“Maybe?”
“Okay, I did. I wanted to see you.”
Morgun smiled, radiant with happiness. She knew it was a dangerous happiness. That going to bed with someone hardly constituted something permanent, but she couldn’t help herself. Maybe it was the hormones, the afterglow. Maybe that made a person not want to live in the real world for whatever short amount of time they were allotted.
She had to ask, even though she knew it could blow up in her face. “Are you…do you think that you’d want to spend the night?”
Laney hesitated. “I have a full day booked tomorrow. As usual.”
“Okay.” Morgun told herself not to be disappointed. Spending the night was a huge deal. It was a lot for someone to consider, and it was sudden. Neither of them planned this. it just sort of happened. Like what happened at the wedding. Sudden. Unexpected. Wonderful.
“If you set the alarm for five, that should give me time to get back to my condo and get showered and changed.”
Morgun blinked, then nestled her cheek just a little bit further into Laney’s warm shoulder. Her skin was fragrant and silky, and she wished they could remain that way for a good portion of forever.
But Morgun counseled herself not to get too attached. Forever was a huge word. A scary word. A word that a lot of people didn’t get. Forever was a mercurial word and she was sprinting her ass off instead of taking the baby steps she needed to be taking. She needed to be careful. Cautious. Not push or rush things or expect too much. She was scared to even hope because hope could be a real bastard. Hope could give you everything, but it could also pull the rug out from under a person and put them on their behind real fast too.
She knew she was bad at living in the present. Her mom often used a saying that sounded like it came straight from the eighteen-hundreds, about borrowing tomorrow’s troubles for today. Morgun knew she did that all the time. She needed to stop worrying, stop borrowing trouble. She just needed to close her eyes, wrap her arms around Laney, and enjoy what they had in the moment.
So, she did. And she was surprised at how easy it was to fall asleep when her steady heartbeat was mirrored by Laney’s.
Chapter 21
Morgun
Morgun knew Laney’s time was precious. She was gone so much for work, and when she was in Anaheim, she was just as busy. They might not have been able to spend every night together, or even every other night, but the second Laney buzzed and walked through Morgun’s door, they wasted no time before starting in on what they wanted to say or do. And that usually involved far less saying than doing. And they did a lot, on just about every surface and square inch of Morgun’s apartment.
She’d never been with a woman as confident as Laney. Or as experienced. Laney made her want to try new things. Different places. Different positions. Even toys. Morgun would never have been able to do that with another person, but Laney made it feel natural and right. She knew just how to touch Morgun, and if she wasn’t sure, she asked. No one had ever asked Morgun where she liked to be touched, or how, or even what she liked.
Laney did. She cared. She stayed the night. She did the intimate things that most people were scared to do, like holding each other after. Caressing hair. Kissing the forehead. Nibbling the earlobe. Running a finger gently over a shoulder. Sleeping wrapped together.
While Morgun had obviously had other relationships, none of them were like Laney. Laney was older. She wasn’t shy. She might have been harder around the edges at first, but every day, she softened further. Morgun had never been with another photographer before. It was nice to be able to ask someone else what they thought about a certain camera setting, or a shot, a series of shots, or even a new technique. It was more than just nice.
After a few days in New York, Laney showed up at Morgun’s apartment as soon as she’d dropped her luggage and camera equipment off at her condo. They waited all of three seconds after Laney walked in before they tore each other’s close off and enjoyed each other’s bodies like they hadn’t seen each other in years.
After, Morgun lay in her bed in a tangle of sheets and Laney’s arms and legs, thinking about how she could ask Laney what she’d been dwelling on for the past few days. She wanted to do a photoshoot with Laney, but instead of focusing just on Laney as the subject, which Morgun knew would only make her uncomfortable, she thought they could take turns behind and in front of the lens. She wanted to do something fantasy related, with costumes, hair, makeup, the whole deal.
She could imagine them shooting in a green space, doing a fairy scape, and at night, playing with fire or sparklers with one of them dressed as a fire goddess or a nymph or something. She hadn’t really worked through the details, but she couldn’t stop thinking about it. She’d always wanted to try something different, really artsy, but she’d never really had a subject who wanted to do it and she couldn’t afford to shell out thousands for a model from an agency.
She wasn’t brave enough to ask another photographer to try to execute her vision either. But Laney… Morgun thought that if she pitched her idea the rig
ht way, maybe Laney would get excited about it too.
She was just about to start talking about fire and fairies, when a phone went off. She knew it wasn’t hers. Her ring tone wasn’t that annoying.
Laney groaned. “Sorry. I forgot to put it on silent.”
“What if it’s work?”
“I just got back. They can call back later.”
It wasn’t like Laney to ignore work, and Morgun practically glowed with the warmth of Laney choosing this moment with her over the outside world. That and it was ten at night on a Wednesday. Surely no one could need Laney that badly.
But the phone went off again. And again. And again.
Morgun finally squirmed around in the bed and got her elbow propped up on the pillow. She looked over at Laney. Her nose was scrunched up in annoyance and she had an evil glint in her eyes, like at any second she’d lunge for the phone and throw it out an open window to take care of the problem.
“You could always answer it,” she suggested lightly.