Finders Keepers (23 page)

“Joze, I’m going.” Grabbing a boot, I started sliding my
foot into it before she flew across the room, grabbed it, and tossed it into
the corner.

“You’re not going anywhere.”

What I wouldn’t have given to have a heart made out of ice
so I wouldn’t have to feel the throbbing deep in my chest from the desperate
look on her face or the tears about to release from her eyes. I wanted to be a
shell of a man. I wanted to be the person I’d always let everyone assume I was.
I sprung up and threw my hands behind my head to keep from pulling her close.
“Fine, Joze. Fine. Give me one goddamned good reason why I shouldn’t go now.
Why I shouldn’t leave now instead of later because you know I’ve got to leave
someday. I can’t stay here and pretend you and me are going to live happily
ever after. So tell me, how much longer do you want to live this temporary
fairy tale? How much longer do you want to keep convincing yourself that you
want me for the rest of your life? Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t walk
out that door now.”

“Because I love you.” That time, her voice didn’t waver. In
fact, those might have been the strongest words I’d ever heard her say.

I collapsed on the bed, dropping my face into my hands. My
whole life I’d waited to hear those words from her, and their timing couldn’t
have been worse. “No, Josie, you can’t. Don’t love me. You get to choose who
you love, so please”—I grabbed her hands and kept my head bowed into
them—“please don’t waste it on me.”

“Don’t tell me who to love, Garth Black. And don’t you dare
tell me it’s a waste to give it to you.” Josie kneeled beside me. I knew she
was waiting for me to say something. Anything, probably, but other than
good-bye, there was nothing else to say. “I just told you I love you.”

“No.” I shook my head, keeping it buried in my hands.
“Please, Josie, just please stop.”

“I love you,” she repeated.

Those words hit me hard. Mostly because of the person saying
them, but also because they were the first time I’d ever heard them. The first
time those three words had been applied to me. Someone loved me. Not just
anyone—Josie loved me. Fuck. What I wouldn’t have done to be the man deserving
of that love. I would have given anything . . . but I had nothing to give. I
couldn’t produce a diamond when I was made of shit. “You don’t love me. You
can’t.”

“I can and I do.” She inhaled slowly. “Some part of me has
always loved you.”

Hearing the exact things I’d wanted to hear for so long,
moments before I was going to walk out that door and leave Josie behind, was
becoming physically painful. “When you and Jesse were together?”

“Yes. It might not have been the kind I feel for you now,
but I loved you.”

I shook my head into my hands. Yesterday, I would have
killed to hear the things she was saying, but right then, those words were
killing me. Because I had to leave.

“When you were mean to me when Jesse and I first got
together and you said some hurtful things, I loved you then. And when you dated
all of my friends, leaving a trail of broken hearts in your wake, avoiding me
like I was one exception to the who-meets-Garth-Black’s-belt-notch-standard, I
loved you then, too.”

All I could do was keep shaking my head. “And what about
when you did become one of the girls to crawl into bed with me? What about when
you woke up alone the next morning to not so much as a note or a good-bye? What
about the months I said horrible things to one of the people I cared about most
because I was taking out my anger on her? My anger at failing her, my anger at
ruining a good relationship she had with a good man, my anger for failing at
everything. What then, Joze?” I couldn’t holler the words like I needed to, and
somehow, their quietness was ten times more piercing.

“I wanted to hate you after that. I tried so damn hard it
hurt.” Josie paused. Maybe it was because she needed to wipe away a tear or
maybe she was simply at a loss, but I couldn’t look at her to find out. One
look and my resolve to leave would be gone. Josie had a way of upending my
whole world in one moment. “But even then, I still loved you. I realized that
if I couldn’t find some way to weed out the love I had for you after that, it
wouldn’t go away. Ever.”

“No, Joze . . .”

“Garth Black, I love you.” Josie slid onto my lap and
slowing pulled my hands from my face. Once she had, her eyes met mine. If I
hadn’t been about to break down already, I was then. “And I know you love me
too.”

“Josie—”

“It’s okay, you don’t have to tell me right now. I know it’s
hard for you . . . I know it’s hard hearing the words.” Lifting the hem of her
nightgown, Josie pulled it up and over her head. She wasn’t wearing anything
beneath it. “Just show me you do.
Show
me you love me, and we’ll work on
the telling part later.”

