I grab my toiletry bag and head toward the bathroom. Once I’m done in the bathroom, I exit and glance over at Millie sitting on the bed. The phone is pressed to her ear, she must be listening to a voicemail, but her face is as white as a ghost.
“Everything okay, Millie?” I ask.
She stops breathing, her body growing paler.
Fuck. Whatever is in that voicemail isn’t good. Did something happen to Oaklee? To some of her other friends? Is it her parents? A sibling? Is someone in the hospital? Did someone die?
A million scenarios go through my head. I’m actually really good in a crisis. I know all the steps you should take. I know how to stop someone from having a panic attack. I know the stages of grief. I know how to help her get through a five-hour flight back home while dealing with the news that someone died, if that’s what I have to do.
I just don’t want to. I don’t want our time here to end. It barely got started. Once we return home, our lives will change. The flirting will end. The possibilities will close. We will go through the motions of pretending for a few months, and then this will end, it will all be over. I’m not ready to go back to my old life.
I kneel down in front of her, putting my counselor hat on, hoping that in a few minutes, I can take it back off again and go back to being the asshole who’s trying to get in her pants. I’m still just wearing a towel around my waist. Kneeling practically naked in front of her should draw a smart comment from her.
Instead, she acts like I’m not here.
She’s in shock. I’ve seen it before.
Slowly, I reach up and place my hand around the phone pressed to her ear. She doesn’t flinch. She still doesn’t acknowledge I’m here.
Carefully, I take the phone from her hand. When I do, her gaze finally meets mine.
“It’s okay. Whatever happened, it will be okay. I just need you to focus on your breathing. In and out…”
Her breathing is shallow. She’s not focused on her breathing. Her head is still wherever the phone call took her.
I stare at the phone a second. It’s unlocked. I could listen to the voicemail myself and understand what I’m dealing with, but even though technically I’m her husband, I won’t breach her confidentiality like that.
“Millie, breathe with me.” I take her hand and press it to my bare chest.
I stifle down my own moan at the touch of her hand on my skin. My cock is throbbing beneath my towel as I kneel between her spread, bare legs.
“In,” I take a deep breath, and Millie does the same.
“Out.” She exhales with me.
“Good, one more time.” We breathe together in and out in long, slow breaths. Our eyes lock, and slowly, I see the light return to her eyes. She’s coming back to me. When she realizes that she’s touching me
and I’m between her naked legs, she jumps back.
“It’s okay, nothing is going to happen.”
She nods.
“Do you want to tell me what happened?” I don’t know if I want to know, or I want to pretend that everything is okay more. I just want more time without the baggage that is our lives. I want more pretend, even if I’m curious about her life.
She shakes her head.
I nod.
“You don’t have to tell me anything, but do we need to head back home early?”
She shakes her head, emphatically. “No, I don’t want to go anywhere.”
Her words are music to me. Her voice is soft and sweet, and it’s practically begging me to be the one to lose—the one to beg for more, for sex, for her.
God, do I want to. I want her more than I’ve ever wanted anything.
But I won’t have her when she’s so vulnerable. When we fuck again, it will be because we both want it, not because she’s scared and wants to use me to forget whatever was on the other end of that voicemail.