Underwater (18 page)

She reached for the guitar and placed it on her thigh, arranging it until she felt comfortable. She touched the strings ever so slightly, creating a slow simple tempo. Then, gently, she started to increase the pace.

I recognized the song immediately.
Right Here
by
Ashes Remain. When she sang in her haunting voice about healing and staying until the morning, I came undone. She had no idea how much her song choice meant to me.

She was everything I wished for.

When the final notes echoed in the air, the message she had for me was loud and clear…she was right here for me. And I couldn’t be more blessed. I knew she was the kind of woman who would stay by my side and face everything head on. My answer to her song – the only thing that my mind was screaming for me to do – was to kiss her.

So I did.

I pulled the guitar off her lap, placed it on the floor, clasped her neck and slammed her lips against mine. I kissed her hard, loving her taste and softness. I cupped her cheeks, tilted her head up and deepened the kiss. When I kissed her, I felt like a man possessed. I wanted to kiss her deeply and thoroughly until I didn’t know where I ended and she began. I devoured her gasp into my mouth, my body a sea of flames.

I pulled back slightly and looked at her with hooded eyes. We both knew for a fact that from this moment on nothing would ever be the same between us. We’d crossed the friendship line and become so much more.

It would heal us, or destroy us.

Keeping my mouth close to hers I said, “I’m right here too… I’ll take care of you.” I gave her a peck on the lips. “I won’t let anything hurt you.” Another peck. “And I will always be your shelter.” One more peck. “Please, remember that.”

“I will,” she breathed out.

“Tiny, I know we’re over this stage in our lives, but I...” I trailed off, suddenly feeling nervous. “I’ve never…”

“You’ve never what?”

Gazing into her eyes, I asked a question I’d never asked before in my life, “Would you be my girlfriend?”

T
o say I was shocked, wouldn’t even begin to cover a shred of what I was feeling. I couldn’t do anything but stare at him.
Would you be my girlfriend?

“Please say something,” he whispered softly.

“What did you mean when you said you’ve never...”

His cheeks flushed while his eyes looked down. Dorian cleared his throat, shook his head, and looked at me sheepishly. “I told you I haven’t touched a woman in over a decade, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well…you also know I can’t touch people freely,” he said while his hand captured mine, lacing our fingers together. The action was so contradictory to the words he’d just uttered, it made me smile. Looking at our clasped hands with a pensive look, he murmured, “You are the first woman I’ve touched in a long time.”

I shivered as his words penetrated my skin, floated inside my body and straight into my heart. He stroked the back of my hand with his thumb, creating little circles while he caressed my skin slowly.

“Didn’t you have... needs?” I was sure I blushed like a tomato.

He laughed. “I’m a guy, Tiny. Yes, I had needs. But no matter what my body thought I needed, my mind knew I couldn’t. The smallest touch made me lose my shit. How could I even attempt to be intimate with someone?”

“And before?” I got why he kept to himself after what happened to him, but before that?

“About a year before I enlisted, my head was busy with training and preparing for boot camp. I never had a girlfriend and girls weren’t on my radar. Yeah, I dated for short periods of time. It was never for long though. During my deployment, I was mostly isolated in Godforsaken places. During vacations, I spent all my time being with my family. My dad…” He closed his eyes while his voice shook. “He got ill when I was deployed.”

“I’m so sorry about your dad, Dorian. I didn’t know.”

His eyes opened. “Yeah.”

“What happened?” I asked softly.

The lines between his eyebrows became more prominent. He looked at me and the hand that still held mine, tugged me to him, until half of my body was sprawled against his. I lifted my head and looked at him with questioning eyes.

He settled his hands on my waist and pulled me up, until I was sitting on his lap. Without missing a beat, his strong arms enveloped me with their warmth, embracing me closer to his heart. He rested his chin on the crown of my head, and every few seconds, tightened his grip, as if he needed to confirm to himself that I was really here, in his arms.

“They didn’t tell me he was sick,” he started, his voice low. “They were afraid it would distract me.” He laughed in a hollow voice. “Make me lose my focus and cause me to get killed. What a fucking joke,” he spat. “When I found out, I went ballistic. I wanted to quit – leave my team behind and go home – but my dad talked me out of it. So I stayed. On my military leaves, I took care of him and the family as much as I could.”

I rested my cheek his chest, close to his heart. His hands pulled me closer.

