You Are My Air: Breathless Book 1 (17 page)

An understanding passed between us. We were both terrified for different reasons, but we didn't have to be scared alone anymore. We could choose a different path. We could see where this was leading, and take a chance on this thing that was growing between us. We could take this as slow or as fast as we wanted. There were no rules. This could be whatever we wanted it to be.

I pulled Natalie into my arms and held her tight. "I don't want to be alone anymore," I whispered into her ear, my voice breaking a little.

"Me either," she whispered back. "And now we don't have to be. We don't have to listen to the fear."

We stood there holding each other for a long time. The only sounds were our breathing and the wind blowing through the leaves. Then Natalie's stomach growled loudly, and she giggled.

"I guess your stomach is ready to go," I said with amusement.

"You do owe me breakfast." She leaned back and smiled at me.

"That I do." I gave her a gentle kiss on her soft lips.

I led her out of the woods and back to the path. There was no one in sight as we emerged out of the tree-line. I put my arm around Natalie's shoulders as we walked back to my car, our conversation light and flirtatious again. I didn't know where this relationship was going yet, but we were both equally invested in finding out now. I was still afraid, but I didn't have to try to hide it from her anymore. It felt like a weight had been lifted from me, and for the first time in a very long while, I felt hope.

**********

I showered first when we got back to my house, planning on starting breakfast while Natalie got cleaned up. Part of me wanted Natalie to shower with me, but I needed a little time alone to try to process what had happened between us in the woods this morning. By the time I came back out to the living room, I was feeling invigorated and filled with a happiness I hadn't felt in a very long time.

I walked in wearing jeans and a heather blue ribbed sweater. Natalie was sitting on my couch with my
Watchman
graphic novel open in her lap. She looked up and smiled appreciatively as she eyed me up and down.

"What do you think?" I asked her, motioning toward the book in her hands as I sat down next to her.

"It's pretty good." She set it on the coffee table. "Wasn't this a movie?"

"It was." I smirked. "It's also arguably one of the most influential graphic novels of all time."

She eyed me up and down again. "I had no idea nerds could be this hot."

"I'm not going to let you read it, if you keep calling me a nerd." I snatched my book off the coffee table to get it out of her reach.

"Hey," she whined. "I was reading that."

"You're not if you can't appreciate it," I told her with a wry smile.

"Of course, I appreciate it," she said in indignation. "I'm a graphic artist. The artwork is fantastic."

"Well..." I eyed her suspiciously. "I guess you can read it then." I gave it back to her reluctantly.

"Thank God," she sighed out in relief. "I thought I was going to have to read your psychiatric journal again. It's nerdy
and
boring."

"You keep this up and you'll get nothing but dry toast for breakfast." I glared at her.

"I thought you said you liked it when I was a bad girl."

"I said a bad girl, not a
mean
girl," I clarified as a grin spread across my lips.

"I'll keep that in mind, nerd." She smiled back at me then leaned forward and kissed the tip of my nose.

I cradled her face in my hand, my smile softening. "Go get cleaned up and I'll have breakfast ready by the time you get out."

"Okay." She nodded and went to get up, but I pulled her down onto my lap. I grabbed her braid in my fist, pulled her head back, and gave her a long deep kiss that made her moan and relax into my arms with a heavy sigh. Then I lifted her onto her feet as I stood up and shooed her out of the room with a swat on her ass. I watched her disappear down the hallway, smiling after her like an idiot.

I made French toast and bacon for Natalie. I heard her phone ringing in her purse a few times while I cooked, and wondered who was trying so hard to get a hold of her. When I was just about finished, my phone started ringing. I grabbed it up off the counter where I had left it, and stilled as I saw the name on the screen. I glanced toward the doorway, then sighed and answered the call.

"Hi, Jenny." It was Jenny Purcell, Andy's sister and my occasional sex partner. We had been hooking up off and on since the day that I went to Purcell Auto to look at my Audi months ago. Jenny and Andy both worked there. I don't think Andy knew that we had been hooking up, or if he did he didn't care.

