Truly (New York 1)

The warm reality of Ben.

She wouldn’t think about her guilt, or about what she felt for him—whether he felt it, too. Whether each of them was here in the bed separately, unknown and unknowable, or whether they had something together that neither would admit.

She couldn’t think about it. Not without ruining everything.

May stroked her hands down Ben’s naked back and lived in the warm slide of his skin and the beat of her own heart. Touch by touch. Moment by moment. Breath after breath, as they roused to life and to the pleasure they could give each other.

There was only now.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

He overdid it on breakfast. It was one of those things—he saw himself putting too much food in his basket at the market, watched himself calculating cooking times and thinking about garnishes, and he knew it was way over the top. He simply didn’t care.

May was leaving, and he was quietly flipping out.

Time had gone funny on him, moving in lurches and gasps. The seconds had ticked by slow as anything in bed this morning. In the dim light that snuck through the half-open bedroom door, he’d watched her face when he clasped her hands and lifted them above her head. He’d sunk inside her, captivated by her short, harsh breaths and the way her pleasure so closely resembled pain. Drawing it out, he’d kept his thrusts slow and controlled through her orgasm, then rolled onto his back and guided her hips in a rocking rhythm that kept him just shy of where he needed to be.

He’d stayed there with her for an eternity. A lifetime of May rising and falling over him, her soft skin beneath his hands, his mouth on her nipples, his fingers tracing the shapes of their joined bodies.

But afterward, time sped up. She got out of the bed, and he was somehow dressed, choosing produce at the market while she showered. He was behind the counter in the tiny kitchen, mixing dough while she talked on the phone. Chopping shallots while she bent over his laptop a few feet away.

And then time buckled again, and they were eating, side by side, his hair wet from the shower while the pans he’d used to make way too much food soaked in soapy water in the sink.

He couldn’t think of anything to say that wasn’t stupid.

Thanks for staying with me.

The sex was incredible.

I’ll miss you.

He’d miss her. Did she know that? He hoped she did, but he had no intention of telling her. He shoveled potatoes into his mouth.

“I need to talk to Dan,” she said.

Ben swallowed wrong and started to cough. It bent him over the counter, streaks of pain in his chest making his eyes water. For the span of a few seconds, he felt wretched everywhere, deep inside his bones where the marrow hid, blood-dark and unfixable.

“Ben? Are you choking? Stand up and let me see your face. You’re scaring me.”

He straightened, wiping his eyes, and she looked at him. Looked into his eyes and saw too much.

“I’m fine,” he wheezed. He grabbed his water glass and forced air into his lungs, holding his breath as his diaphragm convulsed. When he drank, his chest calmed, and he was able to say, “Just swallowed funny. Why do you need to talk to him?”

The lines around her mouth deepened. “I was going to buy a ticket, but at the last minute like this, it’s more than I should spend. I have to ask Dan if he can change the original one. That’s only a hundred and fifty dollars. But I think he’s flying today, so I’ll probably have to leave a message and wait … I don’t know. Maybe I should just buy it.”

Ben turned back to his food. Put something in his mouth. Chewed it. He couldn’t say what it was—fruit or meat or bread. Nothing tasted right. His ears buzzed with the sound of swarming bees.

“I’ll buy you the ticket.”

“You can’t. It’s too much. I think this is, like, a business travel fare, or something—it’s more than a thousand bucks, and the website says there’s only a few seats left at that price.”

“So you’d better lock it in quick.”

“It’s better if I call Dan. I’d be able to pay you back, but I don’t want to spend that much.”

“I don’t mean I’ll loan you the money, I mean I’ll buy it. You shouldn’t have to talk to him after … not so soon. Not if you don’t want to. And it’s too complicated anyway. Easier to go ahead and buy the goddamn ticket.”

“I couldn’t take that much from you. Not when you’re …” She made a looping gesture with her hand that meant nothing.