Spellbinding Love, page 8
The shock of cold knocked the air out of her lungs. Giroud’s nails scraped her face and she fought him, trying to tighten her arms around his middle and push off from the bottom. She broke through and gulped down air, but then Giroud’s writhing pushed her back under and she choked on the cold, brackish water. It filled her mouth and lungs and made it hard to think. Spots bloomed in her eyes and Giroud scrabbled frantically against her hold.
Her feet found the bottom. She planted them as firmly as she could, knowing this was probably her only chance. With one push she surfaced, gasping. Giroud’s wet fur pressed against her neck, and she managed enough momentum to heave him back onto the thicker ice shelf. He scurried away and whimpered, turning around with his tail tucked between his legs to watch her crawl out. The ice broke under her twice more as she staggered back towards the shore, but without Giroud’s weight and panic she was able to climb out and keep going.
Katie had never been so cold. She was shaking, trembling and fumbling as she pulled on her parka and picked up Giroud. He was shaking too, his entire body vibrating against hers. She stumbled back towards the house blindly. Her brain was barely working, numbed from fear and cold. She dropped Giroud twice, despite trying to keep him bundled into her coat, and almost didn’t make it inside because her hands refused to twist the doorknob properly.
But even after stripping off her clothes and grabbing a towel to dry him off, she knew something was wrong. She wasn’t warming up and Giroud wasn’t either, and she couldn’t be trusted to drive. With shaking hands she picked up her phone.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Molly Xiong roared into her driveway in her pickup truck just moments after Katie hung up. The seventeen year old had been the only one home but had been out her door almost immediately, and she helped Katie into the truck and hefted Giroud in after her. She paused to help pile warm, dry blankets over them both and then she was back in the cab. She sped off towards town but flatly refused to go to the vet first. “The hospital is closer,” she insisted over Katie’s pleas. “I’ll drop you off and take him straight there, I promise.”
“But—“
“No buts,” Molly said firmly, checking her blind spot with the deliberateness of a new driver, but she was pushing the speed limit. “It’s the fastest way to get you both help.”
Her brain foggy, Katie gave up and cuddled Giroud to her chest even though his weight was crushing her legs. “Hang on, boy,” she whispered through threatened tears. “We’re gonna warm you up, I promise.”
Her eyes blurred and she lost track of time, but it couldn’t have been more than a few minutes before Molly pulled to a stop. “We’re here,” Molly said and hopped out. She pulled the door open— Katie’s fingers were too thick and the handle too hard to grasp, it seemed— and helped Katie squeeze out from under Giroud. “I’ll go as fast as I can, I promise,” Molly vowed, and tore out of the parking lot. Katie staggered into the ER, blanket around her shoulders like a cape, and within minutes she was bundled into a room in a frenzy of activity. There are some advantages to small towns. Ambulances might take too long, but once you’re here the ERs aren’t full, she thought dully. She kept her phone clutched tightly in her fist, desperate for news, while they helped her fully undress. A nurse wrestled the phone away from her to get an IV started, along with a warming blanket. Katie almost ripped her IV out when her phone buzzed from the chair across the room.
“Hold on honey,” the nurse said.
“Please, he’s all I have,” she begged, and the nurse relented, handing it over. The IV dripped something cold into her veins and the doctor was talking to her, but she couldn’t focus on anything but Giroud. It took Katie three tries to swipe across the screen, her fingers still fat and clumsy with cold.
Molly Xiong
5:13pm
With the vet now. He’s going to be fine.
Katie let out a long, slow breath and allowed the nurse to pry the phone from her hand. “We called your emergency contact,” she said, and Katie just barely had time to register that that meant Micah before slipping into blissful unconsciousness.
Micah was sitting in a chair to her left, staring at his phone, when she woke up. “My mom’s with Giroud,” he said before she could speak. “She sent Molly home and is staying with him now, but sounds like they might want to keep him overnight. If not, she’ll take him back to our place.”
It took Katie a few moments to realize our place meant his mom and dad’s house, not her house. Because of course she didn’t share that with Micah.
She’d ruined so much.
“So he’s okay?”
“Sounds like it,” he said, and she couldn’t get a read on his tone. Whether that was a side effect of everything that had just happened or because she’d broken them beyond repair she didn’t know. “Mind telling me what the hell happened? The hospital just said you had hypothermia.”
“Wait, isn’t it a Thursday? That’s a big night for you at the restaurant. You didn’t have to come.”
He gave her a look. “The hospital calls and says you’re in the ER; I’m going to come. That’s the deal. So what happened?”
Katie looked up at the ceiling and tried to count the holes in the ceiling tiles. “Giroud fell in the lake,” she said, the fear of it finally setting in now that the danger was past. “He was chasing a rabbit but he’s a hell of a lot fatter than a rabbit and fell in.” Her eyes welled up and she swallowed hard, the dual pain of almost losing Giroud and having lost Micah too much to bear.
“So you went in after him.”
“Of course I did,” she said, twisting her head to look at him. “What else could I do?”
