Braveheart, a love story Read online

  And yes, I get that having eyes on these places—the Shelburne and Burlington galleries, in addition to the driveway, the front and side of the house, and the back of the barn—are important, I feel like Ashley’s and my privacy has been completely invaded, and I’m not crazy about that.

  Plus, he asked if I’d pick up some groceries for him, like some damn errand boy, and the amount of Mtn Dew, Cheetos, and Hostess CupCakes (orange, not chocolate) on the list has me raising my eyebrows.

  At the store, I purchase a few extra things for Ashley—a candle that smells like Christmas cookies and a romance book by Kristan Higgins. I pause in front of a shelf of condoms, staring at them for a second before grabbing a box and tossing it into the cart.

  As I wait in line, my eyes slip over to the aqua box several times, and I chide myself for being presumptuous and then for being hopeful. Yes, last night we slept together naked from the waist up, but that’s still a long way from having sex, isn’t it? Not to mention, Ashley folded pretty easily when Simmons suggested that she enter the Witness Security Program, dropping my hand at exactly the same time.

  I’m not going to lie. It stung a little.

  Because if Ashley needs to leave and hide somewhere, she’ll be lost to me forever, a fact she appeared to process and accept at the speed of light.

  I can’t leave with her—I have a twenty-year-old sister who has no one else, and besides, I’ve only known Ashley for a few weeks. Our relationship isn’t far enough along for me to consider following her, and yet my heart aches when I think about losing her. I lean down and pluck the little box out of the cart, about to jam it into the gum and candy rack beside me when I realize the cashier is speaking to me and probably has been for some time:

  “Sir? Sir! Are you ready?”

  “Uh, yeah,” I say, throwing the condoms on the conveyer belt and adding the other items from my cart.

  As the cashier rings me up, I recall Simmons asking me about my ability to protect Ashley and stay on task. How fucking embarrassing. Yes, he had a right to wonder, but outing me as inept in front of the woman I’m seeing? That didn’t feel so great. In fact, maybe that’s why she was in such a fucking rush to drop my hand. Maybe she didn’t want to be tangled up with a loser who can’t hold down a real job because he got “distracted.”

  I pay for my purchases and wheel the cartful of groceries to the truck, wondering how long we have until Răumann shows up at the farmhouse, and then I hate myself a little for hoping we get a few more days together. But the truth is, I’ve fallen hard for Ashley over the past couple of weeks, and I don’t want our time together to end.

  When I get home, I deliver Simmons’s bags to him in the barn, for which I’m rewarded with a curt “Thanks”—he’s still setting up monitors and getting himself situated in the space that used to be mine—and then I head over to the house with the rest.

  Ashley’s nowhere to be seen so I put the groceries away, then take out her little gifts—the candle and the book—and stand at the bottom of the stairs. Am I still welcome upstairs? Last night was incredibly intimate, of course, and I’d like to think that we can move freely around each other now. Besides, Simmons said that I was to stick to her “like glue.” But does she still want me after Simmons’s insinuations about why I lost my job?

  There’s only one way to find out.

  I start up the stairs.

  ***

  Ashley

  I hear footsteps on the stairs and sit up in bed, swiping at my eyes.

  While Julian’s been at the store, I’ve been having a pity party for myself. Gus and Jock stopped by on their way to the airport. They’re flying to somewhere in Canada called Lake Louise for the next two weeks, and as I held Gus’s wiry body to mine, I had the most terrible feeling that I’d never see him again. My heart thundered with fear and sadness, a thousand memories bombarding my mind as I clung to him.

  “It’ll be okay, li’l Ash,” he said, blinking back tears.

  “You don’t know that,” I sobbed.

  “Aw, I see. You want solid facts, huh?”

  I felt his jaw clench against my cheek as I nodded.

  “Okay,” said Gus, “then this is the solidest fact I know, doll baby: I love you. You and your crazy mother brought more love into my life than I ever could’ve found on my own. She was my family. You are too. I loved her and I love you.” He leaned back, looking fiercely into my eyes. “We will see each other again.”

