Fighting With Light (The Coldwell Brothers #2)

33. Liam

33

Liam

The warm air from the day cools us as I push the bike as hard as it can go. We’re both tired and coming out here may not have been the smartest thing to do before a competition, but for once I wasn’t thinking about competing and it may have been exactly what I needed. Aelia’s head rests on my back as I drive with one hand on the handlebars and the other on her thigh. I know this peace is momentary, but she has given something to me I’ve barely been able to grasp.

Aelia has brought a different version of peace, and I could rip out my own heart right now thinking about all of this ending. No, it’s not over yet, but it will be, and I hate myself a little for letting it get as far as it did.

I, no, we, gave into each other, but I don’t think there was any resisting it. I think we both tried and failed miserably, but I’d say it may be the best failure of my life.

It feels cruel to have what I never thought I deserved, and still have to let her go. I found her in the most unlikely of people. I want to keep her. Yet I can’t, and I can’t help but ask the Big Man upstairs why He would do this to me? It feels like a slap in the face. I think I would have rather gone without.

My heart stalls in my chest. No, scratch that, I wouldn’t have traded any of this. We made a promise to each other to allow ourselves to be hurt by one another.

It’s a strange thing I have experienced only when it comes to love. You are willing to suffer, to endure the pain because you love. She is worth every bit of heartache I will feel in the future, hell, how I feel now, and that pain is worth it. That suffering has purpose because it is born out of love. I thought I had very little room left in my soul to be able to love. But she surprised me. No, she reminded me I have a lot more than I thought. I have the capacity to love her more than I thought myself capable. Sure, that realization hurts, but it also gives me hope.

We pull into the resort and I walk the bike back to the porch. Aelia unlocks the door and lays out on the edge of the bed. “I think I’m going to take a bath,” she mutters.

“Okay, I’ll order us dinner.”

“Sounds good,” she says and saunters into the bathroom.

After I order dinner, they said it’ll take about an hour. I glance at my computer because I need to continue to keep digging, but the bathroom door feels like an invitation…so I take it.

The bathtub is on the other side of the room, next to the shower. It’s a small freestanding tub, but it could squeeze two people.

Aelia has her head leaned back on the edge of the tub, with bubbles everywhere.

“Hey.”

Aelia opens her eyes and lifts her eyebrow. “Hey,” she says back.

I stand there awkwardly, wondering if maybe I shouldn’t have come in because she needs her space, which is fair. She’s the first woman I’ve been with who makes me second-guess myself.

“Dinner will be about an hour.”

“Okay,” she says.

“Okay, I’ll go,” I say, spinning on my heel.

“You can stay, Liam,” she says quietly.

I face her again and her shy smile tells me she’s a little more nervous than I thought. This isn’t how things were supposed to be. We weren’t supposed to feel this way.

“Are you enjoying your bath?” I ask her.

“Yeah, I am. Do you want to join me?” she asks with a smile.

“I thought you’d never ask.”

I step into the tub with my clothes on and sink into the warm water .

“I guess that works, though it would have made more sense to get rid of your clothes,” she says, giggling.

“No time, too excited,” I mutter, bending my knees to fit down into the tub.

Aelia giggles, shaking her head, and we sit in the sudsy water grinning like idiots—I love it. She leans back and closes her eyes again.

“Why do you hate him so much?” I ask her.

She opens her eyes again. “I hate him for a lot of reasons. And I think it’s important to note that I don’t hate anyone, it’s a strong word. But my father is and always will be the exception.”

“Why?” I ask again.

She sighs and moves her foot under my wet shirt to my abs. She wiggles her toes on my skin, and I grab her calf, massaging the muscle.

“I was kidnapped when I was thirteen years old.”

My hands pause on her leg and she stares at me as she says, “It was a rival family. I wasn’t sure what they wanted. Being thirteen, I knew what my father did. I had already seen things that no kid should see, but I didn’t know why they were using me to get to my father.”

“What did he do?” I ask.

She huffs a laugh. “He offered them money.” She huffs again and looks away.

“They had me tied up in a basement with some other women I didn’t recognize. They had been there for a while because they were so beat up, others…well…”

I nod, knowing what she’s getting at.

“I was scared out of my mind. I just wanted to go home and hug my mom. Dad had money, territory, drugs, so I knew he could pay the ransom. What I didn’t realize at the time is that they didn’t want any of that.”

“You were thirteen, Aelia.”

She tilts her head and gives me a dead eye look. “And what were you doing at the age of thirteen?”

