Broken Girl(79)

I reach across and take over unbuttoning the last two. I pull up off the couch a little and remove my shirt. My chest bare, my muscles tight, my heart crashing against my bones. She’s not wearing a bra.

She sits straight up, all her weight bearing down on me, perfectly warm, consuming, I buck my hips and I watch her gorgeous body react. I reach up, slip my fingers behind the edge of her shirt across her shoulders. Our eyes magically tethered to each other, as her shirt slides off her shoulders. My mouth goes dry.

“Mmmmm,” she moans as she grinds against me. I’m straining against my pants, I want to be inside her, feel her tighten around every inch I have to give.

“Let me in,” I whisper.

“I have,” she breathes.

“I want all of you, every part of who you are, all of it.”

“I’ll give you everything.” Her words crack against my ears.

“I’m here, for you. Let go and let me in Rose.”

Suddenly, as if she’s been waiting for someone to ask for every part of who she is, as if the one stone blocking the rush of a river becomes dislodged . . . she breaks down against me.

“I never asked for this life. I just want to be free, I want to give you everything I am,” she answers, her body contradicting her words. “I don’t want to fear losing you to my past. I want to believe I deserve you. I want to trust your words, I want to make love to you, but I’m so f*cking scared you’ll never forgive me for who I was.”

Her words slice deep across my heart. This woman, someone who cuts me down to the core of who I am, is still worried, after seven months of being away from each other, being separated by fear and through all that, never sharing herself with me entirely is frightened of me leaving her. Fuck that. Enough is enough. Maybe I can’t tell her how much I love her, maybe the words just aren’t getting through. Maybe it just needs to be done without words, without fears dressing up like something that can save us, I can’t take it anymore. I need to show her how much I love her.

I slip out from under her. Never looking away I pull her into my chest. She doesn’t fight me, instead I feel her melt against me. I hold her for what feels like an eternity before I speak.

“I want to show you something.” I grab her hand and guide her into the bedroom. She’s nervous, her palm is damp as we stand in the doorway.

“This is our bedroom. Yes, our bedroom. Our bed, our closet and our dresser. The space saved just for you and me. You’re the only woman I want here, sharing this with me.”

Her eyes widen when she sees the picture of us on the dresser, her chin quivering, her body shaking, as she drags her fingers across the bed. “When you decide to close this door, our pasts don’t exist. Whatever was, stays was. Whatever becomes . . . is. I’ve spent the last seven months discovering who I am, and I discovered that I’m deeply and madly in love with a woman who isn’t defined by her past.” I wrap my arms around her. “It’s only you and me, no past, no future, we only exist in the moment right now. I love you Rose Newton, more than I’ve loved anyone in my life. I won’t leave you. I’ll do everything in my power to convince you that you’re worthy of being loved by me as much as I am worthy of being loved by you.”

“Just stop it! Just . . . stop.” She sniffles, wiping the tears from her cheeks and nudges her lips up under my chin before I lower my mouth against hers. “It won’t be easy. I’ve got a lot of baggage,” she whispers against my flesh.

“I promise you, I’ll carry each and every bag you have,” I answer. Dragging my hands up to either side of her face, I look into her beautiful earthy eyes.

“I complicate things, make them unbearable sometimes.” She makes an excuse before she swallows hard.

“I can handle complicated things. I’m persistent, remember?” Every excuse she flings at me, I counter with the perfect answer. I drag my thumbs across her lips, asking without the wasted words to kiss her. I lean down and brush my lips against hers, she shivers and that’s when I know she’s run out of excuses.

“I love you, my Complicated Rose.”

“I love you, Persistent Shane.”

“Will you stay here with me tonight . . . and every night after that?” She looks up at me, her eyes beaming as a silence rolls between us. Tears prick and clutter her eyelashes as I pull her into my chest.

“It’s up to you, only you,” I add.

She leans back in my embrace, just enough to look at me. I watch as peace floods her expression, her eyes vacillate back and forth before forever passes between us. She pitches me a slight smile just as she gives me a delicate nod, reaches behind her and closes our bedroom door. My mind responding before my body, I believe the most beautiful woman in the entire world just told me she’s found what she’s been looking for her entire life . . . home.





A Moment of Reflection and Thanks . . .

WRITING A BOOK isn’t a solitary journey. There are so many hands, that touch it. This book was touched by so many beautiful people. People who gave me their hearts, their talent and their time. Nothing is work if you decide to approach it from your creative process. But, man, oh, man, there were parts of BROKEN GIRL that nearly killed me and yet others that made me fall back in love with the process of writing again.

BROKEN GIRL is my quantum leap into understanding how intimate, personal, damaging and healing writing truly is. Parts of this book pull from the personal wounds that scar my soul and other parts of this book are experiences I’ve plucked from the fray of humanity. I dove deep into the good, bad and ugly, splaying myself open while letting the world take a gander.