  I watched from the upstairs window as he waved good-bye, and stood there, with tears streaming down my face, until the car was out of sight. Then I lay down on my bed and wept.

  “Ash?” comes Julian’s voice from the sitting room. “You up here?”

  I sniffle. “Y-yeah.”

  “Can I come in?”

  “Of course,” I say, wondering why he’s asking. After last night, he should know that he’s welcome wherever I am . . . unless last night was a onetime thing. Oh, no. Wait. Is that what’s happening here? Now that I’m Mosier’s bait, about to be shuttled into witness protection, has he decided he’s not interested in me anymore? It hurts my heart to even consider this thought, and I wince, pressing my hand against my chest.

  “Ashley, you okay?” he asks from the doorway.

  I look over my shoulder, lifting my eyes to his. “Was last night a onetime thing?”

  His face, which was soft a moment ago, changes completely. First, he flinches. Then his eyes narrow at me. “Was it for you?”

  “N-no. I mean, I didn’t want it to be.”

  “Neither did I,” he says, his face relaxing a little.

  “But I would understand,” I say, trying to be brave for his sake, “if you felt it was better not to . . . to . . .”

  “To hook up anymore?”

  Hook up.

  Oh. Oh, my God. Okay. I breathe through the pain of those two tawdry, dismissive words. Here I was, with dreams of forever, when we were only . . . hooking up.

  I turn away from him, looking out the window at the barn, where Special Agent Simmons is setting up cameras—traps for Mosier to fall into.

  “Yeah,” I whisper, the single syllable bitter on my tongue.

  I close my eyes because I feel more tears coming, but fuck, I am so goddamn fucking sick to fucking cuntish bastard death of them. I search my mind for more swear words—asshole, dick, cock, fucking, fucking, fucking—

  “Ash.”

  He’s moved so quietly into my room and around my bed, I don’t even realize that he’s squatted down in front of me. But when I open my eyes, there he is, on the floor, looking up at me.

  His eyes—his beautiful, long-lashed eyes—are so green, I think that I will never see their equal again, and it makes me hold my breath, staring into them, focusing all my attention on them, so that my photographic memory will never be without them.

  “It meant something to me,” he says.

  “What?”

  “Last night. Being with you. It wasn’t just a hookup,” he says. “Last night meant something to me. You mean something to me. I . . . I have feelings for you, Ashley.”

  I blink at him. “But there’s no future for us, is there?”

  He winces, then shakes his head, his words soft and sad. “Probably not.”

  I gulp because I know he’s telling the truth, but I hate it. I close my eyes again, breathing through my sorrow.

  “All we have is now,” he says.

  “Now,” I murmur.

  “. . . if we want it,” he adds. “If you want it. It you want . . . me.”

  “I do,” I say, leaning forward until my forehead touches his. “I want whatever time we have left.” I pause, holding my breath, measuring the words I’m about to say and letting myself exhale before I say them: “I want you, Julian.”

  His forehead leaves mine, and a moment later his body depresses the mattress beside me. I open my eyes and look up at him.

  “I want you,” I say.

  I search his eyes and find such tenderness
there, such hopefulness, it makes my tired heart sing with a sudden shot of renewed energy.

  “How do you mean?” he asks, his voice low and fierce. “In what way?”

  Again, I think about what I’m about to say before I say it, just to make sure, but it doesn’t take long for me to know my mind, for me to own my truth. My heart and my mind have already been in communication about what they want, it seems, and they are in perfect communion.

  “In all ways,” I say, reaching for his face with my hands. The scruff of his unshaven jaw tickles my palms and makes me smile. “In every way.”

  “You mean it, Ash?” he whispers, his breath rushing at me like he’s been holding it.

  I nod, slowly at first, then with more and more confidence. “I want you to be my first, Julian. I have no idea what will happen tomorrow, but I know what I want today: I want you to be my first.”

  He starts to smile, then rolls his lips between his teeth for a second before asking, “Are you sure, baby?”

