Note to readers: Yes, this story also has been marked with the dreaded "red ball" NC-17 rating… I would rather err on the side of caution and this is what I have done by choosing that designation. The story is probably borderline, but…
Also, a warning: This story is a tearjerker, so put down the hot flash medication (joke), and pull up a box of Kleenex…you may need it.
And, as usual, all comments are graciously received at either my e-mail, or on the Message Board. I especially like hearing about what part you liked best…Thanks for all your continued support!
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Sam swallowed hard in response to Josie's suggestive statement. With her body leaning hard against his torso, Sam found himself staring right down the front of Josie's nightshirt. And this time, he could see a heck of a lot more than just the column of her neck. He could see right down to the magnificent cleavage Josie formed by pressing herself against him. Knowing he couldn't continue to stare at the tops of her breasts without wanting much, much more, he looked up, and –unfortunately for him—he met her eye.
Suddenly, Sam found he could not breathe as Josie's gaze ensnared him. A part of him realized that she was trying to seduce him, and he had to admit that she was doing a hell of a job. The deep, dark intensity of her eyes was more than he could stand. The desire alone he could have handled, but it was the look of overwhelming love and trust coupled with that desire that was proving to be his undoing. No one had ever looked at him in such a way before… It was powerful and moving—and completely alluring.
Josie smiled slightly as Sam stared up at her, entranced. 'So, he had told the truth after all,' she thought triumphantly. She leaned in so that her lips were just a fraction of an inch above his. In response, Sam's lips instinctively parted a little in preparation for her kiss. But, recalling his heated reaction to her caressing his neck earlier, she instead brushed her lips softly against his and then allowed them to trail right down to that hollow spot just above his collarbone.
Knowing the fight was already lost, but also knowing he had to try, Sam pleaded with Josie, "Please, Josie…don't do this…"
Josie lifted her head to make eye contact once again. She murmured huskily, "But Sam, I thought you liked it when I kissed you there…"
Sam sighed deeply. He knew this was a conversation he could not win. If he denied it, she would simply prove him wrong anyway. "You know that I do, but…" He stopped mid-sentence to suck in a harsh breath as Josie leaned back down to trail soft kisses along his collarbone. As her teasing continued, Sam felt his muscles go weak and his elbows start to give. He collapsed back onto the bed; unable to stop the waves of desire she was creating from eroding what was left of his self-control.
Josie leaned forward as Sam slipped backwards, unwilling to break the spell she was weaving around him. She slipped her left hand around his head to play with the soft hair at the nape of his neck. She braced her right forearm against the bed to maintain her balance. Listening to Sam's sighs and moans caused by her kisses only made her want more…although more of what, she could only imagine.
Sam lay on the bed, his eyes closed, savoring the exquisite sensations Josie was creating. He couldn't stop his left hand from sliding back into her hair and pressing her head softly downward against him. His right hand snaked around to her back and bunched in the material of her nightshirt as she continued to lick and kiss his sensitive neck. He knew that he was dangerously close to losing all semblance of control over himself again, but he could not fight it; the magnetism of Josie's touch was just too strong to resist.
At last, when Sam was groaning and gasping, Josie lifted her head to study his expression. That wild, smoldering, almost-out-of-control look was back, and she had put it there, she knew. The heady feeling of having that kind of power over Sam made her shiver in anticipation of what he might do next.
Sam closed his eyes. In his mind, he stood on the very edge of a precipice, knowing he was about to step over into the realm of no return. He tried with all his might to pull back, to step away from the danger and pull Josie back from it as well, but it was no use; he opened his eyes to stare at Josie. One look into her glorious, amazing eyes, so filled with love and desire for him, and he was hurtling through space without ever realizing he had taken that last step.
Forcefully, Sam pulled Josie's head down to his, kissing her passionately on the lips. He slid his right hand up under her nightshirt to rest between her shoulder blades, pushing her down into him so that there was no space between them. He could not see, could not think; he could only feel…his need for Josie driving him forward.
Josie reveled in Sam's loss of control; indeed, she did everything in her power to convey her need for him as well. Suddenly, Josie found herself on her back with Sam resting heavily on top of her. She had no recollection of how she had gotten there, but she was certainly not complaining. She loved the feel of his weight on her, holding her captive. She slid her hands into his shirt and up his spine, then lightly scraped her fingernails on the way back down.
Without even realizing it, Sam pressed his hips down against hers in response, deepening their kiss. He removed his hand from her head to slide it along her side, wrapping his fingers around her towards her back. Pulling his other hand out a little, it also now rested at her waist with his thumb up and fingers down. As he trailed kisses down to Josie's throat, he shifted his weight slightly to allow his hands to slide slowly up her body, pulling her shirt up along with them, exposing more and more of Josie's stomach and ribs. When his thumbs ran into resistance, he stopped, slowly moving them up and down over her soft skin as he listened to her sharp intake of breath and then her breathy moans in his ear.
