Saving Forever (The Ever Trilogy: Book 3) Read online

  Almost. Nearly. But his eyes betrayed him, though. The slight stoop to his shoulders, the way his knee bounced and his gaze shifted from place to place, rather than ever really settling on mine. As if he was afraid of meeting my eyes, afraid that I’d look too deeply and see the truth.

  I wanted to tell him I didn’t want the truth. I wanted happiness. I wanted to be able to feel like I had a new lease on life. I’d nearly died, and had been comatose for a year and a half. I shouldn’t be here. But I was, and that should be a source of joy. Yet it wasn’t. Without Cade as my center, I was adrift, castaway. I couldn’t find the earth beneath me, couldn’t find the sky. Couldn’t find up, or down. I could only slip from one day to the next, wake up and go to school and go to work. I was playing at life. Pretending at adulthood.

  It was all empty. I was empty.

  Cade sensed my mood as we picked at dessert. “Ever…don’t—don’t give up on me, okay? I know I’ve been a mess lately, and I’m sorry. I love you. So much.” He set his fork down and wiped the corners of his mouth with his napkin, sat back and finally, for the first time all night, met my eyes. “Don’t give up on me. Please. I’ll—get better. I’ll do better.”

  “I just want us, Cade.” I searched his eyes and saw what I knew I’d see--—the guilt and pain and torture--—but I also saw hope, and love. “I want you. I want you to…I don’t even know. I just want us back.”

  “Me, too.” He ducked his head, twisting the cloth napkin into a tight spiral. Fighting emotions.

  Tell me what’s wrong. The thought skittered through my head, but it wouldn’t come out. I was terrified of hearing the answer. Scared shitless of the truth. So instead I reached across the table and took both of his hands in mine. Felt the familiar comfort of the strength in his grip, the rough calluses.

  “I’ll never give up on you, Cade. I swear. I promise. Forever and always, right?”

  “Forever and always.”

  But why did he sound as if the three words were choking him?

  promises and portraits

  For Christmas Cade gave me a framed drawing he’d done. It was full color, and huge, a life-size portrait of me…and Eden. I was on the left, smiling, hair down, loose, caught by a breeze. Eden was on the right, her hair pulled back, a more serious expression on her features. He’d captured our eyes perfectly, as well as the subtle differences in our faces, which he’d merged at the centerline. He’d even given Eden dark roots near her scalp.

  I teared up when I ripped open the gift and saw Eden looking back at me, joined with me on paper as we were in life, body, mind, heart, and soul.

  Or should have been, if she hadn’t run away.

  “I know you miss her,” Cade said as I stared at the portrait.

  I could only nod. When I found my voice, it was quiet and tremulous. “Yeah. I just don’t get it. Where did she go? Why did she leave?”

  Cade didn’t answer right away. “I don’t understand, either.” Yet there was a lie in his eyes.

  I handed him his gift from me. It was a self-portrait. In it, I was nude, sitting upright with one knee crossed over the other, using my hands to cover my breasts. It was an intimate, provocative pose. I’d used my camera and tripod and a timer to take the picture, and then had painted the portrait from the photograph. As I’d posed, I’d thought of Cade as he had been. The Cade I missed, not carefree exactly, but present and passionate, and I’d thought of the way we used to be together, and how badly I wanted that again. I’d tried to communicate all that in my expression. My desire for him, the way I missed him. The way I loved him.

  Cade stared at the portrait for a very long time, his features shifting from one emotion to another, from desire and love to guilt and sadness and back again. Finally, he looked up. “God, Ever. It’s…amazing.”

  I’d worked on it for weeks. Nothing had ever been so hard as that portrait. I didn’t feel beautiful. I didn’t feel desirable. Even alone in my studio, with the blinds drawn and the door closed, I’d felt awkward and vulnerable and gawky, posing naked like that. And even the process of painting had been different. The way I formed my brushstrokes had been different—shorter, choppier, less smooth than before the accident. I had to focus intently on each individual stroke, and I’d messed up a hundred times, had to retouch and fix again and again. When doing my eyes, I’d messed up so badly I almost had to start over. And when I’d finally finished, I knew it was good, but not as good as it would have been before. But it was the best I could do.