I look away. “We were running from my father…learning how to defend ourselves.”

“Exactly. Our childhood didn’t get the pleasure of being normal. ”

I huff. “No, it didn’t.”

“They got me between where I got dropped off for school and the school entrance. I didn’t like that. The maid, Kira, dropped me off, so she always stopped around the corner so I could walk the rest of the way.”

“I’m sorry, princess.” I rub my hands up and down her legs in comfort, and she shrugs, avoiding my eyes.

“After I was down there for a while, I realized two things: he wasn’t willing to give them what they wanted in exchange for me, and I was on my own.” She swallows.

“I knew that if I didn’t want to be one of those girls beaten, bloody, raped, and handcuffed to a pipe in a disgusting basement, I had to do something.”

I take a deep breath, willing the anger and profound sadness not to pull me under like a riptide. This explains a lot about her. She’s tough, but doesn’t appear so. It would seem that people have been underestimating Aelia for a long time.

“When they came back downstairs, I started asking questions. I figured if I knew what they wanted, I could convince them to call one of my brothers because it was clear Dad wasn’t going to cooperate, so I told them to call Romeo.”

“Did they?”

She sighs and sinks lower into the water. “No, they didn’t because I know he would have come right away. Even then, my brothers were a lot of things, but they were not my father, no matter how hard he tried. I was in that basement for two weeks.”

My heart leaps up my throat and I want to punch a hole through the wall because I can feel the pain coming off of her. I want to rage for the girl who was broken by others over and over again. Yet she has a heart of gold. She hasn’t allowed her past to jade her. I don’t think I can say the same for myself, but being with her may be changing that for me.

“Day after day, the women I was in the basement with disappeared. I heard things that…I thought I was going to die there, to be honest, or worse. I was hungry and cold, and when the last girl was dragged up the stairs, I decided to fight back. Speaking up did nothing. I could never figure out if they called my family, or if my father just…let me go. But, I put it together that I was more useful to them alive than dead, so they probably wouldn’t shoot me. I also decided I’d rather die trying than be there another day,” she says, meeting my eyes. I don’t know if she wants to be closer right now, but I need her closer. Grabbing the back of her knees, I pull her into my lap and hug her into my wet shirt.

“When it was time for me to use the bathroom, I did my business, looked for another exit, and ignored the gun to my head. I kicked one of them in the balls and took off. I ran as hard and as fast as I could. But they were faster. They dragged me back, and I was going to try again, but then Romeo showed up with money, cocaine, and drugs to buy me back. Which still doesn’t make sense to me even now, but you don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to.”

“How did Romeo know?” I ask her.

“He heard my father trying to figure out how to get out of giving them what they wanted. So he did it himself.”

Speechless, I hold Aelia to me. There is nothing to say about that. There is no sorry big enough to encompass the pain and the fear a young girl went through. She doesn’t cry, she just hugs me tighter. I want to say those three words to her so badly, but I don’t. I can’t.

“Thank you for telling me, princess,” I whisper in her wet hair.

Maybe it’s time for me to share something with her, too. “My mother had to bleed to get our money back.” A headache builds in the back of my head. I don’t like thinking about the past like this for a reason. But I think it’s time to tell her more about myself, my family.

“What does that mean?” she asks, shifting in my hold.

“My mother comes from the well-established Astor family. She was the last remaining Astor, so my grandfather willed everything to her. My dad used people to get around the law and take it from her despite the prenup. So for years, she had to scrimp, and save, and tuck money away and get the family fortune back at the same time.”

“Why didn’t she just save money and take off with you guys? ”

“She knew it would cost money to hide, and I think part of it was the principle of the thing. My father had no right to take what didn’t belong to him. If she could have done it faster, she would have, but she needed to be careful. I think if he caught her before she was ready, he would have no doubt killed us all.”

“I’m so sorry, Liam,” she says.

“If anyone understands what that’s like, I know you do.”

She nods absently. “What happened when she took you three away?”

I stare at our hands linked, remembering the man who attacked us in the dead of night. The bologna sandwiches.

“We drove, and drove, and drove. In my young mind, it felt like forever. It took us a while to get to California. For some reason, she wanted us to hide in San Francisco.”

“I guess that is as far as you can get from Massachusetts. But why didn’t she just take you guys to a different country?”

“Because we would have had to scan passports. But also because Mom didn’t have access to the money she had taken back yet. It was all about timing. We had to wait, so the cash she had, she was very careful with.”

“Wow,” Aelia says.

