Without You

Zach had learnt from his parents that calling adults by their title and their last name was a sign of respect. He had kept this in mind when he had first met Cadey’s parents, addressing them as Mr and Mrs Parker. Though when Cadey had shared with them the news of her pregnancy, her father had since forth insisted upon being on first name basis.
“Are you sure?” Zach had asked, after calling him Mr Parker for much of the summer.
“Sure,” Michael had shrugged, “If my daughter having your baby doesn’t elevate you to first name status then I don’t know what will.”
As Zach pulls into Cadey’s driveway now, he sees Mr and Mrs Parker hugging and fare welling both Cam and Cadey. He backs his truck up for the gear to be loaded in and when he gets out to greet them, he tries to remember the correct way to say hello.
“Dad!” Cameron squeals, running to him. “Are you ready? We’re going on a plane!”
As is always the reaction to intense excitement from young children, Mr and Mrs Parker laugh and share a sweet look with each other, one that Zach doesn’t miss.
He knows that for as much as Cam means to his parents, that amount is equal to Cadey’s. Cam’s been lucky to have both sets of grandparents so involved in his life, especially with the amount of it that Zach misses.
“Yeah buddy, I’m ready. Are you all packed and set?”
Cameron beams at his parents and his grandparents, proudly gripping his red suitcase, and putting on a little show by wheeling it around in the driveway.
“Nice to see you Zach,” Michael greets, outstretching his hand.
Zach takes it and replies with a “You too,” before they break and Cadey’s mother gathers him for a hug.
“I know it’s belated, but welcome back sweetie,” she says quietly, “Take care of my prized possessions, okay?”
“You have my word Allison,” he promises.
Cam drags his grandparents inside to show them his latest set of drawings, and Zach and Cadey are left alone in the driveway.
“You know when even when she says ‘possessions’ plural, she really only means Cam,” Cadey teases, “I don’t quite know how she survived before he was born. Going through life without someone gobbling up all of her horribly baked cookies and drawing her soppy pictures to decorate her fridge must have been torturous.”
Zach laughs, the humour twinkling in his eyes in the sunlight as his trademark grin appears, at her mention of Allison Parker’s famous, or better said ‘infamous’ chocolate chip cookies.
When he had first met Cadey’s parents, Allison had offered him a cookie, one he took, even though Cadey was warning him he would die a painful death, with her theatrical charades. Having not wanted to be impolite, he had taken Allison’s proud offering, despite the caution, only to find Cadey was right. He hadn’t been completely sure as to what was so off about the flavouring, but the biscuit did taste terrible.
Much to his credit however, and to Cadey’s appreciation, he took a first bite and chewed and swallowed it as if it were heaven. Then when Allison had turned away, Cadey had snuck the rest of it from his hand, into her pocket.
Later, up in her room when they had been excused from lunch, Cadey had teased him.
“Tastes great Mrs Parker,” she mocked playfully in a very poor imitation of Zach’s voice.
“Well what was I meant to say Cade?” he laughed.
“Anything you wanted to,” Cadey smiled. She had laced her fingers through Zach’s and brought him closer to her. “Noah and I spent a lot of our childhood trying to convince her to use a new recipe.”
“I’m guessing she won’t?”
Cadey had shaken her head, and then tucked it against his chest, fitting perfectly. “She said that recipe has been in her side of the family for generations, which I guess means that the women of my family have an unhealthy attachment to tried and true familiarity.”
Zach’s next words had come at her ear, his lips tickling her hair. “So does this mean you have an ‘unhealthy attachment to familiarity’?”
She brought her head up; her face close to Zach’s her lips inches away from brushing against his, one of her hands detangled from him so that she could hold his cheek. “No. I just have an unhealthy attachment to you.”
Zach grinned, closing the small gap between them. “That’s not unhealthy at all.”
“Hey, I’m sorry about last night,” he apologises now, helping Cadey as she picks up her suitcase and carries it to the boot of his truck. “I didn’t mean to get you in any trouble or anything.”
