. Who was she kidding? She’d recall this day as much more than that. It was also about the hottest lovemaking she’d ever experienced. The closest connection she’d ever felt to another, even in the midst of something so wild and primal her brain had gone on hiatus.
“I usually do frozen pizza, but since you’re here, we’ll come up with something a little more appetizing.” He pressed his tongue against the pulse point just below her ear, provoking a fierce throbbing between her thighs.
God, she was primed for him. One touch, one look, and she was ready to throw away her misgivings.
“I’ll make mojitos and throw together some appetizers.” The idea of staring at Justin in firelight as they fed each other finger foods pleased her immeasurably. “Depending on what you have in the fridge and how long the store’s open. You’ll let me borrow your truck?”
“Not sure I trust you around my stick after last night.”
She reached back to grasp his dick playfully. “Keep that talk up and you and your stick will be awfully lonely tonight.”
He laughed and nibbled her neck. Every pull of his mouth made her nipples tingle. “Honey, it’s snowing like a bitch out there. Think you and I are inside for the duration.”
She twisted in his hold to peer out the narrow windows behind the couch. All she saw was white. And more white. “Guess you’re right. I hate driving in snow like this. Or even riding in it. I skidded once on the way to work and nearly wrapped my Miata around a damn tree.”
“We’ll figure out something to eat from what I’ve got.” He banded his arm under her breasts. The subtle pressure of his forearm tightened her nipples, and she heard the smile in his rumbled sigh of contentment. “Pretty sure we can occupy ourselves here.”
“Yeah.” She wet her lips and settled herself sideways on his lap. She chanced another look at his beautiful face, barely resisting the urge to kiss his battered eye. He didn’t want her fluttering. He’d made that abundantly clear earlier. “So what happened out there? Are you going to tell me?”
When he didn’t speak, she forced her heartbeat to slow. Last thing she wanted was for him to think she was going to wig and get all female on him. “I won’t ask a lot of questions, promise. Besides, I came clean about what happened with me.”
“Tit for tat?”
“Something like that.” She glanced at the TV, absorbing the long lists of scores rolling across the screen without comprehension.
His legs tensed beneath her, and he let out a long breath. “I told you a bit about my stepdad. How he was a traveling salesman and spent a lot of time on the road.”
“Yeah, like my dad with his trucking. Sort of.”
“No, not like your dad. He didn’t just act indifferent to his family and send gifts home to make up for long absences. When Frank came back from the road, my mother got the benefit of his fists, not the trinkets he picked up in truck stops.”
She didn’t respond. No words came, and from the faraway look in his eyes, she doubted he’d hear them anyway. Especially since he clearly hadn’t finished his story.
“I was a toddler when he moved in with us. My own dad had never been part of my life, and my mom was so grateful Frank wanted to adopt me. For the first few years, if his abuse went beyond threats and insults, I didn’t see it. Or I didn’t want to see it.”
Her stomach cramped with the knowledge of what he would say next. “You were just a little boy.”
“Yeah, but I knew. I knew one day he wouldn’t stop with calling her a bitch or a tramp. Then when it happened, when I found her in the fetal position on the kitchen floor, she wouldn’t let me get help. I wasn’t allowed to call the damn police and get the fucker out of our house.”
“How old were you?”
“Seven.” As if he was reining himself in, he lifted his hand and gently cupped her cheek. The tenderness in that single touch made her eyes fill with tears.
“How badly was she hurt?” She fought to keep the emotion from her voice.
“Bruises mostly, a fractured rib. Cut lip. She just cleaned up the blood, had me help her wrap bandages around her torso.” His tone turned brittle. “Then she put on her best dress and waited on the living room couch, because it was their anniversary, and he’d promised to take her to dinner at Sloane’s Steakhouse.”
She covered the hand he’d dropped to the couch with her own. “You understand she was a battered woman. The decisions she made in that state don’t reflect on her as a person. She’d been victimized.”
“I heard all the labels.” His fingers lightly squeezed hers. “The psychologist she took me to when I started acting out in school even gave me a workbook. I colored all these pictures of perfect little saltbox houses with picket fences and happy parents and kids. I was supposed to pretend I really believed a broken home could be ‘healed.’” His disgust was palpable. “It’s BS, Kylie. He never changed. Oh, sure, he went to counseling, and he never hit her again. That I saw, anyway. His rage went into hiding. But it was still there. She wasn’t the only one who lived in fear of it coming back.”
A long moment passed before she could speak. “Are they still together?”
Is that why you spend Thanksgivings alone?
