Harper's Rules 1 & 2

Chapter 33: Harper

"Oh, fuck..." I cursed quietly and paced around my hotel room, one barefoot step across the carpet at a time. "I can't... Can I? Nooooo, I can't. I can't."

This is bad. I'm a horrible, horrible person.

After Jake and I spoke on the beach, I never fully went back to sleep last night. My mind was still too wired around the same circular loop of thoughts.

Fuck, I have feelings for Jake again.

Correction: double fuck, they never changed. But how did they just... pop up so quickly?

That makes me even more of a bitch to Eddie.

In the past six months, Jake had somehow managed to get even more ripped. His cockiness oozed out of those bigger, sharper chiseled chest and ab muscles that seemed splashed in my face every opportunity that he got.

Not that I'm complaining but... now he's being mature and... nice?

I don't think my mind can process a considerate version of Jake. Maybe his balls did fall off.

I paused in front of the wall mirror in my hotel room and groaned at my full blown-out pupils. My eyes looked like two black holes had been punched through my irises and my cheeks, neck, and chest were blotchy with pink.

Even when slicked over with sweat from ziplining, he smelled masculine and woodsy and fucking comforting. His confident aura was in full projection mode, although he wore it with relaxed shoulders and a smirk that shot right into me. Past the physical part, which included his hair kept longer but neatly trimmed on the ends and faint stubble that outlined his sharp jawline, Jake seemed like he'd thought a lot about what happened between us

I'd been so wrapped up in what I'd done to poor Eddie that I hadn't noticed much of my reactions to Jake until Eddie ended our relationship. I had reciprocated feelings for poor Eddie but they felt shallow compared to the emotions that nearly drowned me when Jake simply sat with me near his lap, his arms around my chest while we, for once, just talked.

Every press of his lips drew me out of my guilt-soaked funk, tickled my skin with goosebumps, and rose warmth up from underneath my skin. Part of my body, which had felt slightly dormant since my lady bits fizzled out on me after my mother's surprise visit, surged with renewed life and with each throb of warm ache between my legs, one fact became very apparent...

...my traitorous vagina had returned from her sabbatical.

Long time no see, bitch.

Sex with Eddie had been good and I felt guilty even drawing any kind of comparison. His favorite position was missionary though. While I appreciated the view of the black ink from his tattoos, swirled like a secret language only I got to read and darkened with perspiration as he drilled into me, my body hadn't responded the way it had the first time we'd slept together.

Me, of all people, had convinced myself that sex wasn't as important as our intimate connection because I cherished that more than anything with Eddie. Communication breakdowns, and his wife cheating, had led to his failed marriage and he came out on the other side an over-communicator. I wasn't sure if it was his older age or limitless patience but Eddie had shown me that the risk of opening myself was all in my head.

He really cared, like a friend first.

Whenever I opened up to Eddie, hesitation was alway my first reaction. We still got to know each other and I hated that I laid out my fucked-up-ness up front but he absorbed every shit detail without judgement. Confession by confession, his calm, reassurance that I wasn't a total nutjob smoothed over my hesitation until I'd relaxed into the relationship and felt, well, safe.