Cadey arranges the suitcases in the boot and then turns to him, a big smile on her face. “Don’t be, it was really sweet of you to come over and check on me like that. And besides,” she finishes with a grin, “I was the one who hugged you. If anyone should be apologising, it should be me.”
Zach, instinctively, reaches out and holds her shoulder before she can move away. “Cade, you don’t ever have to ever apologise for hugging me.”
Her eyes meet his briefly, and get hooked.
There is a long moment there, between the two of them, Zach’s hand still on her, their eyes locked, where they both have words on the tip of tongues, but don’t want to break the moment.
“Well we better let you and your Mommy and Daddy go,” Allison’s voice interrupts, as she, Michael and Cam return. “Your flight will leave soon.”
Cadey and Zach break out of their trance, and prepare themselves. Cam hugs his grandparent’s goodbye and they say their farewells to Cadey and Zach before they drive away.
“Are you ready to go Mommy?” Cam asks when he’s finished waving until his grandparents car disappeared out of sight.
Cadey nods, bending to Cam’s level. “I’m very ready. How about you go jump in the truck huh? Check that you’ve got your colouring book in your school bag for the plane trip.”
Cam obeys happily, running off to do as instructed, and Cadey straightens herself, and takes Zach’s hand.
“We’ve got this right?”
He nods. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

There are many definitions to the word ‘fine’ and this is something Cadey and Zach learn in between leaving her house to make the flight, and arriving at Zach’s in New Jersey.
The travel itself was a roller coaster of both good and bad, bad first because the flight got delayed, then good because Cam took flying well, too busy with his colouring books and the excitement to have any qualms about safety or the pressure in the cabin effecting his ears as the plane ascended. Then bad again, because he started to get angsty on the way to Zach’s apartment, uncomfortable with the new city and his stomach upset from the snacks he had eaten on the plane.
Cadey carried him inside as he grumbled and wore a pouty face and tears, showing the turmoil raging inside his stomach. He ended up puking all over her shoulder, which to Zach’s surprise, she handled with great poise.
“Its okay baby, I’ll take you to the bathroom and we’ll get you cleaned up,” she’d soothed, not even flinching.
Zach now waits patiently in the lounge room as Cadey showers Cam in the apartment’s main bathroom. When she comes out, he has to remind himself to keep his tongue inside his mouth.
Cam is asleep in her arms, wearing his pyjamas from the suitcase Zach had placed at the bathroom door. Cadey’s hair is swirled up into a bun, and she wears just her jeans and a tight camisole, her shirt having worn the brunt of Cam’s stomach contents.
The sight is so beautiful, so touching, that Zach feels his throat catch.
“Which room do you want to put him in?” Cadey asks him.
When he doesn’t reply, she repeats it, thinking he hasn’t heard her.
“Oh he’s fine now; he just had an upset stomach. He’s out like a light so he will sleep right through.”
Zach makes his way towards her and offers his hands out. Cadey transitions Cameron to his arms comfortably and as he carries him down the hall to the spare room he can’t take his eyes off his sweet sleeping face.
He opens the door, but doesn’t turn on the light, not wanting to risk waking him. The hallway light gives enough clarity of the room for him to get Cam to the bed safely, peel back the sheets and lay him down, then tuck him in.
He doesn’t realise that Cadey has followed behind him until he hears a gasp.
Upon turning around, he sees her gazing around the room, her eyes wide and drinking everything in.
The room is standard size, but pretty accommodating for one in an apartment. Even in the low light offered from the hallway, Cadey can see that the walls have just been painted recently, a soft red colour, and a thin strip of the classic N and J of the Devils logo lines the top of the walls. Three large painted wooden letters are positioned on one of the far walls, forming a descending arrangement of C, A, and M.
There is a small desk in the corner and with a comfy red seat, a bean bag and book shelf in another corner. A pin board hangs on the wall in front of the desk, filled with photos of Cam, Zach and Cadey herself.
Tears spring to her eyes and her hand covers her mouth, but she can’t stop staring. The bed Cam is wrapped up in looks expensive and heavenly, with a Devils bed spread keeping him warm. As her eyes wander, she catches the look of slight sheepishness on Zach’s face, but she is too caught up in the beauty of the bedroom.
