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Her head won’t stop shaking with refusal and denial. “No, Liam. I know what I want. I want you. I’ve always wanted you.” Her nails dig into my wrists. The devastation in her voice is testing my resolve. But we both need the night to calm down, and I need her to be positive.
I pull away from her and grab my phone, ordering her a car. It’s hard not to wrap her in my arms when she wraps hers around herself. It’s impossible to pretend it doesn’t affect me.
Because it does.
And I give in, taking her by the waist and bringing her against my chest. My large palm cups the back of her head as I bury my lips into the bird’s nest that her hair has become. Her pain soaks my shirt. Mine streams into her hair.
My phone notifies me her car is here, and I escort her all the way down to it. She clings to me, her sobs unceasing as we descend to the bottom floor. Once I ensure she’s safely in the car, I tap the roof once, then step back. My hand drags over my mouth, then moves to the back of my neck with both hands, staring at the starless sky, praying I didn’t just fuck up.
Liam
Exhaustion screams from every muscle as I ride the elevator back to the twelfth floor. I need her to think this through to be sure it’s me she wants. Our impromptu run-ins and interludes over the years were me forcing myself into her life. Becoming exclusive was done subtly, me allowing her to believe it was a mutual thing as I brought her here to my apartment, ensuring she was so used to my presence she didn’t want to go anywhere else. I manipulated everything to my advantage, and part of me wonders if that’s not the real reason she’s never been all-in despite her words.
I need her to choose me without me chasing her. Maybe this wasn’t the best way, either. I hope she does what I said and searches her heart because Lily is it for me. Not like Krista was. I thought Krista was it because no one else would ever want me. With Lily, I know I will never want anyone else. But I need her to feel the same.
And I need to clear my head, too. I need to prepare myself for her to tell me we’re done. That she doesn’t want me as I want her.
I let myself into my apartment in time to catch my ringing phone. Swiping it from the counter, I hit the green icon and head for my room. “Yeah?” I answer as I swing the door open to my closet.
“Take it things didn’t go as planned?” Henry asks on the other end.
Sliding the clothes on the bar to the left, I grab my leather jacket from the hanger, then bend over, grabbing my boots from the shelf below.
“Yes and no.” It’s an honest answer. I expected almost everything that happened tonight. Except for her comment. That I didn’t see coming, and it threw me off kilter. After that, I didn’t know what to expect. “Look, H, I’ll fill you in later. Right now, I need to clear my head, so I’m going to take the bike out for a few hours.”
“Liam, it’s fucking freezing out there. And the roads are still shit.”
I toss my jacket back on the bed and set my boots next to the bench at the foot before returning to the closet. A thick black hoodie gets jerked from its place and tugged over my head. Then I snatch my helmet from the shelf above. “I’ll be careful. Phone will be connected like always, but I need air. Call me if my nephew decides to come. You know I’m not missing you lose your shit.” I sit on the bench and lean forward with an elbow on my knee and my head resting in my hand, squeezing my temples.
“I won’t lose my shit,” he grumbles.
“Yeah, right.” The small chuckle from giving him shit feels good. A momentary reprieve from the weight on my chest. “You know good and damn well when that helpless feeling sinks in because she’s screaming in pain, and there’s no one to punch, you will go nuts.”
“That’s what they make drugs for.”
“They don’t always work, dumbass.”
“Since when do you know so much? You had one kid a million years before your balls dropped.”
“Well, they were obviously dropped. I have the kid to prove it.”
“Whatever, jackass. Go ride and don’t get dead.”
“Yep.”
We end the call, and I lean back for a second, squeezing my eyes shut. With a sigh, I begin to pull on the boots, taking way too long, considering they are no laces, but my mind keeps wandering.
The day I met her, she put me in my place quick as lightning before walking away. She left my jaw on the floor and my dick hard as steel. That night on the beach when she looked like a damn fantasy in the moonlight. She carried my heart with her into those waves and never gave it back.
Months later was Angel’s birthday party at their favorite low-key bar, Lucky’s. My mouth twitches. Not my finest moment, but that alley has seen far worse.
Paris… Fuck, that one needs a repeat, and if this shit works out, there will be a repeat.
The corner booth at a club in LA. A cabin in Tahoe. Under the stars. On the sand. So many places and memories.
But there was more than sex. We may have been a secret, but we didn’t stay locked away. You can’t keep a tiger contained and expect her to be happy. Lily was no different.
Weekends in the Catskills on jet skis and kneeboards. Snowboarding at Whiteface. She snowboarded. I watched. She even got me to go whitewater rafting and skydiving, both of which I promised God if I lived, I would never do again. If she asked me to right now, that promise to God would be broken.
