The guys also said that she had been a godsend when she’d told the police that I’d been with her. That made the club able to hide their involvement, meaning that now they were able to look into the details of this all anonymously without having a target on each one of their backs.
My hands trailed down the length of her hair, my fingers sliding effortlessly through the long locks.
“What am I going to do with you?” I asked her.
She didn’t reply.
But she didn’t need to, either.
If it took me going blue in the face, I was going to convince her to stay with me.
I was going to make her mine.
I was going to keep her.
She just didn’t know it yet.
Leaning back in the couch with my mind at peace at the thought of what keeping her meant, I crossed my ankles, tugged the woman in my arms more fully into them, and then switched on a different movie from the one she wanted to watch.
When I got bored with that one, I changed to the television cable, then cruised through those channels until an old favorite, Top Gun, showed up.
I was halfway through the movie, at the volleyball scene, when Belle stretched and then settled more fully onto me. Her leg straddled one of mine, and then she moved until her head was tucked against my neck.
“I used to love this movie,” she mumbled sleepily against my throat.
My cock jerked at the husky sound of her voice.
“It’s one of my favorites, too,” I admitted.
She hummed, her lips playing along the skin there. “Surprisingly, it’s not the volleyball scene that’s my favorite. It’s the part where he’s at the end, and flying, thinking about his partner, and he finally gets past that final roadblock that kept him from really flying again.”
“Some would say that’s one of the worst parts,” I confirmed.
She rubbed her skin against my own.
“Maybe,” she acknowledged. “But it’s also the part of his rebirth. The part where he realizes that he can make it on his own. He doesn’t want to, he misses his friend and his old life, but he knows that life goes on even when he’s missing a serious component of his soul that he can never get back.”
I hummed in agreement. “That’s very philosophical.”
“I’m a philosophical bitch, what can I say?” She snickered, moving even more fully onto me. “I do read and edit books all day, though. I’m bound to have some professionals’ words making their way into my daily life.”
I started to run my hand up and down the length of her back, my fingers tangling with the tips of her hair with every stroke.
“Do you like doing what you do?” I asked curiously. “I know you like reading, but isn’t it a bit different, too job-like, reading, when you’re actually editing?”
“Depends,” she admitted around a yawn. “Sometimes it can be if it’s not a particular genre that I like. Like last month, I had to edit a gothic horror-type romance. It was set in the depression era and even worse, it was about vampires. Another sub-genre that really isn’t my favorite. It took me a while to get through it, but I have to admit it was probably one of my better edited works. When I’m not ‘into’ something that I’m reading, it takes me longer, and I don’t get pulled into the story as much.”
I hummed in understanding. “Are you a professional? I mean, I know that you’re good. You wouldn’t have as much work as you do if you weren’t. But are you like school-licensed or anything?”
“I went to college and majored in English lit. I finally got my master’s last year while waffling between wanting it or not. But it didn’t change anything that I was doing professionally. When an author and I were just starting out, she took a chance on me being her editor. And now that she’s a New York Times bestseller, her name-dropping—mine in particular—gets me enough business to last me all year. I was very fortunate,” she admitted.
“Who’s the author?” I wondered.
She snickered. “She writes erotica. She’s the woman behind the new movies coming out about that billionaire that buys an island and then traps the love of his life on it. The line that they used on the movie poster at the movies is one that I wrote myself.”
I moved my hand up to catch a lock of her hair, twirling it around my finger. “Why don’t you write?”
She shrugged, causing her delicate shoulder to drag against my nipple. “I can. I just don’t really want to. It’s not something that really sounds fun to me. I’d rather sit on my ass and read all day than come up with worlds of my own.”