To top it all off, a framed playing jersey of Zach’s hangs above the bed, and a hockey stick and a small pair of skates sit on a wooden trunk at the foot of the bed.
Finally, she looks at Zach. “Zach…when did….this is so…..”
It’s any little boy’s dream bedroom and Cadey can’t believe the thought and effort that Zach has so obviously put into creating it all. It’s perfect and it’s moving. So much so, that Cadey can’t quite find the right words to articulate just how special it is.
“It was meant to be a surprise for his birthday,” Zach explains, shrugging softly, “I mean I have a proper present too, but when I was doing this I figured I’d show him on his birthday. But then when you said you wanted to come here, I was so thrilled that I didn’t want to make a big deal……”
He has more words to explain, more things to say, and he’s wanted to ask her opinion on it ever since he started the project, given she knows Cam best, but he is cut off, and very suddenly, talking isn’t at all important.
Because Cadey leans in and kisses him, her soft lips moving against his. After a quick lapse due to shock, he is kissing her back, delving his tongue into her mouth when she parts her lips. It all comes back to him, and its like turning back time to their summer, his body just acting automatically, doing as it always has when it comes to being with Cadey.
Her hands wrap around his neck and he locks his arms, low around her back.
But when they break for air, she mutters an “Oh shit” -her spontaneous actions catching up with her.
“Cade,” he begins, wanting to come clean.
She backs away from him and chews her lip. “I need a shower. I probably still smell like Cameron’s throw up, I need a shower.”
Zach bites his own lip, wanting to tell her that he wouldn’t care what she smelt like as long as he was kissing her again like that, but he takes the hint that the moment has passed, no matter what heat is tearing through his body right now.
“Use the bathroom in my room,” he offers, “The other one might still smell like puke.”
She steps aside and he leads the way to his room, and then gestures to the onsuite.
Riddled with so many thoughts swarming inside her head, she just mutely walks in, shutting the door behind her.
Needing a minute to get his breath back, Zach traipses over to his bed, and lets himself fall right down on to it.
However, planning to close his eyes and slow his heart rate back to a normal beat is hard; knowing the only thing separating him and a wet, naked Cadey is a flimsy door.
On the other side of it, Cadey slips underneath the hot spray of the water, letting it stream on to her face and wash over her body. Her heart too is beating like its about to thump right out of her chest, and her skin feels as if its on fire, set alight with Zach’s touch and the feel of his lips on hers. Even now, as she runs her fingers over her own, she can almost still feel his.
Given that he can make her feel feverish with his mere arrival at the start of summers, it shouldn’t come as a shock to her that his kisses can still evoke such fierce emotion and desire in her.
When she feels like she is back in control she shuts of the water and steps out, grabbing the nearest towel and drying herself. It’s not until right then does it become clear to her that she’s in a bit of a pickle. She looks at the clothes she’s left in a pile on the tiled floor, and knows she can’t redress in them. They still carry the smell, and putting them back on would defeat the purpose of having the shower.
“Uh, Zach?” she calls through the door. “I forgot to bring a change of clothes in with me. My suitcase is still in your lounge.”
Keeping calm, Zach gets up and walks to the door. “Do you want me to leave some clothes outside the door, or do you want me to give you my robe, so you can come out and chose some clothes?”
Cadey leans her head against the door, feeling the coolness of it on her forehead. She decides that given their self control levels right now and the events that have already happened tonight, having him rifle through her suitcase -which contains her bras and underwear- is probably not the best idea.
“Um, the robe please.”
Zach retrieves it from inside his closet and Cadey peeps open the door to take it. She wraps it around herself, tying it loosely at the front, but instead of walking out, she heads over to the mirror and sink.
An image of her brother appears in her head, his face disapproving. Snippets from the conversation with her father call out to her. ‘As long as you’re careful…….prepare yourself for that.’
She thought she had been prepared for this. And she was. But she wasn’t prepared for the bedroom Zach had crafted, and the wave of emotions that had swamped her as a result of it.
