He sits the cups on the table and jerks his chin at me. I scoot my chair back, and he sits sideways across my lap. His warmth wraps around me right along with his uninjured arm, and he buries his nose in the crook of my neck, inhaling deeply.
This. This is what I want. It feels… perfect.
“I don’t like waking up alone in bed, Buttercup.” He nips at my corded neck, drawing a line up to my jaw with his teeth and lips.
“I didn’t want to wake you. I couldn’t sleep.”
He butts his head against mine gently. “Then you definitely should have woken me up.” He speaks in Spanish, his low, sultry voice sending signals to my dick. “I could have distracted you from your insomnia.” The offer isn’t an escape, it’s an invitation.
I don’t know why I didn’t think of that, but now I’m kicking my past self in the ass. Wrapping my arms around him doesn’t bring him close enough to me, so I squeeze him, making him groan.
“¿Qué tal?” He squeezes me right back.
“I’m restless.”
He chuckles. “No shit. You tossed and turned all night. You twisted yourself into the sheets like you were fighting with them.”
A sigh spills from my lips. “I don’t know how to just…”
“Be?” He answers for me. “Do nothing? We’ll find things for you to do.” He wiggles his ass against my semi while pulling me into a deep, stirring kiss.
“Mmmm.” He brushes his nose against mine. “We should go back to bed. We don’t have anywhere else to be right now.”
“Areyouokay?” I don’t want him to distract us both from a conversation we might need to have.
He nods, pulling back to look me dead in the eye. “I’m good. I’m not ready yet, but I’d like to talk through my options when I’ve had more time to think on them.” There’s no apology in his voice, no rush to reassure me, just his truth.
My heart swells behind my ribs as I try—and fail—to play it cool. He wants to talk options through with me. I grin at him. “I can do that.”
He shakes his head. “You’re smug now that I’m asking for help, aren’t you?”
“No.” I shake back. “I’m just honored that you want me to be a part of that discussion. It’s huge for me.”
“I’m not sure I have any ideas that are good ones.”
I slide my hand around the back of his neck, allowing my thumb to glide over his jaw and the shell of his ear as I do. “We don’t need to know yet.”
The urge to promise him answers rises sharp and familiar in my chest. Solutions. Certainty. Control. But I let it pass.
I have him—choosing me while everything else is undecided—and somehow, that’s enough to quiet the war in my head.
CHAPTER 53
Xavier
It doesn’t take long to convince my guy to leave his blank-screened email and come back to bed. Coffee abandoned, I take him by the hand and pull him to the bedroom.
There’s a nip in the air, that January chill that makes you shiver on the tiles if you don’t have underfloor heating. Of course, my bougie other half does, so part of me wants to starfish out on the fancy floor and warm my whole body. But I have a feeling something even warmer is in my immediate future.
We find our way to the side of the bed, and I turn toward him. A war of emotions skate over his face. My ice prince is lost at sea. He’s just chosen restraint instead of controlling orfixinghow I handle my future, and he’s still reeling from the meeting with his father.
Cupping his face with my palm prompts him to sigh, his shoulders sagging, his eyes fluttering closed at the touch. I lean toward him, sliding my nose against his before placing the softest kiss against his even softer lips. He moans, reaching forthe band of my pants to tug me against him as his lips capture mine.
He holds me against him, kissing me like he needs the contact to keep him tethered. It’s not urgent or rushed. It’s not sloppy or brutally claiming. It’s slow, it’s deep, and it leaves me feeling wanted like I’ve never felt before.
In a fumble of limbs, we make it onto his bed, face-to-face. In an act of chest-crushing gentleness, he places my injured arm on a pillow between us. His fingers wander my bare skin like he’s tracing places on a map, studying, learning, committing everything to memory as they roam.
He stills, searching my face, always waiting. “Okay?” His ask is quiet but at the same time deafeningly loud. He dots kisses over every inch of my face, down the length of my neck, and when he makes it to my injured shoulder and collarbone, his kisses are featherlight. None of this fixes anything, but it steadies me, and maybe that’s enough for both of us this morning.
