The thought sends an uninvited shiver racing down my spine, and the next minute, I’m nearly hyperventilating. “Everyone’s going to hate me,” I wail. “Everyone knows. All my life, I’ve been good. I never gave my parents any grief. And now…now this! They’re going to be so humiliated! They’ll never forgive me. What if they never talk to me again?”
“Hey.” Taylen takes my hand before I can go into a full-on meltdown. As it is, I’m pretty dang close already. He pulls me up against him and nestles my cheek on his big, warm chest.
I inhale a lungful of his lovely masculine scent. I know what cologne he wears, what deodorant he uses, and even what kind of shampoo he likes since he doesn’t change it up much. Plus, I’ve bought it all for him before. It’s familiar and just so good. It smells like burnt beaches and the woods or something. I’m not a smell master, so I can’t pick apart the ingredients and scents like a connoisseur, but I do smell the apple-scented laundry soap Taylen uses. It’s a stronger scent because he always puts too much of it in when he does laundry. I keep telling him that he doesn’t need so much, but he always puts two cups in every single load. Two! Seriously. His clothing is never even that dirty.
His huge hand slides over my now wilted curls. He tucks one behind my ear, and when it springs back immediately, he smooths it again. This time, it stays.
“No one is going to hate you,” Taylen says in deep, calm tones. “You’re panicking. You need to take a breath. Everything is going to be fine. Your parents love you, and they’ll understand. You just needed to do something drastic to get them to listen. And there’s no way you would have married that butt nugget. I wouldn’t have let you. You’re too…too vivacious and wonderful to get stuck with a boring Neanderthal like him.”
Taylen tilts my face up, and for just a minute, when he looks at me, I imagine him bending his head and…and what? Kissing me? Good heavens. I have no idea where that thought came from, but now I can’t stop looking at his lips and thinking about what they’d feel like. It makes me hot, and my core suddenly feels achy and shivery.
It’s been like six million years since I got laid because I never had sex with Henry. Not. Once. Even though we’ve been ‘dating’ forever. My lacking love life has clearly messed with my vagina, causing it to short circuit my brain.
“Everything’s going to be fine,” he promises, looking me right in the eye. That’s why he tilted my face up. It’s because he wanted me to see that he means it, and I should believe it.
I want to ask him about the brooch, but I think I’ve caused enough trouble for one day, so I choke back the words and just nod like I genuinely believe it’s all going to be okay.
Even though I’m still not sure that I do.
CHAPTER 4
Taylen
Some dreams you just don’t want to wake up from.
I’m in that nice place, just hovering near being awake, but not so close that I can stop the dreams. The dreams come, one after the other. I wake up in between the wall of pillows and duffel bags separating me from Elodie, so I don’t have to worry about springing a sleep hard-on and accidentally rubbing up against her. Friends don’t rub their junk and stuff on other friends. At least Elodie and I don’t, or rather, I don’t, because she doesn’t have a junk and stuff.
Just saying.
We’re never going to do the friends with benefits thing. I love Elodie too much to ever risk hurting her like that. It would just make a mess out of things. Besides, I’m not attracted to her, and the love I have for her is the safest kind of love. It’s the kind of love nurtured over a lifetime that doesn’t come with strings and is at zero risks of being mucked up by the curse.
Despite knowing all that in the brief spans of being awake, I still dream about the brooch.
In the dream, Elodie is wearing it. She’s also in a wedding dress, but it’s not the ugly one from earlier. This one is sleek and pretty, flowing about her lush body and hugging her lovely curves. We’re in a field of wildflowers, just her and me, and I think I’m wearing a suit. Dreams are funny like that since I can’t really tell. Her dress, though, I can go on and on about it.
The wind blows softly, ruffling the gauzy white fabric, swirling it around her gently, and pressing it against her curvy hips, the sleek contours of her long legs, her flat belly, and the swell of her breasts. The dress dives down daringly low there, plunging between her gorgeous orbs and revealing a tantalizing V of creamy skin. She angles to the side, and I can see how shapely her ass is underneath the fabric since the wind is blowing it tight against her posterior.