Time passes quickly, and left on the other side of the door, Zach gets worried.
“Cade?” he calls, slowly pushing the door open.
He meets her at the mirror, trying to decipher the clouded expression on her face.
Finding her voice, words tumble out of her mouth at an uncontrollable speed. “I’m so sorry for kissing you like that. I practically jumped right at you. I just saw the room and….I can’t believe you did that Zach. I mean I can, because I know how much you love Cam but that room must have taken so much work and it’s perfect. When Cam wakes up tomorrow morning he is never going to want to leave because it’s so perfect. He will probably want to never ever leave it because of the colours and the books and…and the desk…oh god the desk, it’s amazing. It’s the most perfect drawing table of all time. I thought I was so set for this trip but the room, the fucking room just-”
“-Stop Cadey,” Zach cuts her off abruptly, actually placing his finger to her lips. He moves closer and she backs gently, until she is hard against the countertop. “I told you, you don’t ever need to be sorry for hugging me, and that goes for kissing too. And you don’t ever have to ask. Sure, years have passed and things with us are slightly different, but there is still nothing as good as your kisses Cade. There is still nothing as good as you.”
Her eyes water again, but she turns her face from his. “Don’t Zach,” she whispers, “Don’t lie. There are plenty of people as good as me. And there’s even more that are so much better. I’m…I’m….”
“You’re perfect,” he whispers to her, finding it strange that she would ever doubt that. “You’ve always been perfect Cade. Especially on that night when you came to my room after that argument with your brother, I think you looked the most beautiful that night.”
“Oh please Zach,” she laughs, “Don’t sugar coat it for me. I was a mess that night. I was crying so my cheeks were stained with tears and my eyes were all puffy, my wisps of hair sticking to my face. A full blown mess.”
Zach walks his hands down across her jaw bone, looking into her eyes. “A beautiful and perfect mess,” he tells her, smiling. She finds her self returning it, still not able to fully deny a compliment from him.
“Maybe, but things are different Zach, so different.”
“Not everything,” he corrects, gripping the gown. “You still drive me crazy Cade. I feel like I need to sit on my hands or something when I’m around you.”
Bashful, Cadey tugs his hands from her. “I’ve changed Zach. Me, this body. I’m not the girl I was back then. Years have passed, I had a baby. It’s not like it used to be.”
“You’re right,” Zach replies, grabbing her gown again. This time his hands work it open, revealing her in all her glory.
He can’t help but stare. His tongue snakes over his lips, hungrier than ever. “It’s not like it used to be. It’s even better, Cade. You’re even better.”
“My stomach, my hips,” she begins to complain, but is silenced as Zach’s hands slide over them and his lips touch on hers.
“These hips and this stomach are the ones that carried my son Cadey, our son. Your body -this body- created him. How could you ever think that you wouldn’t still be perfect?”
Cadey swallows thickly, conflicted at knowing Cameron is asleep in a room down the hall, and that Jackson is possibly waiting on her call back in Minnesota, but she’s wishing Zach would keep going.
He does, wandering his hands all over her affectionately, his lips working at her neck. It feels so, so damn good, and desire pulls at every part of her, and pools deep inside of her, but she knows it’s wrong.
“Zach,” she interrupts, “Please…”
“Please what Cadey? Please stop telling you how beautiful you are? Please stop doing this?”
She bites her lip, and watches her eyes in his. “No,” she replies, her lips pulling into a smirk. “Please don’t stop.”
Her hands wander his broad shoulders and twine behind his head, needing more of him closer as her lips meet his, her tongue winding in his mouth. He hoists her up on to the counter top and further parts her open legs, standing between them and leaning in to kiss her.
There is no holding back, and no effort to, from either of them. Years of pent up attraction and desire explodes between them, like fireworks.
“Zach,” she lets herself moan as he takes control, remembering exactly what she likes and how, it all coming back to him like lyrics to a favourite song. She has enjoyed being the more dominant one between her and Jackson, but she’s pleased to see Zach still takes charge, as he always did. It’s a permanent fixture on her list of favourite things about him.