  “Turn it around,” I said.

  Cade glanced at me in confusion, and then flipped the frame around. I’d printed out the original photograph and tucked it between the canvas and the frame. He slid it free, held it in both hands, staring at it.

  “You are…so gorgeous.”

  I closed my eyes. I wondered if he had any idea how badly I’d needed to hear that. “I don’t feel like it.”

  His face constricted, contorted into a mask of pain. “I’m failing you. You need love. You need me…and I just…I’m not giving you what you need.”

  I tangled my fingers in his hair. “I just need you, Cade.” I leaned in and pressed a kiss to his cheekbone, to the corner of his mouth. “When I married you, I promised to love you, no matter what. I promised to love you in sickness and in health. For richer or poorer. I promised to love the good and the bad. And I do. I always, always will.”

  Cade buried his face in the crook of my neck, and his hand fisted in my hair. He turned his body toward mine, breathing me in, shaking and shuddering. “What if—what if I mess up?”

  “I’ll forgive you.” My heart was hammering, pounding, pouring fear-spiked adrenaline throughout my body. My pulse was thundering in my ears, and my fingers trembled as I clutched the back of his head. “Anything. I love you, Cade. I’ll always love you.”

  He just held onto me, fingers gripping my hair near the roots in a death-grip, almost painful. His breath scraped past his teeth, and he swallowed so hard I could feel it, hear it. “Always.”

  “I swear it.” Could I say that? A sliver of me doubted. “Just be mine.”

  “I am. Only yours.” He tugged my hair gently, pulling my face away from his long enough to look into my eyes.

  I saw love, determination, and need. Fear, too. Hurt and guilt. But all that was subsumed by the need.

  I flattened my body against his, crushed my lips to his. Inside, I was pleading for him to give me the passion I so desperately wanted, the soul-baring fervor my dried-up and starving heart needed.

  His mouth responded to mine, hesitant at first, and then with growing strength. His fist released my hair and slid down my neck, palmed my shoulder, caressed my spine. Rested on the bell of my hip. His kiss took on heat, and I breathed a whimper of needy relief when his mouth left mine and touched my neck. I tilted my head back to bare my throat, my hands clasping his head against me. His lips touched my breastbone above the buttons of my blouse. His teeth nipped, his tongue flicked.

  His fingers curled into the flesh of my hip.

  “Ever. God, Ever.” He brought his free hand up to my face, brushed my wayward hair aside. “How could you not know you’re beautiful? You are. You’re perfect. Inside and out. You’re too good for me. Too much, too incredible. I don’t deserve all that you are.” His mouth slanted across mine, sipping at my breath.

  “Because you…you’re what makes me feel beautiful. This. Us.”

  He shook his head. “No, Ev. You’re beautiful in every moment. With me, without me. You have to know that.”

  “I don’t. I can’t.” I slid my hands around his waist and under his shirt to glide my palms up his strong back. “You have to show me.” I wouldn’t push it. This had to come from him, not me.

  He searched my eyes with his and, as always, I saw the mountain of tangled emotions in his gaze. But as I stared, I watched him push all that away, focusing instead on my mouth, my lips. Down, to the swell of my breasts and the hint of cleavage. He breathed in, and lifted both han
ds to the top button of my shirt. His brow furrowed, and his hands shook with nerves or desire as he slid the button through the gap. I breathed deeply, swelling my chest, straining against the remaining buttons. Hints of black lace showed, a sliver of the cup of my bra and my pale skin. I was still, sitting beside him, my body facing him, my knee pressed into his, thighs touching.

  He leaned in, kissed the hollow at the base of my throat, and his hands circled my waist. Tugged me toward him. I brought my leg over his thighs and sat astride him on the couch, looking down at him now. My calf-length skirt caught, stretched tight, and tangled, and I lifted up on my knees to free it, then sat back down. Lips slid across my skin, descended between the valley of my breasts. Cade’s fingers fumbled at the buttons, freeing them one by one, and then his palms carved over my shoulders to push my blouse off, letting it tumble to the floor. He reared back, gazing at me, eyes dark and hooded with desire as I straddled him, each deep breath swelling my chest.

