“I disagree.”
She turned toward me slightly.
“He’d see your strength,” I continued. “He’d recognize that.”
The space between us shifted. Her shoulder brushed my chest. My hand found hers on the back of the couch behind her without conscious thought. The television played something neither of us was watching.
“I don’t know what this is,” she said softly.
“Neither do I.”
“That should terrify me.”
“Does it?”
She considered that before looking up at me with a softness in her eyes I so rarely saw. “No,” she admitted. There was no gummy haze tonight. No distraction. Just clear, deliberate awareness. “Well, maybe it scares me a little,” she added.
“In what capacity?”
“I’m not sure I can trust my feelings.”
The word lodged somewhere deep. I reached up slowly, giving her time to retreat if she wished, and brushed a strand of hair back from her face.
She did not retreat.
“I only wish to protect you,” I said quietly.
Her breath caught. She leaned in first. The kiss was small. It was a question more than a statement. Her lips brushed mine, soft and warm and uncertain.
I paused. It had been a long time, but she felt too good, so I answered.
Carefully at first. Matching her pace. Letting her set the rhythm. Then a small moan escaped her, and the restraint I had been maintaining for days thinned.
I deepened the kiss. My hand slid to her waist, drawing her closer as her fingers curled into the fabric of my shirt. The world narrowed. Her pulse quickened beneath my palm. Mine answered, racing as hers did.
When we finally broke apart, the air between us felt altered. She was flushed.
“That,” she whispered, “was not very contractual.”
“No,” I agreed.
Her forehead rested briefly against mine.
And in that quiet, suspended moment, I understood something with absolute clarity. I was gone for this woman. Absolutely gone.
And I did not, for once, feel the need to retreat from that truth.
19
BELLE
Ikissed my fake husband.
That was the first coherent thought I had when I woke up. It arrived before coffee. Before pain. Before reality.
I kissed my fake husband. Nothing bad could happen here. Everything was under control.
I lay there for a moment, staring at the ceiling, replaying it. The warmth of his hand at my waist. The way his mouth had softened before it deepened. The way the air had shifted afterward, like something invisible had been acknowledged between us.
