Font Size:  

“Then baby me, but not because you think I’m pathetic.”

“I don’t think you’re pathetic. I think you’re awesome. I’m the one who’s—”

I cover his mouth with m

y hand.

He lifts an eyebrow. I take my hand away.

“Isn’t it time?” he says. “Don’t you think it’s time for me to tell you how sorry I am? What a sorry-ass piece of shit I am, and a coward, and stupid, and—”

I cover his mouth again. “Don’t.”

He goes quiet, watching me for clues. Like I have a clue. I reach out blindly for the blanket, pull it up to swipe at my tears, exposing one leg to the cold.

Everything feels so close to the surface. Scratch us anywhere and see what comes out. West’s confession. My anger. West’s reasons. My heartache. West’s abject apology. My regrets.

I don’t want to hear any of it.

“Tell me if I was wrong,” I say. “What I said in the truck on the way to the airport. Which part did I get wrong?”

He shakes his head. Says something against my hand that I can’t understand.

I take my palm away.

“No part,” he repeats. “You were right. You’re always right.”

“I’m not, though. I’m guessing all the time, and I screw up. Don’t put me on a pedestal.”

“You’re always right about the stuff that matters.”

When he smoothes his hand over my forehead, pushing away a strand of hair that stuck to my temple, I take his wrist and pull it down until his palm is pressing flat over my heart.

I leave it there. Let him feel it beat.

I’m alive. I guess that’s what I’m showing him.

I don’t want to spend my life staring backward at everything that’s gone wrong. I want to be here.

So I pull him down by the back of his neck until his mouth is on mine and he’s kissing me again with his hand over my heart. He’s kissing me deeper, moving over me, stroking my tongue with his, letting me feel the heat and the strength in him.

There are things I want to say, blanks in the conversation that the good girl who still lives in me insists I’ve got to fill up.

She wants to tell him, I forgive you.

She wants to say, I still love you.

She wants to press her hand over his heart, too, and make him swear never to leave. Never to fuck up like that again.

But I’m not her anymore. I’m not sure if I do forgive him.

I know I love him, but I don’t want him to have those words. I want him to earn them back.

Convince me, I think, as my blanket falls away. As West’s thigh moves between mine, his belt dragging over my hip, his hands so sure of themselves, so good at gliding down my back to my ass, at grabbing and lifting and positioning me just so.

“We’re gonna go slower this time,” he says, kissing over my collarbone. “So much slower it might just kill me.”

“Make sure it’s not so slow that I don’t notice it’s happening.”

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
Articles you may like