Jackson is a great guy, and he takes care of her, but nothing, nothing in this world compares to Zach and what he does to her.
She’s missed it, missed it so much that she gives in all control and lets her self drown in it.

When they are finished, when the come down from the high is imminent and they are both exhausted, Zach scoops her up and carries her to his bed, laying her down gently on the luxurious silk sheets. Though it nearly kills him to, he covers her beautiful naked body with the blankets before he slips in behind her.
He keeps her close to him, dying in the wonderful feeling of having her in his arms again. He kisses her head, closes his eyes and breathes in the sweet smell of her shampoo, strawberries and cream, his favourite smell in the world. He wonders if it had struck her as odd that he kept a bottle of her favourite shampoo in his shower, but he doesn’t care. Her breathing changes slightly, her chest rising and falling more softly as she slips into sleep.
“I love you Cadey Jane Parker,” he tells her. “I love you.”

When Cadey wakes the next morning, from the best night’s sleep she has had in years, there is strangely no guilt.
It was wrong to sleep with Zach last night, wrong because it might confuse things between them and also wrong because of her commitment to Jackson. But she wants to allocate these two days to her dreams, to living out the fantasy she’s dreamed of, so she fights off the guilt, leaving it for when its time to go home.
Sadly, there is no Zach there either, much to her discomfort. She had been hoping to wake up right beside him.
After lounging a bit longer in the expensive and heavenly sheets, she dresses herself hurriedly; slipping on a pair of Zach’s shorts and a loose training shirt, given her suitcase is still out in the lounge.
When she’s finished, she walks out into the apartments lounge room and kitchen. Zach stands over the stove, pushing something around in the fry pan with a spatula.
“Had some cooking lessons in the past few hours have you?”
He turns to see her coming towards him, in his clothes, and beams at her.
He has been living out his own fantasies too. Last night, as she slept in his arms, he tried to close his eyes and savour every sense, how great her hair smelt, how soft her skin felt, the quiet sound of her breathing, the vision of her long brown hair on his chest and the taste of her kisses still on his lips, as he was unsure as to when it would happen again.
He sets down the spatula and opens his arms as she makes the last few steps toward him. “You’d be surprised what you can learn from a quick search on Youtube.”
They both laugh as his arms fasten around her, and she buries her face in his chest, into the softness of the Devils hoodie he wears.
“I would have cooked breakfast.”
“I know,” he replies, edging back and pushing her hair from her face to capture her better. “But I wanted to. I wanted to do something nice for you. You know –besides what we did last night.”
His lips pick up in to a devilish grin and Cadey rolls her eyes, but her mouth betrays her, laughing at his comment. “Uh, yeah. As lovely as that was, you know we’re gonna have to talk about it at some stage, yeah?”
Talking about it is the last thing Zach wants to do. Repeat? Yes. Replay? Yes. Reschedule? Yes. But discuss it and where it leaves them and what it means for her being with Jackson? No. No. No. No.
He keeps her face in his hands and brings his closer. “Not now though right?”
“Not now,” she answers. “But until we do, in front of Cameron everything has to be business as usual.”
“Okay.” He leans in and places a kiss on her nose, and she almost wants to pinch herself, but she’s too afraid that this really is a dream.
“Speaking of Cameron, where is my little boy?”
“Still asleep,” Zach answers as she untangles herself and heads for the fridge. “I checked on him this morning, and guess what?”
“What?”
“His thumb wasn’t in his mouth.”
Cadey looks back at him, moving her gaze from the half empty fridge to the delectable smile on his face. It’s a known fact between all of Cameron’s family members that when he is sleeping in a strange place for the first time, he sleeps with his thumb in his mouth. To hear that he feels settled in Zach’s house is a cherry on top of the wonderfulness that last night was.

Cadey sets plates at the table as Zach dishes up three servings of scrambled eggs and bacon, mystifying her as to how he got fresh food in-between arriving last night and serving up this morning.
But as soon as Zach lifts a forkful of food to her mouth, she decides it doesn’t matter. Whatever Youtube video he watched taught him well.
“Is it good?” he asks, genuinely worried at the reception his first attempt will receive.