For many moments, Sam continued his assault on Josie's neck and on her skin, feeling her response and desire from his caresses building quickly. Suddenly, from out of nowhere, the steady, clear voice of his conscience asked, "Have you even noticed where are you caressing, Sam?" He hadn't worried about it, hadn't even considered it, but as the voice echoed in his head, he pulled back to look down at Josie.
Sam's eyes traveled from her hair, mussed from his fingers repeatedly sliding through it; to her face, her eyes closed and her features contorted with pleasure; to the place where his hands rested on her body. Her shirt had been pushed way up from the movement of his hands. From beneath the edges of the bunched up material, he could just see the bottom curves of Josie's breasts…and his thumbs resting against them.
Sam sobered suddenly and instantly, as if someone had just thrown cold water in his face. He thought, shocked, 'What the hell am I doing!?" That thought was quickly followed by an even more shocked, 'Oh my God, what the hell have I done!?"
Sam yanked his hands away from Josie's breasts as if they had burned him. Then he jumped off the bed and away from her entirely, cursing himself mentally the whole time. He slowly backed himself toward the open doorway of her bedroom in shock.
Josie, who was startled and confused by Sam's sudden abandonment, sat up on the bed and looked at him curiously. "Sam?" she questioned breathlessly.
Sam's chest was heaving from his supreme effort at self-control. All his nerve endings were screaming for him to return to Josie, to return to bed. But this time, even though his hormones and desires were running rampant, his mind was clear. "Josie…" he panted, then paused to take in another calming breath. "I have to leave…please understand…" Then, with only a pleading hand out toward her as an explanation, he turned on his heel awkwardly and hurried from the room.
Sam strode quickly and purposefully from Josie's room to the spot in her apartment that was the farthest away from her bedroom: the kitchen. He was still breathing heavily from the effort of having left Josie's arms, Josie's bed, as well as from his own unfulfilled desire. He stopped at the sink, as if to stare out the window above it, but all he could see before him was Josie's stunned, hurt look as he'd left the room a moment ago. He leaned his elbows on the thin strip of counter in front of the sink and sank his head into his hands, leaning over dejectedly. His fingers curled around to bury themselves in the hair at his nape as he bent his head down in shame to stare straight down into the white porcelain basin.
He'd hurt her, damn it; he'd hurt her when that was the last thing he'd ever meant to do. His heart constricted in pain as hot tears stung his eyes, leaking out of the corners to stream down his cheeks and drip off his chin into the sink.
He desperately wanted to go to Josie: to apologize, to hold her, to sit down and make her understand why he had acted the way he had. But he knew that he couldn't trust himself around her right now. If he went back to Josie, he would only end up making things worse. Cursing his own weakness, he turned away from the window and leaned against the counter for a moment before allowing his body to slide lifelessly down the front of the cabinet to rest in a heap on the floor.
* * *
Josie stared at the empty doorway long after Sam had left. Her senses were still very addled from the intensity of Sam's caresses, so she could not even begin to fathom the reason for Sam's sudden departure. 'What happened?' she asked herself in shock. She debated the idea of going after Sam and demanding an explanation for his strange behavior, but quickly nixed the idea when she recalled the desperate look in his eyes as he left. Instinctively, something told her it would be better to leave him alone for a while.
After a few moments, Josie's presence of mind started to return, and with it came a whole jumble of emotions: pain, loss, betrayal, confusion, humiliation, and embarrassment. She missed Sam terribly; his kisses and embraces were so intoxicating. She felt lost and lonely without him. But she also felt humiliated. God! She had literally thrown herself at him! And what was even worse than that…he'd rejected her advances! She shook her head forlornly. What had ever made her think that "Josie Grossie" could seriously attract a man as incredible as Sam? Maybe she'd even disgusted him! He had practically run from the room…
'I ruined everything,' she thought miserably. She curled herself up into a ball on her side, pulling her knees up under her oversized shirt. Scalding tears coursed down her cheeks in rivulets, sinking into her pillow as they dripped steadily off her face. Silent sobs shook her frame as she continued to cry until she thought she had no tears left. In despair, she felt her heart breaking. She knew that her dreams of 'happily ever after' with Sam were over; in the morning, he'd make his excuses, and then walk out of her life, never to be seen again…and when he did, she knew she'd never survive.