  Still I didn’t move. I let my hands rest on his shoulders, watching him.

  He glanced up at me and then touched my bare shoulders, palms skating down my arms, back up. Around to my shoulder blades, pulling my body to his mouth. He pressed soft kisses down the swell of one boob, stopping at the edge of the cup and crossing over to kiss the other slope of flesh. His hands fluttered up my spine, teasing and tickling, and then he ran a finger inside the strap of my bra. Another kiss, this time nudging the cup down with his chin to nip at the darker circle of my areola. I sighed, curling one arm around his neck, fingers tracing the shell of his ear, the shaggy hair at his temples.

  A brief fumble of his fingers, and then my bra fell away. He leaned back, pulling the undergarment free from one of my arms, and then the other, and then he tossed it to the floor near my discarded shirt.

  “God, Ev. So fucking gorgeous.” He dipped in, flicking my nipple with his tongue. “What would I do without you? What beauty would there be in this life without you?”

  I cupped his head with both hands, moaned as he scraped his teeth over my nipple. “Don’t—don’t ever find out.”

  Cade buried his face between my tits and inhaled, then cupped each heavy globe in his hands and pressed them together, took both of my erect nipples in his mouth and tongued them. I moaned again, and the sound shifted into a drawn-out sigh as he slid his palms over my back, scratching and smoothing, caressing and touching. Tender, gentle, insistent.

  “Take me to our bed, Cade.”

  He stood up with me, supporting my weight with his hands under my ass, and I crossed my feet at the ankles behind his back, pressed my nose to his neck and tasted the salt of his skin. I felt hope burgeon inside me, hope that he’d find his way back to me, hope that I’d been imagining things, inventing the guilt in his eyes.

  Cade set me carefully onto our bed, holding onto my thighs as they gripped his waist. He kneaded the muscle of my legs, gazing with open desire at my bare upper torso. He leaned forward, traced around the waist of my skirt, searching for the zipper. I angled one hip up, and he found the pull-tab at the center of my spine, tugged it down. Curled the fingers of both hands into the waistband of the skirt and the elastic of my panties, black to match my erstwhile bra. I’d dressed for this, hoping, praying, wishing for this. I’d shaved my legs and crotch, shaved myself bare for him.

  He pulled the skirt and underwear down, tossing them aside, and I curled my legs around his waist once more. His eyes roved over me, from face to boobs to belly and core, and then he faltered and stopped at the scar tissue where the surgeons had done the hysterectomy. Cade reached out and touched the scar, tracing the ridged line of tissue where it ran from one side of my torso to the other, low, just above my pubis.

  I tensed at the touch. We’d made love before now, and he’d obviously seen me naked, so surely he’d seen the scar. Yet he acted as if he hadn’t. His fingers paused on the scar, and his mouth opened as if to speak.

  I put my hand over his, pushed his touch lower. “No. Don’t talk about it. Not now.” He hesitated still. I brought his touch to the apex of my thighs, lifted my hips. “Please.”

  I wouldn’t say it again. I’d begged him once. I wouldn’t again. I shouldn’t have to.

  He nodded and then bent over me, kissed my diaphragm, my ribs on the left side, down to the crease of my hip. Kissed across the scar, inch by inch, kiss by kiss. The inside of my thigh. Slid his hands under my backside, lifting my hips and kneeling down at the foot of the bed. My legs hung over his shoulders now, my thighs framing his head. His stubble scratched the tender skin on the inside of my thighs, and I couldn’t quite catch my breath as the heat of his mouth warmed my core. He knew how much I loved it when he did this, when his tongue slid into me. God, yes, just like that, bringing me to the rocking, fiery, roiling edge of pleasure. His tongue and lips, his hands splayed under my ass, supporting me as I hung partially off the bed, my knees bent over his shoulders, heel hooked over his ankle, toes curling with each laving lick of his tongue into my wet aching heat.

  He always knew when I was on the edge, and this time, he kept me there, letting me come away from the edge before falling over.

