Nicole Edwards - Travis

Jerking his gaze back to the churning waves in front of him, the agitated water resembled the storm of emotions that was building inside of his chest.

He doubted she would understand, but walking away from her had been the hardest thing he’d ever done. There were many nights that he wondered where they would be today if he’d had the guts to talk to her rather than run away. If he would have accepted himself for who he was back then, rather than thinking she was too damn young and naïve to understand. To this day, Travis wished he had told her that she was everything to him, but still not enough. Except that would’ve hurt her so much more than his walking away.

He knew Kylie. He knew she wouldn’t have been able to understand, and she damn sure wouldn’t have been able to share him. Or herself.

If Travis thought for one second he would be able to accept that he could be happy shutting off that part of him that needed something more than she was even equipped to give him, he would’ve stayed with her. That was why he married her in the first place.

He wanted to be the man she needed. He wanted to be her man period.

He just wasn’t.

“You should’ve trusted me. You could have told me before you married me.” Kylie’s whisper was loud in the enclosed truck.

Turning to face her, Travis felt that ever present anger bubbling to the surface. “Trusted you? Do you really think this was about trust? Darlin’, you can’t even begin to understand what I’ve gone through since I left you that day. It was better for you, I promise.”

“What was better for me? That you married me and then left me completely alone? That you let me fall in love with you so deeply that my heart actually hurt for months after that? You can tell yourself whatever you want to make it easier for you, but you’re delusional, Travis Walker.”

Travis couldn’t resist, he jolted across the seat, pulling her against him and gripping the back of her head, holding her so that she had to look him straight in the eyes. The feel of her silky hair as it grazed the back of his knuckles was pure torture. As was seeing the sudden uncertainty in her eyes.

Letting his mouth linger just above her lips, he closed his eyes and inhaled the sweetest fucking woman he’d ever had the pleasure of touching. When he felt as though he could control himself, he opened his eyes again and looked at her.

“I wanted you more than my next fucking breath, Kylie. I wanted to bury myself in your body and never let you go. I wanted you beside me for the rest of my damn life.”

“But you couldn’t stay with me, right? Because I wasn’t what you needed? So, if that’s the case, why did you tell me you aren’t gay? I saw the way you kissed Gage last night,” she sounded breathless, but there was no fear in her eyes.

Damn her. She was just as fearless now as she was back then. Kylie Prescott was feisty, and she made his fucking dick hard with how much she thought she knew and how much she believed she could handle. And that was the key word – thought. Kylie might pretend to be bulletproof, but what he was about to tell her was going to be the true test.

“Believe what you want, Kylie, but I’m telling you, I’m not gay.”

“No?” Her breath tickled his lips and Travis wanted to press his mouth to hers, to taste her again, but he knew as soon as he did, he’d never be able to let her go. And he wasn’t any different now than he was then. He was still the same man. The one who wanted more than he deserved.

“Making love to you healed my soul, Kylie. Being with you was more than I ever dreamt it to be, but it… wasn’t enough.”

Kylie tried to jerk away from him, but he didn’t let her go. His hands cupped the back of her head, his thumbs scraping along her jaw gently as he forced her to look at him.

Easing closer, Travis let his lips lightly brush hers, hearing her breath catch, absorbing the tremor in her fingers where they were latched onto his forearms. “Would I want to kiss you if I was gay, Kylie? Would I want to strip you naked and spread you out right here on this seat and bury my tongue in your pussy?”

Her eyes widened, but Kylie didn’t say a word. He could practically feel her body overheating as his words turned her on. He knew they did. She could deny it all day long, but Travis got to her.

“I’m not gay. I’m bisexual, Kylie.” The words spilled from his mouth on a rush, and his gut twisted as he waited for her reaction. Waited for her to push him away.

“Bisexual? Meaning you…” She obviously didn’t understand what he was trying to tell her. Or maybe she did, and she just couldn’t process the words.

“There has always been a part of me that longed for more than just one woman or one man,” he explained, watching to see if the light would come on, if she would realize what he was saying.

“I wasn’t enough,” she whispered, but she wasn’t asking a question. It sounded as though she were working the details out in her head. “You mean you’re interested in a…”

“Threesome. Polyamory. Ménage. Call it whatever you want.”

Travis waited for a reaction. Waited for her to say something. He expected her to tell him he was crazy and that the only thing he was interested in was fucking other people.

She said none of those things.

Pulling back, Travis allowed a little space between them, but he kept his hands where they were. He wasn’t ready to let go of her. Not yet. Not after ten miserable years of aching to feel her soft, smooth skin against his fingertips. A full decade of trying to lose himself in both women and men, desperate to find even a trace of what he found with this woman.

God help him. He had to kiss her.

Without thinking, Travis leaned closer, letting his mouth brush hers gently, his tongue easing between the seam of her lips until she opened for him. As soon as the invitation presented itself, Travis delved inside, pulling her to him as he shifted so that he could go deeper, taste more of her. The soft little moan that tore from her throat spurred him on, and it wasn’t until she whimpered that Travis pulled away.

