Then I wonder if maybe she never changed her number after all. Maybe she just ignored all my old calls and texts into infinity.
I sit in my car and start going through my phone, wondering if all my numbers transferred over throughout all the iPhones I’ve had over the years.
And there she is.
Ruby.
I never deleted her.
She’s always been there.
I text the number: Ruby?
I wait, expecting to get someone else, telling me I have the wrong number.
A green message appears.
Yes?
My heart drops.
With shaking hands I text her: It’s Luciano. I need to talk to you. Are you alone?
I imagine she’s using her Finnish Nokia, so I don’t see any of the text bubbles while I’m waiting. It’s torturous.
Then it appears.
Come to my AirB&B. 19 Calle de la Aduana. Buzz 4.
I punch it into my phone and it routes to me Puerta del Sol.
I text back: On my way.
I start the car and speed out of the parking lot, past the guards and the gates until I’m on the motorway zipping toward Madrid. I don’t think I’ve ever driven so fast in my life, overtaking everyone, going far above the speed limit. If I were to get caught I would get in big shit, they love to drag celebrities here when they’ve done something wrong. But luck is on my side today.
Once in the city core I have to slow down, but I make it to her building fast enough. I find parking and then I’m running to her door, my finger jabbing the number for her apartment.
“Luciano?” she asks, her voice crackly through the intercom.
I close my eyes at the sound of her voice, try to steady my breathing. “Yes. It’s me.”
The door buzzes.
I step through.
There are only two apartments on the main floor, so I run up the steps two at a time until I’m on the second floor, heading to the door with number 4 on it.
It’s closed.
I raise my hand ready to knock, my heart nearly bursting out of my chest, all the cells in my body vibrating and on edge.
The door opens before I get a chance to knock.
Ruby stands on the other side, dressed in a sleeveless floral sundress, her hair damp and braided to the side. No makeup, no lipstick.
The most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.
Our eyes meet.
Time stands still.
Everything we’ve never said passes between us.
“Hi,” she says to me.
“Hi,” I say back.
Then I kick the door shut and lunge forward, grabbing her face in my hands while her fingers curl around the fabric of my shirt, and I’m kissing her. I’m kissing her with fire and sorrow and love and sunshine, all these years coursing through my veins, lighting me ablaze, pouring out from my lips straight to her soul.
She cries out softly against my mouth, her hands wild, trying to hold me tighter. My hands slip back from her face, into her hair, messing up her braid, and we’re stumbling and turning until she backs up against a wall.
I stop and pull my head back, trying to remember why I’m here, that I need to talk to her, that the last thing I was supposed to do was kiss her.
“I’m sorry,” I say hoarsely. Everything feels so fucking raw and sensitive, like I’m one self-inflicted wound.
“Don’t be,” she says, her hands going up to my face, holding me. “Please don’t be sorry.”
I close my eyes, try to swallow, try to think. I put my arms against the wall, bracketing her in, resting my forehead on hers. “I really came here to talk.”
“This is us talking. Don’t you remember?”
She stands up on her toes and reaches up to place her mouth on mine. Her kiss is beyond sweet, just hinting at the wild woman I know she can be.
My cock grows tight, poking her hip as I press myself against her. The urge to be inside her is a monster inside me, clawing its way through the walls I put up in her absence.
Talk to her.
Take it slow.
But no.
I can’t hold back. I need to. I want to. I have to take my time savoring her but there’s an urgency that I can’t ignore.
That eternal ache I’ve had for her ever since she left me.
I close my eyes and she nips and kisses along my jaw, and I know we’re saying more to each other than our words ever could. Each kiss is a promise, a revelation, a confession.
“Ruby,” I whisper to her, running my hands through her braid until her hair is loose and free around her shoulders. “Ruby, I…”
“I know,” she says sweetly, pressing her lips to mine. “I know.”
She grabs my hand and tugs me toward the bed, which is in the middle of this sparsely decorated studio apartment.
“I need to tell you something,” I whisper to her, as she reaches for my shirt and starts to bring it up over my head, my arms raised.
“Tell me in other ways.”
She steps back until the back of her legs hit the bed and she reaches down to the hem of her dress and slowly peels it off her. I watch, transfixed, as she reveals her calves, her thighs with that beautiful, familiar scar running across it, then her teal-colored lace underwear, the undulating curve of her hips, her smooth, soft stomach, her breasts, full and bare and edible enough to make my mouth water.
She tosses the dress aside, steps out of her underwear, then sits down on the edge of the bed, motioning me to come forward with the crook of her finger.
I watch her, dumbfounded. It’s like I have whiplash from the past to the present, the Ruby I knew, the Ruby I know now, and it’s all coming together to make me realize it’s the same fucking person and it always will be.
It’s Ruby.
She doesn’t have to beckon me anymore.
I’m at her in a flash, my hands a blur as they touch her,