She grins and sets her hand on top of his on the table. “It’s great Zach. I’m just disappointed to think that I could have been making you cook all along.”
Zach swallows. There are a lot of things they could have been doing all along. Things like last night for starters.
They eat breakfast in a glazed happy bubble, skilfully teaming up to cut each others bacon, not wanting to let go of their entangled hands.
After sticking the dishes in the dishwasher and placing Cam’s plate in the microwave to reheat when he wakes, with her hand still in his, Cadey leads Zach to Cam’s bedroom.
Quietly, they inch the door open and take a look at their sleeping handsome devil.
“Wow, he can really sleep huh?” Zach whispers.
“Usually when he hasn’t been feeling well he sleeps for ages and then wakes up fully recharged as if nothing happened,” Cadey explains. “I’ve always been jealous of him for that.”
Zach’s brow knits together. “Are you still feeling tired from having trouble sleeping?”
She shakes her head, “Not really. Last night was the best sleep I’ve had in such a long time.”
“Well, maybe it was the, ah, exercise you got beforehand. That’s probably the key.”
Cadey leans in to Zach, her lips against his ear. “It might have just been a fluke. Guess we will have to try it again just to test its credibility.”
“God Cade,” Zach groans, simply with the heavenly thought.
An honest-to-god giggle trickles out of her mouth, melodic and light, a sound Zach hasn’t heard in years. They creep backwards and shut the door again, leaving Cameron undisturbed.
This time he leads her, back to his room. She sits on the bed and he goes and gets her suitcase.
While he’s gone, she has time to absorb the room. It’s light and beautiful colours, something that’s translated through the entire apartment, with the exception of Cameron’s room. The apartment is classy, obviously afforded by Zach’s hefty pay check, but much to her surprise, it doesn’t feel very ‘lived in’. A few personal touches here and there like his products in the bathroom and a few bits and pieces magnetised to the fridge show’s that he clearly lives here, at least during the season, but it is not his home.
His home is the house he owns in Minnesota, one that is all of his own design interiorly. Like the pencil marks of Cameron’s growth that lines one of the doorways, the pool table he is always shooting on, and the large digital TV that he insisted upon.
She is digesting it all as a glimmer of something on his bedside table catches her eye. She sits up and retrieves it, holding it in her hands and beaming an irrepressible smile that sparks in her eyes.
It’s a classic black photo frame, containing a photo of her and Zach. But not just any photo -the photo of them at the bonfire, his arms around her, her cheek turned to meet his lips.
“I found it this morning,” Zach explains, re-entering the room. “That was the one I was talking about for Cam to use in his assignment.”
He stands her suitcase at the end of the bed, but she doesn’t move to open it. She just continues to stare at the photo.
It’s framed. The photo is framed. Regardless of whether it was previously hanging or not hanging, it’s in a frame, which shows consideration. He didn’t just throw the photo into the bottom of some box or draw to fester. He framed it. He went and brought a frame and put the photo in it. And that is what sticks with Cadey.
The weight on the bed shifts as he sits down beside her, his body lined with hers.
“We look pretty happy, huh?”
He slips his arm around her. She nods. “Insanely happy.”
“That’s because we were.”
Cadey takes one last long look at the photo, before setting it back on the table. “Zach?”
“Yeah?”
She closes her eyes, the next topic seeming impossible to broach seamlessly, but the question nagging at her head like a chipmunk gnawing. Half turned to him; her hand slips up his neck, her soft fingers stopping on his cheek.
“Why now?” she asks, her voice nearly cracking. “I know that every summer, you’ve always been around. But this one feels different, and…and the room and everything…why now?”
Her eyes watch nervously as Zach’s face falls, his tongue snaking out over his lips. “I don’t know Cade. Well actually, I guess I do. I’m just not sure it will make sense to anyone else or if I say it out loud.”
“You can tell me,” she pleads gently. “I never judge anything you tell me Zach, you know that.”
He does know that. Never has she once in her lifetime judged a confession or deep thought of his, not back in their summer when he admitted his fear at not being good enough for NHL level despite having been drafted, or the weight of pressure he put on himself to be as successful at the sport as his father had been.