My heart thuds at the terrifying memory of my mother fighting a man two times her size again. “When we were there, Mom got one of those pay-by-the-week places. It was a small room with two double beds and a mini fridge. I remember going to bed and she was so agitated about something. We stayed cooped up in that room and barely went outside because she was scared someone would find us. Well, they did. He broke in to get rid of us. Everything happened so fast. Me and my brothers fought the stranger, and then Mom shot him.”

“What did you do with the body? Were the police called?” she asks.

I chuckle. “These are all valid questions, but uh, no. Mom thinks a guardian angel helped us. This long-haul trucker showed up because he heard the commotion, and then he helped us get rid of the body and clean up. Then he disappeared. ”

“That’s wild.”

“I try not to think about it too much.”

She rests her head on my shoulder. “I don’t blame you.”

“Yeah,” I sigh. We’re quiet for a moment and the water is getting cold.

“You make me feel safe,” she whispers. I smile into her hair and kiss her head. Before I can respond, a knock echoes in our villa and Aelia leans back, floating away from me. I pull myself out of the tub and yell, “Coming!”

Tossing my wet clothes into the shower, I grab a towel and wrap it around my waist before answering the door.

As I wheel the cart into our room, Aelia comes out in her lavender, silk pajamas.

“I had an amazing day, thank you,” she says. My heart flips around in my chest like it’s trying to reach out and hug her.

“Good, I’m glad.” I smile and cough, clearing my throat. She tilts her head and looks at me for a moment. We stare at each other, locked in the past, until I break the link.

“Come on, princess.” She steps around me to sit down. I grab her waist before she can and wrap my arms around her, and she turns her head, pushing her forehead into my pec.

“We will find what we need, Aelia. We might be able to talk to locals about it when we get there,” I suggest.

She tilts her head back and looks up at me. “It’s not that,” she sighs.

I frown at her. Maybe dredging up the past got to her because I don’t know what else she could be upset about, or she isn’t upset at all. Women are confusing. “Then what is it?” I ask her, point blank. The corner of her mouth tilts up.

“Nothing, Tarzan, nothing at all,” she says and pushes away from me.

I shake off the confusion and sit across from her.

As we eat, Aelia keeps glancing at me over the table and I swear the room is getting warmer. She smiles and takes a sip of her wine. I’m not drinking tonight. It will slow me down tomorrow, but I sure like the way her tongue dips out over her lips once she takes a sip. That expensive bottle was worth every penny .

“This wine is delicious,” she says, looking down into the glass.

“Good, it should be, since the bottle was two grand.”

She sets the glass down and looks me in the eye. “I mean, I’ve had better,” she says. The corner of her mouth tips up, and I take another bite of my chicken.

“You’re mean,” I mumble.

She giggles and rests her chin in her hand. “But you love it,” she says the last words in a rasp. My chewing slows and my gaze locks into hers. The stupid organ in my chest that hasn’t stopped jumping up and down for her confirms everything.

“Yeah, I do,” I mutter and swallow, trying not to choke on the chicken.

She schools her face, not allowing me to see how she really feels about that, but I think she gets the double meaning. At least I know she feels it, too. This is not one-sided. I don’t want her to hurt, though. I would carry it all so she didn’t have to feel the inevitable coming.

But that’s yet another annoying thing I’ve discovered about love. It forces you to feel it whether or not you want to, whether your past and your future are rife with violence and paranoia or peace and happiness. That explains why I see so many stories about it. Traveling the world like I do, I’ve picked up on how it’s unmistakably universal. It transcends all cultures and backgrounds. It’s available to all. Love was waiting for me and I never saw it coming.

“Do you feel ready for tomorrow?” she asks hesitantly.

I take a swig of mineral water. “Yeah, I think I am. I just need some good sleep and then I’ll be ready to go.”

“Good because I was nervous that our excursion might have thrown you off.” I watch her drain the last of her wine and set the glass down.

“No, I think it prepared me more. It got all the nerves out,” I say, standing from the table. I walk over to her side and hold my hand out, yanking her body up and into mine. I slide my hands down her silk-covered body and back up. Her pajamas catch in my calluses, but she doesn’t seem to care. The soft fabric makes me feel too rough for her. She’s all soft lines and small curves. I’m all hard edges and scar tissue .

I drag my hands up to her shoulder blades where the thinnest straps on the planet sit daintily on her shoulders, and push one down with my finger to kiss her bare shoulder. She shudders in my hold and I do the same to the other.

