The Plus One (A Brush With Love, #3)

by Mazey Eddings

There’s no way this dickhead locked Indira’s cat in a closet to pat down the titties of some rando without interruption.

“That would require you to be one, Chris. And from where I’m standing, you’re a cheating, cat-imprisoning man-child with the emotional intelligence of a rusty nail. So, no. I won’t be calming down.”

“Pick me. Choose me. Love me,” Collin whispered in time with Meredith Grey on the TV, pressing his head against the back of the couch as he blinked past his tears.

He’d seen Indira naked. He’d seen her naked and she was undeniably hot as fuck and Jude absolutely did not know what to do with any of this information because his brain was short-circuiting and his heart was slamming against his chest and his brain kept looping the different parts of naked fucking Indira and her sleek, gorgeous skin through his head.

“Maturity is a social construct upheld by the patriarchy with an incredibly narrow, white, cis, neurotypical scope to enforce conformity and then implemented as an othering and shaming tactic for anyone that steps outside of that paradigm.”

I could always get under his skin, and I kind of loved it. It meant he saw me.”

“We struggle too. We hurt. We handle situations badly or get depressed or anxious or anything else. We’re all flawed. Your emotional struggles as a human are not a moral judgment of your worth, and they’re not a reflection on your ability to help others.”

“If sitting with them were comfortable, we wouldn’t let them fester until they infected our hearts and our heads. But we avoid. We throw ourselves into work or vices or others because it’s easier to focus on those things than our own hurt.”

Therapy is scary because it requires you to be brave. It’s one of the most radical forms of self-love.”

Jude placed a hand on Chris’s shoulder as he walked out, stopping him before he made it down the hallway. “Someone else shouldn’t have to step in for you to listen to her, or anyone else, for that matter,” Jude said, voice hushed but sharp as a knife’s edge. “Don’t let that happen again.”

Either her standards were exceptionally low, or Jude retaining her cheesesteak order for the better part of a decade was the most romantic thing to ever happen to her … Both things could be true.

“Don’t apologize. You’re allowed to tell me—anyone—when you’re upset. You don’t have to pretend to be okay.”

And before Jude knew what was happening, she pushed forward. And kissed him. Her lips were hot and searching, and she threw her arms around his neck, pulling him closer. Jude went without a fight. He kissed her back, his brain unable to keep up with all the sensations pummeling him at once. The slide of her tongue against his. The brush of her hair against his cheeks. The taste of her lips as he took them like a starving man. A tiny whimper escaped from Indira, the vibrations rattling straight into his chest. That noise, quite simply, turned Jude inside out.

Jude thought he knew the human body. He knew muscles and blood vessels and bones and organs and how they all worked in miraculous harmony. But this kiss, apparently, had the power to reroute nerve endings. Turn blood into smoke. Set fire to every cell. Indira was a fever, one that had been biding its time, waiting to compromise his system.

“Indira,” she said, tilting her head. “There’s something I want you to understand. Something crucial. Regardless of how Jude sees you, regardless of if he gets help or lets you in or any other path his journey may take him on, you are perfectly enough, exactly as you are.”

The problem with being self-aware and introspective while also being, admittedly, emotionally damaged was that Indira could reason through her feelings and their source and how they didn’t serve her, but she also couldn’t stop the ruminating circles of feeling them.

Was being roasted her love language?

Because feelings matter. They’re chemicals mixing with experiences and some deep, unknown part of a human soul. They make us who we are and I always wanted to help people find a way to steer their ship when those feelings had them lost at sea.”

Her touch made him feel … safe. Grounded. Gave him the physical anchor that allowed him to push his way through his jumbled-up thoughts and resurface as himself.

Jude knew he was both lost and found in the loveliness that was Indira Papadakis.

Jude gripped her hips like gravity had ceased to exist and she was the only way he’d stay grounded on earth. His fingers pressed into her thighs, her ass, any part he could press his palm against. He caressed and squeezed and touched her like he’d die if he stopped.

He pulled the fabric down around her thighs, revealing her sweet, wet cunt. “Show me,” he said, gripping her wrist and leading her hand to her clit. “Show me what you like.”

“This is real,” Indira said, her voice level and powerful. “Whatever this is between us is real and it hurts and it’s beautiful and it matters. And I won’t let you deny that. You deserve happiness, Jude. I deserve happiness. And I think we can have that. Together.”

“Because I think, what you actually want, is to grab this moment with both hands, and never let it go. I think your brain has convinced you that you don’t deserve to be cared for. Well, I’m calling bullshit. Because I care. And I’ll keep caring. I care now. I cared yesterday. I’ll care tomorrow. Every single day, I will sit outside your doorstep. And I’ll wait. I’ll wait until you need me, and I’ll be ready. Nothing you can say will change that.”

Jude had no fight, no restraint, left in him. He wanted her too badly. He wanted her smile and her laugh and her biting sarcasm. He wanted the warmth of her skin and the way she made him feel alive. He wanted her comfort. He wanted Indira.