"Hey, sexy," she said in a low seductive voice. Jenny and I always had a good time when we got together. She was wild and pretty much open to anything in bed. Plus, she had no interest in a relationship with me. It was purely physical and before I met Natalie, some of the best sex that I had ever had. "Do you have any plans tonight?"

"Um..." I trailed off. How do you tactfully break up with a fuck buddy? "I already have plans." My voice came out flat and monotone. I usually flirted right back with her, but now I realized I had lost all interest in ever seeing her again.

"O...kay," she replied, immediately picking up on my discomfort. She was just as observant as her brother and probably even smarter. "Maybe later this week we can get together?"

"I'm sorry, Jenny," I said apologetically. "I'm not going to be able to do that either. I sort of...I mean...well, there's this girl..."

"Ah," she said in understanding, laced with disappointment. "You met someone."

"I did." My discomfort slipped away as I talked about Natalie. "She's special and I like her a lot. I want to see where this is going, and I won't be able to see you anymore. I'm sorry, Jenny. I hope you're not angry. I know we weren't in a relationship or anything, but I do respect you, and I don't want any hard feeling between us." Especially, since I was close friends with her brother and her future sister-in-law.

"David," she answered in a gentle, understanding tone. "There's nothing to feel bad about. I never had any expectations that this would last forever. We had fun for a while, and that's all there was to it. I'm happy for you, and I hope it works out. You deserve to be happy."

"Thank you, Jenny." I sighed in relief. No matter how much I had whored around; I had tried to be as much of a gentleman as I could. It didn't always work out, and I'm sure that I pissed off quite a few women, but at least this time no one was angry at me.

"Your welcome, David. I'll see you around." Then she ended the call, and that was that. I laid my phone back down on the counter and let out a deep sigh, before I turned to see Natalie standing in the doorway into the kitchen.

"Hi," she said quietly as I stared at her guiltily, wondering how much she had heard. For the first time ever, I felt ashamed of all the random meaningless sex I'd been having for the last year and a half.

"Uh..." I felt a very different fear now, a fear that I'd lose Natalie. It blew the other fear out of the water and made me feel sick to my stomach. "About that call..."

"Was she your girlfriend?" Natalie asked as she walked further into the room and stopped across the kitchen island from me. Her eyes were unreadable and focused sharply on mine.

"No," I answered honestly. I wasn't going to lie to her, no matter the outcome.

"Have you slept with her or anybody else since we met?"

"No, Natalie," I told her with a shake of my head.

"Are you going to sleep with her or anybody else now?"

"Absolutely not," I said vehemently. "I only want you now, sweetheart." I was blown away by the stark truth of my own words. It was true. I didn't want anyone else. I had a feeling no one could ever measure up to her. Shockingly, I didn't feel any fear from those thoughts.

"Then it doesn't matter who that call was from," she said with certainty. I sighed. I couldn't let this stand. Maybe the who didn't matter, but she deserved to know the kind of man she was with.

"That may not matter, but there are some things about me that you need to know," I told her. Her face turned blank again as she nodded at me. "Let me get our breakfast, and we can talk while we eat. Okay?" I hoped to God this wasn't the last time I got to spend time with her. She nodded again and wordlessly came over to help me put the food on plates. We carried them out to the dining room next door, and I went back for the coffee and juice. We sat down and both of us fiddled with our coffees, adding cream and sugar, and generally procrastinating. Finally, I couldn't take it anymore.

"I was engaged about a year and a half ago," I announced, trying to keep my voice even after taking my first sip of my coffee. She looked up at me with a startled expression. "Our wedding was in less than a month when she left me. I was so messed up, that I joined Doctors Without Borders and ran away to the Ukraine for almost a year after that."

"You what?" she asked incredulously.

"Yeah," I answered. "I freaked out and fled the country. It was stupid in hind sight, but at the time I just couldn't be here where everything reminded me of Paige." I couldn't remember the last time I said her name aloud. I hadn't even planned on telling Natalie her name, but it just kind of slipped out.

"I'm so sorry." Natalie's eyes were filled with compassion. "I can't imagine how much that hurt. Who wouldn't want to run away after that?"