The loose fabric drops enough that the top of her breasts peek out. I lean down and kiss each one, and she shivers again. Her hands run through my damp hair as I breathe out on her skin and goosebumps rise beneath my lips.

I kiss the skin that I can see and walk her with me towards the bed. Pulling her between my spread legs, I grip the backs of her thighs. She looks down at me as I gaze up at her, and swear my heart is about to beat out of my chest. She grabs the edge of her top and slips it over her head, dropping it to the floor.

This is as close as we will ever get to I love you, and it should be celebrated. We should be able to show each other that there will never be another. I know that’s the case for me. She is etched into my broken, messed up, bleeding heart. Her name is carved into my flesh with my family and will remain there until the day I die.

I joked with Kai many months ago when he and his wife, Cordelia, told us they were getting married. It doesn’t matter that I sort of pushed him to take the leap with Cordi. I told him I thought he would be some kind of Evel Knievel monk because he kept his distance from women, so they didn’t end up being associated with our chaotic family. The joke is on me because I get it now. I understand why Kai risked it all for her, for their kid. There’s no question I would do the same for Aelia. I glance down at her stomach, imagining what it would be like to see her grow with our result of love. And the mere fact I am even considering what it would be like to be a father, to be a husband, makes this more laughable. My brothers would be cracking up at this point.

But I wouldn’t be alone.

Resting my forehead against her stomach, she runs her hands through my hair soothingly.

“Hey,” she whispers.

I lean my head back to look at her and the soft smile on her lips breaks me a little bit. “Make this count,” she whispers .

She doesn’t have to spell it out for me. It has nothing to do with actual sex; it has everything to do with the fact that I am hers, and she is mine, and we can’t keep it that way. So, for the time we do have, we better make this count.

Grabbing her knees from behind, I pull her to straddle my waist, and she holds my shoulders for balance as she presses her lips to mine. I groan into her mouth from the tightness in my chest. She whimpers and I wrap my arms around her ribs. Her warmth steadies me and her mouth grounds me. She rolls her hips, sending a spark over my skin. From the first time we’ve been together and almost every time after, I realized every second counts with her. Loving her slowly is what I’m meant to do. I need to claim every inch of skin on her beautiful body, and that takes time. She deserves to be cherished and loved like this.

She pulls her mouth from mine and I dip my head down to her chest, dragging my teeth over her skin, leaving wet, sloppy kisses. I want to leave my mark on her.

“Do it,” she gasps.

I lean back and she nods. “Do it, mark me. I want them to know,” she says breathlessly.

I growl and flip us so she’s beneath me. Tucking my nose to her neck, I suck on the skin at her pulse and she moans, digging her nails into my back. I lean back to see the red mark that will turn into a hickey and grin triumphantly. She bites her lower lip and I continue my re-exploration of her body until I get to her waist. Her silk shorts are all bunched up, and I grab the waist and rip them like they are floss.

“Liam!” Aelia yells. I grin and nip her chin.

“I’ll buy you fifty more,” I mumble on her skin.

“Now I don’t have a matching set,” she grumbles, then gasps as I leave another mark on her hip.

“I’ll buy you every color of the rainbow.”

“I do like color,” she breathes as I reach the apex of her thighs.

“I prefer you without it.” I kiss the soft skin on her inner thigh .

She moans and tips her head back. “The same could be said for you,” she mutters. I smile into her skin, then sit up and toss my towel.

“Better?” I ask her. She nods and stares at me for a moment. I get back on the bed between her legs and her cherry scent fills my lungs. “I think I just distracted you instead.” I graze my nose against her and she moans into the ceiling.

“No more talking,” she gasps.

I smile and use my tongue for better purposes. She grips my hair like a handle, arching her back, quaking in my hands, and I groan into her.

“Oh...Liam!” Aelia cries out as she falls down the rabbit hole. She lifts up on her elbows and looks down at me.

I kiss her hip and sit up. “I like it when you scream my name like that, princess.” I grin.

She smiles back, her eyelids droopy and satisfied. “Then make me say it again,” she whispers.

I move back up her body to her mouth and she links her arms around my neck, holding me hostage as she plunders my mouth with her tongue, and I brand her with mine. I want her to experience the way she makes me feel so she’ll never forget it. I want her to be shopping somewhere and look at a pair of silk pajamas and remember me. I want her to see a surfboard and know that I haven’t stopped thinking about her. I want to carve myself into her skin so she can’t take a shower without smelling the memory of me on her.

She kisses me like I’m all she wants and I think maybe, at least in this moment, we are all each other needs.