  I think about Tig having sex with all those men who meant nothing to her. And then I look into the eyes of the man before me. I haven’t known him that long, it’s true. But in a handful of days, he has become my friend, my protector, and my first love. And in another handful of days, I will likely lose him—either to a life with a man I hate, or a life of unknowns that cannot include him. We are in between right now, on an island between the past and the future. It’s finite and it’s fragile, and no matter what happens next, I want to make the very most of this moment with him.

  “I’m positive,” I say, leaning forward to press my lips to his.

  We fall back on the bed together, kissing each other, grappling with our clothing. His hands fall to the hem of my shirt while mine land on his belt buckle. But after a moment of struggling, he breaks away from me and stands up.

  Grinning down at me, he reaches for the button on my waistband and unsnaps it, unzips the zipper, and pulls the jeans down my legs. Then he reaches behind his neck and yanks his T-shirt over his head. His chest is solid and beautiful, and I sigh.

  “Do you work out?”

  His grin widens.

  “Yeah.” He flexes his pecs on purpose, and they pop. “I have weights in the barn.”

  I sit up and run my fingers from his shoulders to his waist. He’s not overly ripped like a football player or bodybuilder. He’s still human, but with some very nice definition, including a V of muscle that disappears into the waistband of his jeans. I love that V. I want to know everything about where it leads.

  I undo his belt buckle and unsnap his jeans, which he shoves down his legs. Underneath, he wears tight cotton shorts in navy blue, and his sex, his—my cheeks flush as I think this word—dick is a rigid column underneath the thin fabric, bulging up and slightly to the right. My eyes fix on it, wondering how that is going to fit inside me.

  As though he can read my mind, Julian whispers, “It’s okay. We’ll go slow.”

  I look up at him, holding his eyes as I slip my fingers into the elastic waistband of his underwear and pull down. My heart is thundering as he reaches down to help me lift the fabric over his erection and down his legs.

  I am tempted to look down, to look at him—all of him—but a feeling of shame, or maybe of shyness, overwhelms me, and suddenly I can’t look anywhere. I close my eyes, clenching them shut. Intense heat suffuses my cheeks, and I imagine how ridiculous I must look, perched on the edge of the bed in white panties and a T-shirt, with a naked man standing in front of me.

  “Ash,” he says softly, and his voice is so close to my ears, I know he’s not standing over me anymore.

  When I open my eyes, he’s squatting before me, just as he was before.

  “We can stop here.”

  “No!” I say, reaching for the hem of my T-shirt and whipping it over my head. What was it Gus said? It’s not wrong to want someone. It’s not wrong to like them. And it’s not wrong to give yourself over to loving if the chance arises. “I want this. Please.” I reach behind my back and unclasp my bra. “Help me, Julian.”

  His fingers skim up my arms to the straps of my bra, and gently, slowly, he pulls them down my arms, uncovering my breasts and leaving me almost naked. His eyes look into mine for a moment before he drops them to my chest. He flinches, biting his lower lip.

  “You’re beautiful.” He glances up at my eyes. “I know you hate hearing that, but it’s true.”

  “I don’t hate it,” I say. “Not from you.”

  “Lie down, baby.”

  I lie back on the bed, sliding my head up to the pillow and watching as Julian joins me, kneeling on either side of my hips. He leans down and kisses me, his lips gentle and tender on mine. He sucks my bottom lip between his and then the upper. He licks the loose seam between my lips, and they open for him, my tongue seeking his as I reach up, threading my fingers through his hair and pulling him closer. Between us, rubbing the valley of my sex through my panties, I can feel his dick, hard and hungry, and I am scared, but I also want this.

  His lips skim down my throat to my collarbone, then lower still, to my breasts. I feel his tongue, hot and wet, lick a circle around my left nipple, and I gasp in surprise, though my fingers, still in his hair, press his head to my chest. He kisses the bud of sensitive flesh, laving it with his tongue, sucking it between his lips, and my hips buck off the bed. He moves to my right breast, reaching up with his hand to massage the left, and sucks my right nipple between his lips, licking and sucking until I am whimpering from the sharpness of the sensation.

  “Too much?” he mutters, his breath hot on my skin.

