“I went over to her house,” I growl, barreling forward. “And she kissed me. That’s all that happened. She kissed me, and I kept thinking about you. So I left.”
“So fucking noble of you.” She tries to push past me, but I grab her and wrap my arms around her, holding her tight against my chest.
“I’m done letting you blow me off. You’re going to listen to me this time. I left because I realized I wanted you.” She goes perfectly still in my arms, and I drop my mouth to her ear. “I know that doesn’t seem like much to you, but I’ve been in love with Meredith for years. And now she wants me for more than the occasional good time. She wants the life I wasted years dreaming she’d let me give her.”
“Then go to her,” she whispers.
“I can’t. I’ve felt real love with you. Good, healthy love. Love that makes me think about making babies and growing old. Settling in with someone whose hand in mine is the most comforting thing in the world. That’s what I want now, and I want it with you. All of it.”
“I don’t want a husband who sees me as the best companion. The best mother for his children. I want more than that. I want someone who wants me—physically—as much as you used to want Meredith.”
“I want you more than I ever wanted her.”
She scoffs. “Right.”
“I can’t believe how wrong I was.”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I thought I was being the good guy by not pushing you about sex. I thought you needed me to be patient. To be okay with your rules, to be okay with you barely letting me touch you. But I was wrong. You needed to know. You needed me to show you how much I want you.” I drop my mouth to just above her ear. She smells so damn good. “I think about it all the time. My hands on your body. My mouth. The way you’d taste if you’d just let me kiss you everywhere.” I pull back, breathing heavily, fighting to keep myself from touching her, from kissing her until she listens to me.
She squeezes her eyes shut. “You’re confusing me.”
“Good. Maybe that means you’re finally listening to me.”
“Max…”
I step close, skim the shell of her ear with my lips “How can I prove it to you?” I whisper. “I’d think knowing how hard you made me when we touched might be enough evidence, but apparently not. Maybe you need more than that. Maybe you need to know how much self-control it took me not to seduce you. Or maybe you need to know that when you sucked my dick, the sight of your lips stretched over me turned me on so much that I had to close my eyes so I wouldn’t embarrass myself. Or maybe that’s not enough for you. Maybe I also need to tell you about what I think about when no one’s around. Maybe if you could see what I’m picturing when I jack off—if you had any idea how much I fantasize about driving inside of you, sucking those tits, making you come—maybe then you’d believe me.”
HANNA’S NAKED, sitting on the edge of my bed and staring at her phone.
I rub my eyes and look at the clock. It’s six in the morning. I came back to my room last night and found her waiting for me. I stripped her bare and kissed her until I couldn’t think anymore. Every day since my father’s death, I’ve felt myself sink a little further into the darkness.
Vivian doesn’t want Collin to be raised in LA, and I can understand that. Hell, I agree with her. But the week my father died, Vivian and her new husband started looking at houses in Tennessee. When Collin told me about it, he slipped and called Vivian’s husband “Dad.”
It was an accident, and Collin caught himself and giggled away his mistake. I tickled him and acted like it didn’t matter, but the slip ate at me. The fact that he said it by mistake and not deliberately proved something, didn’t it? And the more I thought about their move, their happy little new family, the more I realized I’ve lost my place in my own family again. Right now, I’m Collin’s second family, but soon, I won’t even be that. I’ll be tertiary. An afterthought.
Unwelcome at my own father’s funeral and soon to be an afterthought to my only son, I slipped deeper and deeper. The night I met Hanna was a bright spot in the darkness, and when I made myself say goodbye to her, it came back—suffocating me until not even the sound of Collin’s voice was enough to let me draw a full breath.
So I summoned my angel, knew I could climb out of the depths on the sound of her moans alone. I had her coming for the first time before we ever left the foyer, and by the time I had her in my bed, I felt like I could breathe again.
But I’m so fucking selfish that I didn’t think until now how much, by saving me, she’s tormenting herself.
Rolling over, I brush my knuckles across her shoulder blades. “What is it?”
She doesn’t look up from her phone. “It’s Max,” she says softly. “He wanted to check in and make sure I’m having a safe trip.”
I tense. If I’ve ever been used before, I’ve never cared. But the idea of my time with Hanna all working to manipulate the ex? The idea grates on me.
“What does he think of you being here with me?”
With a click, she places the phone back on the bedside table. “He doesn’t know. Everyone thinks I got an out-of-town wedding cake gig.”
I want to reach for her. Last night, I was so wrapped up in my own grief and my own need, I was so busy running from my own demons, that I didn’t think to ask about hers. But now I want to touch the tight lines around her eyes and make it better. To trace my thumb down her cheeks until I find the tracks of the tears he made her cry.
“I almost didn’t expect you to come,” I confess. “I thought you’d be back with him by now.”
When she turns to me, there’s an apology in her eyes. “I kissed him.”