Sometimes Moments (Sometimes Moments, #1)(71)
“I need you to hate me, Peyton,” he begged.
She shook her head, their foreheads not breaking contact. “I can’t give you that.”
He squeezed his eyelids tight and said, “I know, Oliver. This is why I have to leave. I—”
Reaching up, Peyton took the phone out of his hand and held it to her ear. “Oliver, Callum will call you back in the morning. We need to talk about the fire and your wedding,” she said.
“Wait, Peyton.” Oliver stopped her from hanging up. “Why can’t you hate him?”
Callum sat straight and pulled away from her, as if he knew what Oliver had asked. He seemed afraid of what she would say next as a forgiving plea swept his face.
Peyton stared in his lost and conflicted eyes before she answered, “Because I want to feel loved by Callum Reid, even if it’s only for a little while. I want his love more than I want to live another day. I want to be with him for as long as I can, because for the last four and half years, I’ve been deprived of his love and his touch. I can’t hate him because he’s the love of my life.”
Oliver sighed. “He’s never stopped loving you, even when he moved to the city. You were the girl whose picture was by his bedside table. Whatever happens, just know he loves you and has always put you first.”
Peyton hung up the phone and placed it on the couch. Then she peered up through her lashes to see Callum staring down at her. He looked tormented, like he was in his own version of hell. When Peyton stood up, she held out her hand to him. Callum rubbed his palms over his face then let out a groan.
She stepped forward, rested her hands on the back of his head, and brought him to her stomach. She hoped that this one embrace could show him that she’d be okay. That she would rather see him free than stay here in Daylesford. His arms were around the back of her legs, holding her tight.
“I shouldn’t have left you, Peyton,” Callum said and gazed up at her. “I’m so sorry. If I could go back, I would. I’d change it all. I wouldn’t have left you here on your own.”
Peyton moved her hands from the back of his head to his cheeks. “Don’t do that to yourself, Callum.”
“God, why can’t you hate me?” he exclaimed, frustrated.
“Because I’ve spent years trying to. I’m tired of holding you accountable, when the reality is that I didn’t fight for you to stay. I didn’t do enough to convince you that what we had was worth you staying,” she said, brushing his skin with her thumbs.
“You were worth staying for. You will always be worth staying for. I was just a coward. I couldn’t let you be held back by me. I had your happiness in mind when I left,” he explained, untangling his arms and standing up.
Callum cradled her face in his hands before he brought his mouth as close to hers without touching. Placing her hands on his waist as she held him to her.
“Leaving you, Peyton... I was like the after events of a revolution. I was liberated, but I was lost. I had no direction in my life. But when I came back, my sad and lonely life made sense. Life is better with you in it, Peyton. It always has been,” he revealed before his lips lightly touched hers.
“Thank you for letting me have sometimes instead of never,” she said softly.
His lips brushed hers again, this time harder, more desperate. Open kisses that slowly tore away the loneliness of her heart and replaced it with need and desire. Her fingers dug into the side of him as his tongue found hers, moving and sucking, and she found it impossible to breathe.
Callum’s lips moved back and he pressed his forehead to hers, panting. “Peyton, you’re trying to mask the pain of losing the hotel with sex.”
She shook her head. “I’m not in as much pain as you think I am, Callum.”
“Pey—”
“No,” she interrupted. “I know what it’s like to lose it all. It hurt to see it burn down, but it is nothing compared to the feeling of losing my parents. And it comes nowhere close to losing you. That broke the person I was.”
“I don’t think it’s hit you yet. And I’m okay with you blaming me, Peyton.”
Her heart squeezed. She couldn’t and wouldn’t blame Callum for the fire. He had been in her bed when it’d happened. If she were going to blame anyone, it would be Jay. He had stood back. He’d influenced the firefighters. He’d let it burn to ash.
“I don’t want sex from you, Callum.”
His breathing hitched. And she pushed her body into his.
“I want you to make love to me. I need you to make me feel better. I need this sometimes moment with you.”
“Couch?” he asked before his lips crashed into hers, making her both her stomach and heart dip.
She answered each of his kisses with her own desperate ones, the need in her growing. She needed the pleasure he drew out of her. She needed the explosions and the momentary period of forgetfulness. She needed him and his heartbeat on her skin.
His lips moved from hers and trailed slowly from her jaw to her neck. She let out a soft moan, unable to suppress it.
“Bed,” she let out. Her heart beat hard against her chest as she cupped his face, making sure his eyes were on hers when she said, “Make love to me in my bed. No teasing or games. Just make love to me.”
“I love you so much,” he said with a hint of hesitation.