  “N-no. Just . . . new,” I sigh, my voice low and breathy,

  He suckles at me again, his fingers toying with the nipple that isn’t being loved with his mouth, while his other hand slips over my belly and into the waistband of my panties.

  One of his fingers, warm and wet from my nipple, slides between the soft folds of flesh between my legs, finding its mark, and I cry out softly, a sound halfway between a whimper and moan. As he tongues my breast, his finger moves in slow circles, sliding over my aroused, slick skin. My knees rise and my toes curl. My eyes are closed, and I push the back of my head into the pillow. My body is his playground, and he is doing things to it that I never imagined. Even more, my body is responding like it’s been waiting for him to touch me like this. Like maybe it’s been waiting forever. It knows what it wants, and as my hips start to thrust softly against his hand, I feel a gathering within me. I am holding my breath, the same way I would if I was in the shallows with a massive wave coming straight for me. I hold . . . hold . . . hold . . . and then it breaks, and I gasp, fireworks bursting behind my eyes as my body relaxes into trembles and I fill my lungs. I am shattering under him, off the bed, floating in the stars, only the sound of his low, satisfied rumble of laughter returning me to earth.

  “You’re . . . laughing at me,” I murmur.

  “I’m enjoying you,” he answers, his voice low and hot, but still tinged with amusement.

  “What?” I whisper, realizing that he’s sliding my panties down my legs, and further realizing that I am not embarrassed to be lying prone and naked before him. “Why?”

  “Because you’re so sensitive. Because this is all new for you, which makes it new for me.” He spreads my legs, kneeling between them. “Because I bet you taste as sweet as you look.”

  He dips his head, spreads me with his fingers and tastes me with one slow, long lick.

  “Mm-hm. I was right.”

  My fingers curl into the sheets on either side of my hips as he does to my sex what he did to my nipples. Licking, kissing, and sucking on my tender flesh, he brings me to orgasm number two, but his voice is more taut and less playful than before when he asks me:

  “Are you sure you want to have sex, baby?”

  I open my eyes to see him reaching over the bed. I hear the jingle of his belt buckle and then the crinkle of plastic. He holds up a condom.

  “Do you know what t
his is?”

  Remembering Gus’s warning, I giggle. “No glove, no love?”

  Julian’s eyes widen. “Where did you hear that?”

  “Sock that wang before you bang?”

  He blinks at me, still holding up the condom. “Where does a nice Catholic schoolgirl learn an expression like that?”

  “From a sassy gay man.”

  “Ah. Gus.”

  “Gus,” I confirm. I lean up on one elbow, feeling bold. I point to the packet in his fingers. “That’s a condom.”

  “I’m clean,” he says quickly, out of the blue.

  I stare at him. I’m not sure why he feels the need to tell me this, but maybe I should reassure him too.

  “I showered earlier.”

  He looks confused for a second, and then his lips twitch. “No. I mean . . . I don’t have any diseases. I don’t sleep around.”

  “Oh.” Now my cheeks flush with embarrassment, and I look down at the white sheets, feeling young. “That’s good. Me neither.”

  He lies down beside me and slides his fingers under my chin, forcing me to look at him. “I’m using a condom because I don’t want to get you pregnant.”

  I’ve been taught that trying to prevent pregnancy when you’re married is a sin, but then again, everything I’m doing today is a sin, and besides, Julian and I aren’t married. The strangest thing of all, however, is that I don’t feel guilty about what we’re doing. I don’t feel dirty, and I don’t feel bad. It feels right, and a rush of peace, of goodness, washes over me like a blessing.

  “I’m not ready to be a mom,” I say, thinking about Tig. She was only sixteen when she had me, unmarried, unsupported, alone. I want to do things differently. When I have my first child, I want to be ready.

  “I’m not ready to be a dad,” says Julian, though he’s looking at me peculiarly, like maybe he’s looking at his future and liking how it looks. “Someday.”

  “Me too,” I say. “Someday.”

  “I care about you, Ashley” he says, looking into my eyes. “So much.”

  “I know you do. I feel the same.” I lie on my back. “And yes, I’m sure I want to have sex.”