“I didn’t mean it like that— I wasn’t criticizing,” he said, and maybe it was her imagination but his voice sounded softer. “I just meant, of course you would.”
“He’s family,” she insisted, stubborn tears stinging her eyes despite her best efforts. She never cried, but lately she was turning into a goddamn fountain.
“Hey hey hey,” Micah said, standing to move closer. “He’s going to be fine. We’ll— you’ll have that tough old boy around for years yet.”
Katie caught his slip but didn’t let herself read too much into it. Micah had been there the day she adopted Giroud. Hell, Micah had debated names with her for a solid week before she settled on Giroud. Giroud was almost as much his as he was hers. It was only natural he’d refer to him like that.
Like they were a family.
A nurse came in to check her vitals and Micah moved back to his chair. She missed his closeness and wanted to ask him to stay, but the request caught in her throat. You don’t get to ask for that. After the nurse said she was being discharged, Micah helped her out of bed. He held her elbow firmly, his warm, broad fingers burning into her skin, and she hated it when he let go. Almost as much as she hated herself for how things had turned out between them.
Micah was silent as she checked out of the hospital and followed him to his car. She shivered in the cold, more from the memory than any real sensation, and he automatically turned the heat all the way up. “Can we go to the vet?” she asked.
Micah shook his head. “Mom says he’s sleeping and she’s headed home. But Dr. Garcia said we can come get him first thing tomorrow morning.”
That little we gave her the extra boost she needed. “So you’ll stay with me tonight?”
A muscle in his jaw flickered. Micah stopped at the red light on Main and drummed his thumbs on the steering wheel. “Yeah,” he said finally. “I’ll stay.”
“I know you must have a lot—“
“It’s fine,” he interjected. “I’ll stay.”
But the easy camaraderie of his previous nights in her house eluded them. They were both stiff and awkward, bumbling around each other and knocking elbows in the hallway. The cats were in a tizzy without Giroud and the house felt emptier without him.
Micah stopped in the hallway and opened up the linen closet. “Did you move the extra sheets?” he asked.
“Those are probably in the basement in the dryer,” she admitted. “Why?”
His eyes darted away uncomfortably. “I, uh, assumed I’d go sleep in the guest room.”
“Why?”
“You know why,” he said, resigned.
She did know why, truth be told. But she was weak and tired and fundamentally selfish, and she wanted him. She wouldn’t sleep well alone, because normally she had Giroud snoring and kicking next to her, and whenever she closed her eyes she heard the crack of the ice splitting and his panicked, gut-wrenching yelps. But she swallowed down her fear and nodded. “I’ll go get them,” she said, and turned towards the stairs.
She was halfway down when he spoke. “Don’t bother,” he said, and she once again hated the fact that she couldn’t read him.
“Are you sure?”
Silence fell, broken by Gertrude mewling for attention. “Yeah,” he said finally. “I think— yeah,” he said, illuminating nothing.
Micah was already in her bed when she returned from the bathroom and climbed in. “You sure this is okay?” she asked again.
He took a shaky breath. “Yeah, I— I think I need this too,” he said hoarsely.
Katie rolled to her side to face him. “You do?”
“I thought I lost you,” he whispered, and reached out to touch her cheek hesitantly. “Do you know how scary that is?”
“I do, yeah,” she said. She had spent years being terrified that she would lose him like she had lost everyone else in her family. She had imagined Micah’s death so many times she’d lost count. She knew exactly how scary it was, because she’d lived it. She just never imagined there was another option, one where he was fine but out of reach.
“Hey, about— about the stuff I said other day,” he started.
“Don’t worry about it,” she said, because she wasn’t sure she could handle this conversation right now. “Emotions were high. We both said things we didn’t mean.”
“Well, I meant some of it,” he said meaningfully, and her stomach twisted. “But other stuff— I was out of line. I’m sorry for putting all of that on you. My feelings aren’t your problem and I shouldn’t have done that.”
“I’m sorry too,” she said. There was so much more to say, but she was glad to have him with her even if it felt tenuous. She took his hand and rolled so she was tucked tightly under his arm. She pressed his hand above her heart and he let out a shaky breath against her neck.
“Thank you,” he whispered.
Katie squeezed her eyes shut and nodded. It was easier to breathe with his weight behind her. Her bed was still missing Giroud, but she felt more whole than she had in months.
CHAPTER NINE
Katie awoke to the familiar sound of Micah’s slow, even breaths. Gertrude was curled by her feet, eyeing them both warily, and then she hopped down and sauntered out of the room, Geraldine close on her heels. Katie rolled over to look at him, his face soft the way it always was when he was asleep. He had a few days of stubble glinting in the weak December light, and Katie reached out and touched his cheek. She let her finger feather over the blondish-copper bristles, tracing his jaw and the cleft in his chin.
A sleepy slice of blue blinked at her. “Morning,” he rasped. Usually, when Micah spent the night, the next morning was all business. They rarely got up at the same time, and they certainly never woke up like this; never luxuriated in her bed together. That would have been crossing a line, but those lines were all blurry and confused now anyway.