  I opened my eyes to meet his. “What…?” I couldn’t breathe; the ache in my core and the need rifling through me was stealing my words. “I need…Cade…more—”

  He helped me slide up onto the bed, and I leaned back on my hands, shaking, watching him as he peeled his shirt off. I edged forward and planted my feet on the floor, twisted the button of his jeans free, jerked the zipper down. He stilled, letting me finish undressing him. I stared up at him as I tugged his pants down, his eyes blazing with need. I didn’t look away as I pulled the elastic of his underwear away from his erection, slid them down past his hips. I didn’t look away as I lowered my face to him, keeping my eyes on his until the last second. Cade gasped and then grunted as I wrapped my lips around him, gliding my fist around his steel thickness, caressing his soft skin stretched so tight around him.

  He moaned my name and tangled his fingers in my hair as I slid my mouth down his length, tasting the moisture leaking from him. I worked my fingers gently around him at the root, slid my hand up as I let him fall from my mouth, spreading my saliva over the broad head of his cock with my palm. His knees buckled as I twisted my hand around his tip, dragged my thumb across the head and then licked the drips of pre-come as they leaked out.

  I brought Cade to the edge, as he had me, and then I released him. I sat on the edge of the bed, one hand wrapped around his cock and the other clutching the firm globe of his ass. He was breathing hard, staring down at me, eyes hooded, muscles tense. He grabbed me by the forearm, tugging me upward. I stood slowly, my body sliding against his.

  We stood naked together, face to face, body to body, his erection an iron length between us, hard against my belly. I reached up with one hand, dragged the back of my hand across his jaw, then my palm across the opposite side, cupped his cheekbone and leaned in to kiss him. As our mouths met, he pressed into me, leaning down, his arm supporting me at my waist, a hand at my nape, laying me down.

  He knelt over me, staring into my eyes. I smiled up at him, clawed my fingers into the muscle of his buttocks, pulled at him. And then I had an idea.

  I scooted up the bed, wiggling out from underneath him, ignoring the confusion on his face. The look cleared and turned to heat and burning desire as I rolled to my stomach and brought my knees up beneath me. Lifted my hips to him. For him. “You used to love this.”

  He growled in his chest. “I still do.”

  I craned my neck to watch him lift onto his knees and slide up behind me, fitting his cock between my buttocks, taking my hips in his hands. I felt my body tensing in preparation. He held his erection in his fist and guided himself into me, into my tight wet waiting cleft. I moaned and rocked forward as he entered me, biting my lip at the delicious feeling of fullness.

  I fisted my hands in the sheets, letting all my weight rest on my forearms. He slid deep, groaning, and t
hen pulled back, paused. Palmed my ass cheeks, smoothing his hands over them, then gripped my hips and drove deep. Whispered my name. Pulled back, almost out, and impaled me once more. I gave full voice to my pleasure, to the perfection of his body puzzle-made to fit into mine. I rocked back into his thrusts, moaned and groaned and grunted deep in my throat as he set a rhythm, slow but pounding hard.

  A thick balloon of tension welled up inside me, burgeoning tighter and filled with explosive heat, intensified with each grinding clash of our bodies. His voice met mine in the late morning air of our bedroom, his deep rumble of pleasure winding around my higher whimpers. We moved together, finding true union at last.

  One of his hands slid up my spine and the other tugged me by the crease of my hip against him, moving faster and faster now, encouraged by the needy, mewling shrieks of my impending orgasm.

  “Yes, Cade, yes…don’t stop…god, yes, fuck me hard, Cade—” I heard my voice grating and gasping, distinctly feral growls as detonation neared, white-hot lightning spearing through my core. “Now, harder, please—yes, yes—oh, fuck, Cade, yes!”

  I slammed back into him, breathless and shaking as I was seized by a wrenching, spasming, dizzying climax.

  And then he pulled out of me completely, leaving me empty and clenching and moaning with confusion and need. He nudged at me, pushed me over onto my back, and I grasped at him, pulled at him, found his slick hard cock with my hands and fisted his length desperately, guided him into me, frantic for his body to complete mine yet more.

  “I need to see you,” he whispered, “I need to see your eyes when I come inside you.”

  I locked my legs around his waist and clawed at his shoulders, needing to feel his skin against mine, his weight and his heat and his flesh. I rocked my hips against his, keeping my eyes open and fixed on his.