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Sam sat on the cool kitchen floor in front of the sink, his knees up, his arms folded across them, and his chin resting on his arms, staring at the floor. Moonlight streaming in from the window over the sink cast a harsh white glare on the linoleum in front of him. The same capricious light that had turned his beautiful, innocent Josie into a glowing seraph the night before now shone icy cold upon his defilement of her tonight.
The frigid moon's unforgiving eye transformed all the longing that Sam's body still felt into another kind of ache: an open, jagged wound of guilt that cut him to the core. He welcomed the pain, seeing it as justly deserved. He deserved this pain and much more, he thought.
Josie was an innocent, a complete and total novice with respect to many things, including romantic love. She'd announced that fact to all of Chicago and, probably, to most of the country. But even if she hadn't, he would have known. She was too shy, too unsure of herself as a woman to be anything else. And of all the people on the planet she could have easily won with her dazzling smile, beautiful eyes, and kind heart, she had chosen him—Sam Coulson, mild- mannered English teacher—to fall in love with. It was a gift beyond imagining; a gift he thought he'd never be lucky enough to find.
And yet, here he was with the woman of his dreams. She was funny and sweet, sexy and smart, courageous and deeply emotional. When Josie did anything, he knew, she gave her heart and soul to it. He'd seen it time and again in the things she did: how she had thrown herself into her role as a teenager, even though going back to high school was a nightmare come true for her; how she had wrote such wonderful and miraculous papers for his class, even though in reality, none of it had been necessary; how she had put everything on the line to stand out on that baseball field and wait for him, not even knowing if he would come back to her…
And now? Now, she had given her heart and soul to him because she loved him. She had believed in him enough to freely yield to his attentions, trusting that he would be strong enough for the both of them, as he'd assured her he was… She felt confident that he would know where to draw the line. Except that he hadn't known. No, that wasn't true, he admitted. He had known where to draw the line…he just hadn't done it. He'd allowed himself to get caught up in the moment and carried away by his own desires instead of protecting Josie from them the way he'd promised.
Sam had no idea where the voice of reason that had ultimately saved him had come from, but he was supremely thankful for it. It had certainly been a rude awakening; like being responsible for watching over the henhouse only to discover that he himself was the wolf. He had been so lost in the swirling mist of emotions and sensations that he didn't even realize he was already well down the path toward making love to Josie.
The fact that both he and Josie been low on inhibitions due to the wine, the fact that she had been encouraging him –baiting him if the truth were told, the fact that he was completely smitten by her; none of that mattered in light of the simple truth that he had betrayed her trust in him.
Sam felt lower then he'd ever felt in his life, even worse than those two horrific days after the prom when he'd believed Josie had used him…because this time, he was the perpetrator, not the victim. He was a man of honor and he had given his word to Josie that she could trust him. And then he had abused and betrayed that trust the very same night that he had promised to uphold it. He had gone back on his word, nullified his honor. And without his honor, Sam knew, he was nothing.
'You are no better than those snakes that hang out in bars and use their pretty lies to seduce women into bed and then are gone by morning,' he accused himself mentally. Because no matter how much he'd meant what he'd said to Josie at the time, the end result was the same. He'd lulled her into believing him, and then he'd taken advantage of her. Then add to that the abrupt, awkward way that he'd ended the encounter. He knew Josie well enough to know that his pulling away in the manner he did would destroy her already fragile self-esteem. So now, not only would Josie feel used and betrayed by him, she'd probably feel responsible for it, too.
Josie had every right to hate him now, he determined grimly. In the morning when she looked back on this night, she would realize that he was not her knight in shining armor after all, but a poor facsimile, and she would want him out of her life. He wouldn't blame her at all. How could he possibly ask her to give him her trust again after this? Deep down inside, he had feared that he was not good enough for her, and tonight his worst fears were proved to be true. He didn't deserve her; moreover, for what he did tonight, he deserved the pain of losing her that he was sure would come.
But he knew that no matter what the outcome, she deserved an apology and an explanation for his actions. And she deserved it right then and there…no more waiting. He did not care how difficult it would be, or how much physical or emotional pain it would cause for him. He knew that this time, would not allow himself to touch her again. He'd sooner cut off his hand then betray her trust another time.
That settled, he pushed himself up off the floor and rose to a stand. He turned toward the sink and turned the cold-water tap. After letting the water flow for a moment, he placed both hands under the stream, bent over, and splashed the frigid water on his face. Turning off the spigot, he grabbed the dishtowel, still draped over the drying champagne flutes, and patted the water off his face. As he laid the towel down on the counter next to the strainer, he spied the glasses and stared at them for a long moment, cursing himself yet again for allowing this night to happen. Then he turned to exit the kitchen.