If it was just tonight, he was going to give her all that was left of him.

“I want to taste you forever,”

Jude pushed into her, his panting breaths mingling with Indira’s raspy groans, sliding forward, chest rubbing against hers, their temples pressing together as he seated himself fully in her. They both took a moment to feel their bodies together. It was raw and real and the most alive he’d felt in a long time. Like her body was made to hold him. “You feel,” he grunted out, heart threatening to punch through his chest, “so fucking perfect.”

“Hold on,” Jude said, and Indira slowed, too far gone to fully stop the drag of her hips. Jude sat up, cinching one hand around her waist and using the other to scoot back against the pillows. “I feel like I can’t get close enough to you,” he said, nuzzling his face against her chest, whispering the words into her breasts. Indira hummed, taking on a lazy rhythm as she slid and circled over him. “I know, baby. I feel it too,” she said, knotting her hands in his hair and tilting his head, bending down to kiss him, deep and messy, and beautiful.

“Indira,” he said, pushing her hair from her face, wrapping the curls around his fingers. She looked at him with those achingly familiar eyes. “I think I want more than just tonight.” Indira smiled, lips swollen from his kisses. “I think I do too.”

“Someone once told me that birthmarks and moles are markings of where lovers of your past lives kissed you the most,” Indira said in her husky voice, propping up on an elbow to look down on him as she continued touching. “Seems like past-life you was very busy.”

“While you may be rigid and stuffy, I am a woman of multitudes and have the capacity to like many things at the same time. Shocking, I’m sure … Plus, I’ll never miss a chance to be contrary toward you. It’s my love language.” “So, your years of being annoying and combative have just been some sort of extended foreplay?”

“What the fuck is happening?” Jeremy zipped to his side. “The apocalypse is upon us, it seems,” Jeremy said, giving Collin a kiss on the cheek, and resting a hand on his back.

“You can’t possibly expect me to do manual labor after what you did to me last night. I’m simply exhausted.” “What I did—” Jude sucked in a breath, narrowing his eyes. “It doesn’t have to happen again if it leaves you so feeble.” Indira’s eyes widened and she perked up in her seat. “Let’s not get hasty here—” “No, no. If my sexual prowess is so potent, I’ll refrain from sapping you of your energy. It’s for your own good. Besides—” “Joke’s dead, Jude. You killed it,” Indira said, clapping her hand across his mouth. “And if you ever use the term sexual prowess again, you’ll never get another chance to demonstrate.”

“The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can, uh…” “Go mattress spelunking?”

I wish to always remember the feeling of this moment.

“I’ve always said mac ’n’ cheese is the world’s most potent aphrodisiac,”

“I think you should start having higher expectations from me,” he said with a rough laugh. “Because you deserve the world.”

He’d been writing love on every inch of her heart since they were kids, and he’d found the most beautiful, messy, ridiculous reminder of that and put it in a frame.

“I feel like I should give you a present now,” she said, giggling at the bubbly type of pleasure filling her chest. Jude shook his head. “The best present you could give me would be lying on your back and showing me your pretty pussy,” he said gruffly.

“Fuck me, Jude. Please. Please,” she begged, wild fingers tugging at his clothes. “I need you so much.” “That’s my good girl,” Jude said, pressing his thumb against her in reward for a moment before undoing his pants and pushing them down.

“I could stay like this forever,” he said, voice so low it was all vibrations from his chest to hers.

“Come with me,” Indira begged. Jude’s pace doubled, and he pressed his temple against hers, groaning as he did what she asked. Indira felt her pulse in every joint of her body as she threw herself over the edge of desire, each heartbeat saying: He’s mine. He’s mine. He’s mine. I’m his.

“You’re annoyingly adorable and simultaneously intolerable,”

“I’ve always loved you. Even when I didn’t like you, I loved you. You’ve been a permanent fixture in my life, someone steady to rely on, even when that reliance came with annoying each other or teasing. Because you let me tease you back. You’ve always been my person, Jude. My annoying, wonderful person. And I think I’m your person too.”

“I’m not looking to fix you,” she said, staring straight into his eyes. “I’m here to love you.”

“Everyone always talks about skin-to-skin contact in the context of babies and parents, but adults need it too,” Indira said against his chest, trailing her fingers across his collarbone. “Probably just as much. Or maybe it’s just me being touch hungry.”

“Yes, I like your house, Jude. I’ve always liked your house. Even years ago when your house was more like a tiny apartment that was sometimes super stubborn and kind of douchey and—”

You can hurt and also be loved. You can feel sadness and also laugh and feel joy. Good emotions can coexist with hard ones. You can struggle and suffer and learn to heal while you also love. The best place to start is by giving yourself permission to feel with abandon. Feel everything.”

Indira was worthy of love just as she was. And she needed to start loving herself too, let go of the things that hurt her.