I wanted to squeeze my eyes shut. I wanted to pull my hands
away and lock them behind my back to keep them from sliding around her waist
like they were. I wanted to keep from looking into her eyes. But I couldn’t. I
was a strong, stubborn man save for one thing: Josie Gibson.

Pushing on my chest, Josie laid me down. Having her on top
of me, looking down at me with so much love in her eyes it practically
suffocated me, I almost slipped. I almost said it. Those three words I’d been
choking back for years. And years. And years. I almost said those words, but I
didn’t. I knew if I did, good-bye would be impossible. If I ever let Josie know
how I truly felt about her, she wouldn’t let me go. I wouldn’t let myself go.

Her eyes explored me, inspecting each bruise and bandage,
before she leaned over and kissed each and every one. Her hair skimmed my
chest, creating goose bumps. When her kisses moved from my chest down my
stomach, I stopped breathing altogether. When Josie’s mouth had touched every
hurt on my body, her mouth moved a bit lower.

“Josie,” I sighed in a strained voice, tangling my fingers
through her hair.

I felt her smile curve into position before her tongue
pressed into the spot just above my button fly. The willpower it took to keep
from throwing her on her back and slamming inside of her two seconds later was
the kind of thing men only knew of in legends. Stories told around a campfire
about a man who was able to lay still and resist the woman of his fucking
dreams naked and straddling him as her tongue explored the skin a whole inch
north of his hard dick.

My hands slid down her waist until they had a firm hold of
her backside, and when my fingers moved a bit lower, it was painfully obvious
she was as ready for me as I was for her. And still, the legendary willpower
stood. My idea of restraint had always been slowing down enough to roll on a
condom, and there I was, still half dressed and promising myself I’d stay that
way.

When Josie’s mouth had made the return journey, her face
lifted above mine. Her smile and playful eyes were back. “Sorry, I missed a few
spots.” Slowly, she kissed every bruise and gash on my face as she had my body.
The only part she missed was my lips. When her lips slid from my jaw to my
mouth, they paused. “I love you, Garth.”

It was as painful as it was overwhelming to hear those
words. “Josie, no. Don’t—”

“Too late,” she replied right before her mouth covered mine.

She kissed me until I’d forgotten why I needed to say
good-bye—I almost forgot my own damn name. She kissed me like she’d waited a
lifetime to do just that, and I kissed her back like I’d have a whole lifetime
to live without ever kissing her again. It was surreal in a way only a person
who’d loved another their whole life could understand. Josie and I kissed for
so long I almost forgot she was naked and ready above me.
Almost
. When
her lips skimmed past my jaw and down my neck, her fingers trailed down my
stomach until they tugged on my fly.

Oh, shit. I knew I needed to stop, I
knew
that . . .
I just couldn’t remember why. Once my fly was open, Josie’s hand gripped me,
moving steadily up and down until I was gasping. When my gasps turned into loud
moans, Josie’s mouth moved back to mine, silencing my cries of pleasure and
pain with her kisses. I might not have been able to remember why I needed her
to stop, but knowing I needed to stop it was enough. That made what should have
been pleasurable, painful and what was painful, pleasurable. It was a fucking
train wreck of pain and pleasure and touch that I never wanted to walk away
from.

As Josie’s hand moved faster, I had to grit my teeth and
move my hands from her ass or else I would come right then. If I was going to
come with Josie, it wouldn’t be in her hand.

In one seamless move, I had her on her back. I braced myself
over her, my hips locked so closely together with hers, one small movement would
put me inside of her. Exactly where I didn’t only want to spend the rest of the
night, but the rest of my life. All the possible conquests in my future didn’t
hold a candle to the way I felt being so close to Josie, knowing she loved me
and I fucking worshipped her.

Kissing her once more, I leaned back just enough to stare at
her. I wanted to look into her eyes, and I wanted her to look into mine. She
wasn’t drunk, she wasn’t with Jesse, and it wasn’t strictly a moment of
reckless abandon. I wanted to look into her eyes when I took her so I could see
exactly what it felt like to know she was making love to me just like I was
making love to her .

