Total pages in book: 77
Estimated words: 75748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 75748 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 379(@200wpm)___ 303(@250wpm)___ 252(@300wpm)
“I want you here,” I said, my voice barely loud enough for me to hear.
But he heard.
He turned slightly, pressing a kiss to my hair.
“Good. There’s nowhere else I want to be.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Nico
Back at the safe house, we did exactly what I said we would.
We ordered food. We ate together on the couch. We took Goya for a couple of walks.
Then she took my hand and led me down the hall toward the bed.
Her hands were all over me, taking her time removing my clothes, tracing over my chest, my stomach, closing around my cock.
We fell into the bed, bodies tangling, breaths syncing, moans mingling.
Everything was too much and not enough. Every second stretched. Every sensation built, compounded, then we both shattered under the pressure of it all.
Afterward, she let me pull her onto my chest, her body draped over mine, her fingers tracing over my chest, making little shapes and words that I couldn’t quite make out.
At some point, Goya woke up from his four-hour nap on his dog bed to come and hop up on the bed to keep our feet warm.
It was the most content I think I’d ever been.
Was there some part of me that was concerned that this was just distraction and comfort for Blair? Sure. There was a possibility that once this was all finally over and we went back to our lives, Blair was going to want nothing to do with me. Once she had time to really think about the whole mafia thing, the danger, the reality of what that meant I was often involved in.
She might decide she’d had enough of uncertainty with Matt and move on from me.
She might never grow to care for me the way I’d cared about her almost since the moment we’d met.
But the fear of losing her wasn’t a good enough reason not to fully immerse myself in her while I had the opportunity. To let my hands, lips, and tongue get to know every inch of her. To memorize her sighs and shivers. To revel in the way her face lit up when she laughed, and knowing I was the one to give her that brief moment of joy.
Maybe all we would have was a weekend, a week, a month together. But I was going to slow down time so it felt like a fucking lifetime.
That was part of the reason I found myself reaching for my phone anytime I caught her in a moment of unguarded beauty: standing in the window with her steaming mug as the sun streamed in, sitting on Goya’s bed with him, her cheek pressed to his head, in the kitchen flipping blueberry pancakes in one of those silk pajama sets I never thought I’d love as much as I did.
In case there came a day when the memories started to fade around the edges, I would have the pictures to look back on.
“What has that intense look on your face?” Blair asked as she reached for her coffee.
Her plate in front of her was a soupy mess of syrup and a few swimming blueberries. She’d finished off the last of the stack after declaring a few moments before that she was going to burst.
“I was just thinking about art,” I admitted.
“What about art?”
“I guess I just never considered before that each canvas is a moment frozen in time. I know that most of them were likely done over weeks of posing. But still. It captured a moment that would never happen again in the exact same way. And there’s something really poignant, but sad, about that.”
“Exactly,” she agreed, eyes going all gooey.
“What is your favorite piece?”
“Of all time?” she asked, looking panicked.
“What comes to mind first?”
“The Lovers by Émile Friant. Have you ever seen it?”
“No.”
“It’s a man and a woman stopping on a bridge to, it seems, admire the landscape, but they are caught up in each other instead.”
“Why that one?”
“I don’t know. I think… it’s the simplicity of it. How it shows so much intimacy and vulnerability with just a shared look. There’s something… delicate about it. Like love, I guess.”
“New love, maybe,” I said, watching that vulnerability overtake her features again.
“Hm?”
“New love is delicate. Real love is… resilient. It’s built on something strong enough to help it weather the inevitable storms.”
Her gaze cut away at that, staring out the window at the rain clouds chasing away the morning sunshine.
“I guess I’ve never had love like that,” she said, seeming to speak to herself.
“You’ve never received love like that,” I clarified. “I think we both know you gave it.”
She was silent for a moment. Then, in a barely-there voice, she asked, “Can I confess something awful?”
“Sure, but I doubt it’s as awful as you think.”
“It is.” There was another long pause as she fought with herself, sucking in, then releasing a deep breath. “I don’t think I loved Matthew. Not the way you should love your spouse, anyway. I… I think I was infatuated at the beginning. So much so that I mistook it for love. But it couldn’t have been love. I barely knew him. And then, I don’t know. I think it was… commitment and dedication, not love. I was all in, you know? And if he was even halfway in, I think I would have let that be enough forever.”