A sense of impending doom settled over Sam like a mantle, and the knot in his stomach grew with every step closer to Josie's bedroom door. When he reached the band of light that glowed from her bedroom doorway, he took a deep breath to steel himself against the pain and conflicting desires he knew he was about to experience. He turned the corner and called softly, "Josie?"
He did not get a response; indeed, she was already asleep. Sam let out a deep sigh, both in frustration at the missed opportunity and in relief of not having to deal with the issue tonight. He took another step into the room to study the scene before him.
Her bedside table light was still on, just as it had been when he had left the room an hour or so before. The sheets and blankets still lay in a tangled heap at the bottom edge of the bed. Josie lay on her side facing him. She was curled up into a tiny ball, her knees tucked up under her nightshirt to lie flat against her chest with her arms banded around them. His chest constricted painfully as he witnessed this proof of her misery. He forced himself to step even closer to stand above her and look down into her sleeping face. Even in slumber, it was obvious to him that she had been crying…her cheeks and nose were red and the area surrounding her eyes was all puffy. Besides, a large damp spot still remained on the pillow beneath her head.
A moan of raw guilt escaped from Sam as tears pricked at his eyes and began to roll unchecked down his face, landing between his feet on the carpet. It shredded his insides to know that he had caused Josie this much suffering and pain. The power of that thought made his knees go weak and almost give out entirely, but he refused to yield to the comfort of despair. In his opinion, he deserved to be shot, drawn and quartered, or something equally as heinous; he felt that no punishment ever devised could help him repay the debt he owed to Josie's soul at that moment.
He swiped angrily at his tears—allowing himself none of the compassion he felt toward Josie—and then turned to grab the top hem of the sheet and blanket by her feet. He pulled them up to rest gently just under her chin, tucking them in around her. That done, he bent down to switch off the bedside light.
After allowing his eyes to adjust to the darkness, Sam walked around to the other side of the bed, sat down, and slid himself across the sheet so that he was seated next to her sleeping form. He ran the tip of his finger down a damp trail on her cheek before rubbing his palm against the hair stuck to her forehead. He leaned down and placed a small kiss on her face near the corner of her eye and whispered, "I'm so sorry…you deserve much better…"
Not thinking of himself, but only of some small way in which to comfort her, he pulled up the covers and lay down beside her, his left arm and hip resting a hairsbreadth away from Josie's back. He thought that maybe if she could sense his presence and know that she wasn't alone, it might provide some measure of consolation. He wanted to hold her, rub her back with his hands, and soothe her, but he didn't dare. It was not so much that he didn't trust himself to control his desire; any lingering tendencies he'd had toward that end had quickly fled once he saw evidence of the pain he'd inflicted. Rather, it was more the fear that his touch might now be repugnant to her. His heart was already broken and his soul ripped to pieces…he could not stand it if she pulled away from him now.
Sam lay in the bed stiffly, uncomfortably, the covers up to his neck. He didn't deserve to be in the same state with Josie, let alone be in the same bed with her. He was about to grab his pillow and go out to the couch when Josie stirred beside him. Holding his breath, Sam lay still and turned his head just enough to see what she would do.
Josie moved slightly backwards on the bed, and her lower back bumped into Sam's forearm. She uncurled her legs from inside her shirt to stretch them out next to his, her feet lying on his calves. He felt her toes wiggle a little against him, almost as if she were trying to determine what they were resting on. Then, with a small groan and a mini cat stretch, she rolled over so that she was facing Sam. Her eyes fluttered a little and she mumbled questioningly, still mostly asleep, "Sam?"
In response, he slipped his left arm underneath her and pulled her closer, pressing a kiss into her hair. "Shhhh, honey…yes, it's me…go back to sleep."
Josie let out a small, contented sigh and snuggled into Sam's embrace, her left arm and leg laid across him. She promptly fell back into a deep sleep.
Sam let out the breath that he wasn't aware he was holding. He used his right hand to push Josie's hair up and away from her face as he laid his cheek against the top of her bent head. The sweet floral smell of her hair filled the air as he breathed in deeply with relief.
Maybe, just maybe, he decided, everything would work out all right after all…because if Josie could turn to him now for comfort, when it had been he himself who had hurt her, there was indeed hope. It would be a chance he didn't deserve, he knew. But he also knew that he was not so proud that he wouldn't take anything Josie offered; he loved her too much. And if she offered him her love again, even after tonight's debacle, then he would be the happiest, luckiest man on earth.
But Sam realized that only the light of the morning would have those answers, and he determined not to dwell on them now. Still afraid but now also hopeful, Sam snuggled himself closer to Josie, closed his eyes, and surrendered finally to the dark recesses of sleep.
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