“Hey,” she said, her fingers still trailing across his face, mapping his cheekbones and earlobe and the thick, corded muscle of his neck.
“Katie,” he whispered.
But she was sick of talking. She was sick of talking and fighting, and she didn’t want to lose him ever again. So she leaned over and pressed her lips to his. It was light and quick and she pulled back almost immediately, worried that she’d overstepped, but Micah cuffed his hand around the back of her neck and crushed her against him.
It stole her breath away, kissing him like that. She explored his lips, full and soft, and wondered what else there was that she didn’t know about him. She didn’t know that he liked to kiss slowly, like he was savoring her, or that his tongue would brush against hers in a delicate dance. She gave herself into the wave of sensations, his hips rocking into her and his hot, bare skin under her roaming hands. She’d seen the play of muscles in his back but she’d never felt them before. It was totally new and yet utterly familiar, just like feel of his stubble against her jaw.
She nipped at his lower lip, testing. In a flash he was on top of her, his morning erection hard against her panties. Katie keened, arching her back, and he attached his lips to her pulse point. Micah smelled like he always did, like fresh bread and basil and him, and she let her mind go blank. It was astonishing how right this felt, how much she wanted this. She’d wanted this for years and never let herself even consider it— had told herself it wasn’t possible, that he deserved someone else, someone better. Giving in was terrifying and freeing. She wished she’d been this brave years ago. She nuzzled his neck and sunk her nails into his shoulders, reveling in finally having what she never let herself want.
Katie rolled him to his back and pulled her nightgown off, baring her breasts. Micah looked up at her, stunned. She knew how he felt— like the world had turned upside down, but also like everything was suddenly in focus after years of blurry, indistinct flashes. She tangled their fingers together, leaning down to find his lips. This kiss grounded her, but when he swept his tongue across her lower lip she fell back into oblivion. He ran his hands through her hair and smoothed them down her back, bumping across the divots of her spine.
Katie rolled her hips forward, the thin barrier of her panties rubbing against her clit with just the right amount of friction. She was wet and getting wetter, and after one more rock forward Micah shifted them again and pinned her to the bed. It was hard to breathe, seeing him look at her like that, so she squeezed her eyes shut. But his every touch felt like something she’d been missing in her life, like nothing had been right until that very moment. His weight was heavy but good and she wrapped her arms around his neck to pull him closer. He peeled her panties off with one hand, the other roughly palming her breast, and when he sealed their lips together again his other hand found her slit.
She moaned and spread her legs wider, his rough, callused fingers teasing her folds. He was gentle— too gentle— but when she bucked impatiently into his touch she felt him grin against her skin. Micah pushed two fingers into her, stretching her and filling her, but it wasn’t enough. She moaned again and dug her nails into his shoulder, urging him on.
His thrusts were quick and hard, his thumb rough against her clit. He bent his head and attached his mouth to her nipple, his teeth scraping across her skin in a way that made her shudder. It was too much and not enough and everything in the world, all at once. She keened and thrashed in his arms, helpless to stop the need coiling inside of her. He surrounded her in the most delicious way possible, and when he curled his fingers inside of her she was so worked up it took hardly any time at all before she was falling apart, her peak roaring through her uncontrollably.
If they stopped, even for a second, her brain would start working again, so she rolled to her side and rifled through her bedside drawer to find a long-buried condom. Micah had shucked his boxers by the time she found one and ripped the packet open, and he rolled it on and pulled her astride him so quickly she knew he shared her fears of reality.
She found his eyes and sank down on him. Again it was too much and not enough, and for the first time she realized it might never be enough— she might never, ever have enough of Micah, and the thought was simultaneously exhilarating and terrifying. His eyes locked onto hers and she knew he felt the same, scared and elated and desperate all at once.
She gave herself the space of a few heartbeats to adjust to the stretch of him inside of her and then started moving; rough, eager thrusts that set her breasts bouncing and made his jaw drop open with want. She rode him hard and fast even as a voice in her brain said slow down, slow down, the eternal fear of losing him still a soft flicker of panic in the base of her skull. But this wasn’t about thinking, it was about feeling— feeling him swell inside of her, seeing the blush spread down his chest, learning how his chest felt under her palms. Micah’s hands settled at the flare of her hips and helped her move, his fingers digging into the soft flesh so hard she wondered if she would always bear his marks. She liked the idea, she realized, and as if he could read her mind he redoubled his grip, sure to leave bruises behind.
Katie planted her hands on either side of his head and snapped her hips harder. They traded kisses with strained, craning necks, his hand once again smoothing up and down her back. The calluses on his hands made her shiver as she moved, pulling him as deep inside of her as she could. She didn’t think it was possible but her need started building again, tightening and spiking with each thrust. Micah’s thumb pressed against her clit, sloppy and harsh and perfect, and he pulled one last peak from her, trembling and shaking. Micah came just heartbeats later, groaning as he released himself inside of her.
For a few seconds, Katie felt at peace; happy.
And then she saw Micah’s face.