Not ever.
He keeps that in mind now as he begins to explain. “My life has been all about hockey for so long now. You know how it is Cade, every thought was about hockey and the NHL and making it and doing well. When we got knocked out of playoffs, it felt horrible. I hated it. But then after the game, in the locker room, some of the guys were with their kids and they were happy, even though our season was over.”
He takes a deep breath and shakes his free hand through his hair, trying to keep his voice even as his heart unravels inside his chest.
“These most recent few years, since Cam was about four, I think I unwillingly sort of put myself at a little bit of a distance. He’d reached an age where he had words and was more observant and to be really honest, I was worried that he would see through my summer appearances and be upset with me. Seriously upset. It scared me to think that he would be able to tell me he hated me or that he didn’t want to see me if he wanted to. But with that stuff in the locker room, I realised that family is the most important thing. I realised that Cam doesn’t care so much as to when I come and go, but rather how our relationship is. So I promised myself that I’m going to make a better effort. I’m going to make sure that we have the best relationship that we can, and that he knows how much he means to me.”
Cadey feels herself completely melt. “Oh Zach,” she sympathises, her voice no louder than a whisper. “I had no idea you felt like that. If I’d had known, I would have set you straight. I would have told you.”
His fingers press to her mouth, just like last night. “Don’t blame yourself Cadey. Don’t ever blame yourself for anything. Cam is who he is because of you and the spectacular job you’ve done raising him. You are the best mother in the world and the only I could ever want for my child, and while I want Cam to know what he means to me, that also goes for you too. I’d say thank you but that doesn’t cut it Cade. It doesn’t cover any of it, or tap into even half of my gratitude and admiration.”
She blushes, turning her face. Zach curls his fingers underneath her chin and tilts it back to him, meeting her eyes. They smile at each other, touched and delighted at all the deep sharing.
“How did we go from those crazy happy kids in the picture to this?” Cadey asks, chuckling.
Zach’s eyes shine. “I don’t know, but our child is sound asleep in the other room and you’re here in my arms, sitting on my bed, wearing my clothes, so as far as I’m concerned, ‘this’ isn’t that bad.”
Naturally, Cadey moves her head and kisses him, her tongue running softly over his lips before he parts them and allows her in.
He alters his heads angle to deepen their kiss and quickly, it heats up. She turns square on to him and runs her hands up his arms and across his shoulders, feeling his muscles even through his hoodie.
They break only long enough to get some air and for Cadey to strip Zach of his sweatshirt, her fingers taking it from the hem and brining it up over his head. It leaves him in a white singlet and his shorts.
Like magnets, their lips are quickly back to each others, and with a simple move, Zach’s back hits the mattress, brining Cadey down on top of him. With her legs on either side of him, straddling him, she can feel his very present need for her growing in his shorts. His hands slide up the shirt of his she has on, tracing his palms over her skin until he reaches her breasts. His hands cup them, and then his fingers run over her hard nipples.
She feels much like the younger girl she was when they first got together, rolling around with him on the bed, hot and heavy, but wary of not waking other occupants of the house.
His lips trail off down her jaw, and kiss at her neck, sucking and nipping.
“Zach,” she lets herself release breathlessly. “Zach….”
She moves tightly against him and Zach lets go of his own moan, slick against her neck.
So caught up in each other, they don’t hear the front door open, or the sound of foot steps growing closer.
Actually, they don’t notice any new arrivals until the arrival himself knocks on Zach’s open bedroom door.
“Well, this is a little awkward for a first meeting and a reunion,” the voice intrudes on their special moment.
Cadey goes still, freezing in Zach’s arms. He tilts his head to look past her, and sees a familiar face grinning cheekily and looking back at him. Cadey tucks her head in his neck and chest, afraid to look and see who it is, feeling like she’s caught doing something wrong.
Zach slips his hands out from under her shirt and wraps them around her, holding her to him as he sits up.
“Nice to see you again Zach,” Travis laughs, “And this must be the famous Cadey I’ve heard so much about.”