I’m stuck in place. My body and mind frozen.
After watching me for a long moment, Nikhil lets out a sigh. “Meena, why are you here? You don’t owe me anything. The terms of the divorce are settled. I don’t need some…some consolation prize. Or some gift from you because you feel guilty or because you pity me or—”
“No, Nikhil. It’s not that.” I take a deep breath. “I didn’t turn in the papers.”
His brows knit, and I force myself to continue.
“The divorce papers. I didn’t turn them in.”
Something bright flares in his eyes, hope or something a lot like it. I hold on to it, even when it flickers out quickly and his face returns to that dull nothing expression, I hold on to it like a lifeline.
“Was there something wrong with them?” he asks.
“No,” I say quickly, then shake my head. “Yes, actually. All of it. All of it was wrong.” I take a step toward him. “I didn’t come here just to find out about the house. I mean, I wanted to buy the house, but only because I thought you were going to sell it. I thought you were going to walk away from all of this, and I couldn’t let that happen. You deserve this, Nikhil. You deserve to be happy.”
He doesn’t react. Not even a little bit.
A lump forms in my throat. “But,” I say, “I guess you didn’t sell the place, so you already know all of this and—”
“Why didn’t you file the papers?” he asks, and for the first time, his voice is gentle; it’s lost some of its earlier hardness.
My vision blurs, tears forming at the corners of my eyes. “Because I couldn’t. Because I…Because I’m…” Something hot and wet slides down my cheek. I lift the back of my hand to wipe it, butNikhil’s already there. His hand holds my jaw, and his thumb slides across my cheekbone.
“Because you’re what?” he asks. He’s so close I can feel the breath of his words on my skin.
“Because I’m in love with you.” I squeeze my eyes shut. “I’ve always been in love with you.”
“Meena,” he whispers. Something light touches my forehead. A brush of his fingers, I think, but I don’t move. Not an inch. I’m too terrified of what he might say. Terrified of what I might lose.
“Look at me,” he says gently, and slowly I open my eyes.
He’s no longer watching me blankly. His face is a kaleidoscope of emotion. Vibrant and colorful. With each millisecond, it shifts. From hope to fear to so much joy it makes me ache.
“I love you,” he says, cradling my face in both of his palms. “I’ve never stopped. Never. I’ve never not been in love with you.”
A sob of relief escapes my lungs, and he catches the sound with his mouth. In the days apart, I’ve replayed every kiss, every touch we shared during the storm, but this…It’s better. It’s not us desperately clinging to a few stolen moments, terrified that each second is bringing us closer to goodbye. There’s a certainty to each movement, a rightness. There’s no more bitter aftertaste of a looming expiration date. There’s just us.
Nikhil’s hand sneaks around to the small of my back. He pulls me closer against him, and I melt, the warmth from his body transferring to mine.
He loves me. He lovesme.Still. After everything.
After a few minutes, he slows, his firm lips sliding one final time across mine before he pulls back entirely.
For a second, I’m worried, but he doesn’t step away, and my anxiety melts entirely when he leans toward me, his forehead resting against mine.
“We need to talk,” he says, with just a tiny amount of regret, making it clear he doesn’t quite want to. That he’d much rather continue as we were, but he’s right. There’s so much we haven’t said to each other. So much we’ve both buried and neglected all these years.
“All right,” I say.
We stay like that for a moment, our breaths intermingling, and then we part.
But as we walk back to the front of the house, Nikhil reaches toward me, slipping his hand into mine.
19
“Where’s your car?” I ask. I should have thought about that earlier. I hadn’t seen a car in the driveway when I’d gotten here.
“I have a new hire,” Nikhil says, his fingers lightly squeezing the back of my hand.