"I told myself that I would never trust another woman again," I continued, getting to the part I wasn't sure she'd accept so readily. "I started sleeping around, never letting myself get attached to anyone. I haven't had an actual girlfriend since Paige. I've been whoring around for the last year and a half, and I understand if that's something that's a deal breaker for you."

She looked down and stared at her plate for several moments. I held my breath. "Have you been tested for STDs?" It was a question I didn't expect just yet. At least not until she decided she was done with me. I should have been upfront about my sexual past from the beginning, but I guess that, deep down, I really had been ashamed of myself before today.

"Yes," I answered her in a subdued tone. "I was negative a week before I slept with you, and I haven't had sex with anyone else since that blood test."

"Did you get anyone pregnant?"

"No," I said in a flat tone.

"Then it doesn't matter either," she announced with a firm voice. "God knows I'm no saint, David. I've had meaningless sex before. I've even slept with a few random strangers a few times too. Who am I to judge you for your past? All we can do is deal with what we have now. I like you a lot, and I want to see where this leads. I'm not going anywhere."

I'd never felt such utter relief in my life, and I let out a deep breath. I hadn't realized how invested I was in this, until I thought that it might all slip away. "You don't know how happy that makes me, Natalie," I told her, putting myself our there, trusting her with things I never thought I could again.

She smiled at me with affection. "I'm negative too, by the way. And I'm on birth control."

"Are you saying you don't want to use condoms anymore?" I needed her to spell it out. I wasn't going to assume.

"That's exactly what I'm saying." She nodded, her smile turning wicked.

"I saw this conversation going in a completely different direction," I said with a laugh, then started inhaling what was left of my breakfast as fast as I could. She watched me with an amused and quizzical expression.

"What are you doing?"

"Trying to get to this unprotected sex I've been promised," I said through a mouthful of bacon.

She laughed loudly and opened her mouth to speak again, when her phone started ringing in the living room. She grimaced. "I'll call whoever that is back."

"It rang several times while you were in the shower."

"It's probably my mother," she grumbled as she reluctantly got up to answer it. From what Natalie had told me, her mother was a handful. My mom was so relaxed and carefree that I could only imagine what it was like for Natalie to deal with her emotional roller coaster of a mother. Natalie walked back into the dining room with her phone to her ear a moment later.

"Mom, stop," she said in exasperation. "I'm fine. I was in the shower when you called." Natalie paused, and I could hear her mother's almost hysterical voice, but couldn't make out the words. Natalie started pacing back and forth across the room. "I saw Ford yesterday, Mom. He's fine. In fact, he's already back to work." She paced some more. "No, I haven't forgotten about the charity dinner. I'll be there." Her pacing stopped abruptly, and she eyed me thoughtfully. "I'll figure something out, don't worry." There was another pause as her mom spoke some more. "I've got to go, Mom. I love you. I'll call you tomorrow. I promise." Natalie ended the call. Stress was radiating off of her now, and I had never seen her like this.

I rose from the table and walked up behind her, placing my hands on her shoulders. The muscles there were tight and filled with tension, so I dug my thumbs into them and started working out the tightness with firm circles. "Relax, sweetheart. You're all tense," I told her softly. She stiffened for a second then sighed into my ministrations. "That's it," I said as her body finally relaxed. I worked on her muscles in silence for a few minutes, just enjoying touching her. When I was finished, she turned to me with a grateful expression.

"Thank you," she said as she ran her hands up my chest. "I needed that. Talking to Mom is really stressful sometimes."

"What's this charity dinner you were talking about?" I asked curiously.

"Well, my mom works for the Spencer Foundation and there's this dinner I have to go to next weekend," she said in annoyed resignation. I had heard of the Spencer Foundation before. They were a big contributor to the hospital I worked at. "She's been badgering me about bringing a date for weeks now."

"I could go with you," I suggested, surprising myself.

"Really?" she asked, incredulously. "Are you sure? I don't want to freak you out by having to meet my family this soon. My mom is a bit a handful, and I don't want to scare you away."