“He died. And I wasn’t there. I wasn’t even at his funeral. The fucking cancer took him away, and I wasn’t there.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” I said with conviction. “You had no choice. You were a soldier in the war. It’s not your fault.”

“I know that now,” he said, sounding defeated. “But it still doesn’t stop the guilt from eating me up.”

I leaned back, and looked him in the eyes. With my forefinger, I traced the curve of his scars. “Who did this to you?” I whispered.

“A fucking monster.” His voice was so full of venom that I recoiled back. Then he cupped my face, his touch so soft, as if he was afraid he would break me. “I need you like I never needed anyone in my life and it scares the fuck out of me,” he said. “But I don’t give a damn anymore.” He shook his head. “You are my weakness, and I’ve never let myself have a weakness.” His lips whispered a butterfly kiss across my lips. One, two, three times. “So please,” he murmured. “Don’t leave tonight.” His tongue caressed my lips. “Stay.”

“Okay,” I murmured back.

He tilted my head up, forcing me to look up at him. “What are you thinking about, pretty girl?”

“That we have so much in common,” I answered truthfully.

He smiled that smile again, the smile that made him look so attractive, so sexy, that all I could think about was attacking him with kisses.

“Tell me about your family,” he said quietly.

“When we found out that my dad had cancer… God…” I shook my head. “I thought my world ended. I was with him when the doctor told us. At first, I thought he was joking.” I laughed bitterly, remembering those first few seconds when I thought everything was only a bad joke. “But soon, I realized he wasn’t joking at all. When we got home, I was the one who had to tell my mother that her husband might be terminally ill. All the way back, I thought and pondered how to tell her the news. I didn’t expect the expressionless eyes. The silence. The denial. From there on, everything started to fall apart.”

His thumbs caressed my cheeks while he looked at me with sad eyes.

“She used to be so happy, Dorian, and full of life,” I continued. I wanted to let it out, get rid of the huge weight that held me down. “But now?” I shook my head. “It’s like she’s been extinguished.”

“What about your brother, Adam? Does he know what was going on?”

“Yeah,” I said faintly. “He found out in the worst kind of way. He was hiding behind a wall while my parents were fighting. When I got home that night, and found him eavesdropping, I lost it. I pulled him away to my room; we fought, we talked, we cried. The next day, I talked with both of my parents separately. Now, I’m hoping things will fall back into place, but I’m not holding my breath.”

“Hey, don’t say that.” He tucked a few wild strands of hair behind my ears. I closed my eyes, feeling the touch of his lips against mine. When he pulled back, I opened my eyes. “You’re not alone anymore, sweetheart.”

“Thank you.” Emotionally drained from all the deep conversation, I changed the subject. “I still can’t wrap my head over the fact you never had a girlfriend.”

He laughed and leaned closer, rubbing his nose against mine. “Well,” he breathed, “I’ve never had a special someone I wanted to make mine. So I never did.”

“That’s what you want?” I asked quietly. “To make me yours?”

“It’s only fair, Tiny.”

Tiny…
for some reason, I liked his nickname for me. “Why?”

“Because I’m already yours.”

I sucked in a breath, and if it was possible my heart beat faster.

“Say that you’re mine, that you’ll be my girlfriend.” Brushing his lips against my ear, he demanded, “Say it.”

I took a deep breath and said the words he so needed to hear. “I’m yours.”

He slammed his lips against mine. His tongue caressed my lips, demanding entrance, and I gave into him without a second thought. My heart already accepted the fact he owned me. Now, my head needed to catch up.

“I will soothe you and heal you,

I will bring you roses.

I too have been covered with thorns.”

—
Rumi

I
floated in the endless sea, drifting away toward the unknown.

The water temperature was frigid, biting me with its coldness. Chills passed through my body and my teeth chattered. Black shadows were all around, closing in on me. I felt as though I was being pulled down to the bottom of the abyss and just when I was fully submerged into the murky depths, warm hands reached for me and pulled me up.

I opened my eyes slowly and blinked away the fatigue, my vision hazy and blurry. Rays of sunlight broke through the window and it took me a few moments to figure out where I was.The dream had disarmed me. I didn’t understand its meaning. And while I wanted to understand it, I was also grateful for it because, for the first time I could remember, I was awoken by a
dream
– not a nightmare.

As my mind still reminisced and ran in frantic circles, I looked up and caught my breath. At first, I thought I was hallucinating, or maybe I was still sleeping and conjured her in my mind.

It couldn’t be
.

My heart began to beat faster while my insides trembled.