It would be a first, and one I knew I’d never forget.

Then, almost like a spotlight, a beam of moonlight broke through
the window and illuminated Josie’s face. Where the bruise taking up one whole
cheek was darkening. My stomach twisted right after it clenched. I remembered
what happened and
why
we couldn’t do it. Now. Or ever. I might not have
directly caused it, but Josie wore that bruise because of me. I moved to roll
off of her, but her legs wound around me and didn’t let me go.

“What? What is it?” she asked.

I closed my eyes so I didn’t have to see what my shit-poor
luck had done to Josie, but then I forced them open and made myself look so I’d
never forget. So if I ever got the tiniest inclination to throw myself back
into Josie’s life, I’d remember the image of her bruised face below me then.
“It’s just . . . what happened . . .” The skin between her eyebrows wrinkled. I
lifted my thumb to the wrinkle, trying to erase it. “Mason. I can’t stop
thinking about what—”

“Colt and me?” she interjected. “Is that what you’re worried
about? Colt and me and what happened between us?”

I took a moment to figure out what she meant. “Well, shit .
. . No, that wasn’t what I was thinking, but now I am.” I’d never asked Josie
about her and Colt’s relationship for two reasons. One, because it was none of
my goddamned business. And two, because I didn’t want to know a goddamned detail.
Even thinking about Colt Mason’s hands running down the same areas mine just
had or about his . . . inside of her . . . I punched the mattress beside her
head, trying to get the image out of my mind.

“Garth, stop. There’s no need to get all worked up.” Her
hands formed around my face, and she waited for my eyes to shift back to hers.

“No need to get worked up? Another man being with you . . .
Another man being . . . intimate with you . . . It’s a lot for me to process,
okay? Let’s just leave it at that and forget about it. Forget
forget
about
it.” Truly, if I never had to experience the image of Colt naked and braced
over Josie the way I was, that was just fine by me.

“There’s nothing to get worked up about and nothing to
forget”—she shook her head when I raised an eyebrow—“or forget
forget
because
nothing ever happened.”

I know I was one flex and slide away from being buried
inside of Josie, but I liked to think my brain didn’t strictly run off whatever
my dick was doing—or almost doing. But what had Josie just said? Surely she
couldn’t have meant . . . “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

“I don’t know. Are you asking me what I think you’re
asking?”

“Okay, I was confused before, but now I’m positively
dumbfounded.” I slid Josie’s hair back from her forehead and waited.

“Colt and I never . . .” Biting her lip, she shrugged.

“You and Colt never slept together?” Because I needed it
spelled out—especially when it came to the topic at hand.

Josie shook her head. “No.”

If my body hadn’t been beaten to a pulp earlier, I would
have attempted a back handspring. “Then who was the last guy you slept with?” I
skimmed through my memory banks. Other than Jesse and Colt, I couldn’t recall
Josie being with anyone else. I couldn’t remember her being with anyone but . .
. I arrived at my conclusion the instant before she replied.

“Well . . .
you
were.”

That had been two years ago. The last guy she’d been with
was me, and that was forever ago. I felt two emotions: pure and utter elation
that I was the last man inside Josie and . . . pity. “
I
was the last guy
you slept with? Damn, that sucks for you.” It certainly didn’t suck for me, but
it did for her. “At least the first guy you slept with was Jesse fucking
Walker. That has to even it out somewhat. Jesse, first. Me, last. Think you
could call it even and we cancel each other out?” Damn. I’d slept with so many
women over the course of two years I didn’t even want to consider tallying up
that number. Especially realizing Josie’s tally was a big fat zero.

“Jesse and I never slept together either.” Josie’s hands
stayed planted on my face, and her thumbs stroked my cheeks. It was a soothing
gesture, but I should have been soothing her. She hadn’t slept with Jesse, the
guy she’d been with for two years, the guy she’d started dating when a
teenager’s libido is in full force . . . Which meant . . .

“Fuck,” I muttered as my head became too heavy to hold up.
Even with her hands braced around it, the weight was too much. “Are you saying
I was your first? That that night was your”—I swallowed and hung my head
farther—“that was your first time?”