As he continued to cup her head in his hands, they stared at one another. The look of disbelief on her face contradicted the hazy lust he could see in her eyes. She wanted him. She wanted him as much as he wanted her, but she was more cautious than he was.

“You couldn’t tell me this before you married me?” she asked long seconds later, her voice dripping with incredulity.

Bucket. Ice water. Thank you very much.

That caused him to let her go.

“And what would you have told me, Kylie? Would you have put your arms around me and said that it was all right for me to feel like that? That you’d be willing to share me? Share yourself with another man?”

That statement hit home for her because her eyes widened as realization dawned. He gave her a minute to work out the details in her head before he asked his next question.

“Why didn’t you divorce me years ago? Why now?”

Even when Kylie glared at him with contempt, she was still the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. From her heart shaped face, her pretty bow shaped lips, and hair so golden brown it sparkled, the woman was heart wrenchingly beautiful.

Kylie glanced down at her hands, then back at his face.

“I didn’t have the money,” she mumbled, glancing out the window as she paused on a breath. “I didn’t want to see you again. I did want to see you again. I... You name it, Travis. I came up with one excuse after another for the last decade. I didn’t want to face you again because I wanted to see you so bad it physically hurt.” She paused. “It still hurts.”

Her honesty humbled him. She sounded sad, yet stoic. “I’ve thought about you every day since then,” he told her, glancing out the front window so that he didn’t have to look into her eyes as he said the words. She had a way of slaying him with just a look.

No one who knew him would ever say that he was much of a talker. In fact, Travis was pretty sure he’d said more today than he had in the entire past week. Kylie brought that out in him. He remembered the times they spent together when they were both much younger and although he didn’t share much about himself personally, he found it easy to talk to her about certain things. It just felt right.

Back when he first met Kylie, he spent hours talking to her. They talked about where she grew up, her parents, his parents, her sister. They talked about so many things, yet he somehow managed to make sure she never got too close. He’d been young, stupid and downright scared shitless about the military. Not that he would admit the last part to anyone. And when he found himself in the arms of the sweetest, most beautiful woman in the entire world, he allowed himself to think it could be forever. That she might just be the one woman who could change him. At the very least, the one woman who could accept him.

Except, he never gave her the chance.

So, instead of letting Kylie into his life, he managed to keep her out. Entirely. Looking at her now, Travis couldn’t help but wonder why. Ever since Gage brought her to Kaleb’s house, he’d been wondering the same thing.

Just the sight of her stirred up old feelings that he would prefer to keep inside the closed book that contained all of the stories of his past. The problem was, there were so many feelings coursing through him, Travis didn’t know which way was up. His ideas on how a relationship – his relationships – would work weren’t the same as others.

As much as he wanted to think a relationship with Kylie could be normal, Travis knew that wasn’t the case.

Wanting her had never been the issue.

Keeping her was.

♀♂

Kylie’s head was spinning. Between the sexy, seductive scent of him washing over her, along with the explanation she had waited to hear for so long, and then the kiss…

Kylie suddenly – and inexplicably – wanted to jump his bones.

There was a myriad of emotions churning in her – sadness, hope, frustration. Desire. Yes, definitely lots and lots of the last one. They all swirled together confusing her about what she was doing here. How she got here. And it had nothing to do with the drive from Killeen.

Just that morning, she woke up with the sole purpose of seeing Travis so she could understand what made him walk out on her all those years ago. The bottom of her life had been ripped out from beneath her feet just three weeks into what was supposed to be a marriage to the man she’d given her heart and soul to. And now she was here, reliving it all over again.

Although life altering, his explanation was not what she thought it would be. She had expected him to admit that he was gay and to tell her that he was in love with Gage – though she didn’t think that would’ve been the case back then.

That didn’t happen.

No, this was Travis Walker. He had to be much more complicated than that.

Without a doubt, she knew she should be coming to terms with the end of their decade long ghost of a relationship. Travis was offering her explanations, but for some reason, hope was swelling in her chest, making her want things she knew she shouldn’t want. The kiss didn’t help because… well, because it rocked her world even if she had to pretend otherwise.

If it weren’t for all of the things she had recently learned about Travis, thanks to the many articles she’d read on the internet, Kylie would swear he was the same man she met so long ago. Handsome, surly, and vulnerable beneath all of the rugged exterior. And to top it off, from what she could tell, Travis was just as confused now as he was then.

Only now he wanted to talk.

And she was hanging on every word, trying to wrap her mind around what he was saying. His reasoning was not at all what she expected. Granted, Travis was still just as cryptic as always. Despite the additional pieces she was trying to work into the scrambled puzzle of the worst time of her life, Kylie still had a hard time rationalizing what he was saying.

Saddened by her wayward thoughts, she stared out the window, watching as the sky darkened even more, the dark water in front of her crashed against the bank as the wind picked up, a storm threatening. The tension inside of the truck seemed to be churning in much the same way.

She wasn’t sure where this conversation was going, but at least she knew one thing for sure... It didn’t matter how much time had separated the two of them, Kylie still wanted Travis with a passion she couldn’t deny.