“Levi—”
“No, wait,” he whispers, breath shuddering, eye wide. “You don’t have to say it again. I heard you, baby. Iheardyou.” His voice breaks halfway through the sentence.
Suddenly my own heart aches. Because I know exactly what he’s doing. He’s protecting the moment. Protecting me from feeling pressured.
This man.
A watery laugh escapes me as I shake my head. “Levi, I love you.”
As weak as my laugh was, it dies the moment I see his jaw quivering. His eyes close briefly, and his entireface crumples. “I love you too,” he whimpers.
A rough sniff follows. Then another. He swipes the heel of his palm beneath his eyes so quickly that I almost miss it.
“You know,” he says, laughing shakily, “I had this whole speech prepared for when you finally said it again.”
I blink, and his laugh grows stronger when he sees the sheer emotion on my face. The relief in his voice is so enormous that it breaks my heart in two.
“I was going to be cool about it, you know? Not… sobbing like this.”
I snort through my own tears.
His grin widens.
“I love you,” I say it again, just for the hell of it. Because something has shaken loose inside me.
He laughs harder. The tears he refuses to shed lose the battle anyway. But his smile never leaves his face. Neither does mine.
“Christ,” he mutters, his forehead drops against mine. “I love you too, Cece. All of you.”
My chest tightens as he collapses next to me again, pulling me in tighter.
And then he’s kissing me desperately. Everywhere. Every inch of my face is showered with his love disguised as kisses.
My forehead.
My temple.
My cheek.
My jaw.
Every kiss carries relief.
His mouth finally finds mine, and I melt into him immediately, instinctively. Into the safety this man has painstakingly built for us.
When we eventually separate, Levi rests his forehead against mine and simply smiles. Because somehow we’ve started relying more on actions anyway.
And that smile of his is something I never want to disappear.
Heis someone I never want to be cast away from. I won’t even let any damn version of myself get in the way of that.
Because Levi Astor is the wings to my anchor.
Can’t get enough of Levi and Cece?
Here are two, never-before-seen, bonus epilogues with a glimpse into their future.
BONUS EPILOGUE ONE
