“Do you really think I could—”
“Alejandra,” Mick reproached her. “You are what? Thirty-three yet you don’t look past thirty. Your body has been trained to surf its entire life. I’ve surfed professionally until I was forty, and then decided to retire because I wanted to help other surfers reach the top. You are an athlete, one of the best. Don’t give up just because you cheated on death and come up a little bit beaten.”
Alejandra nodded. “Thanks, I’ll—It’s just been tough.” That was the pep talk of someone used to giving them.
“You’ll come back,” he repeated. “I’m sure.”
But she didn’t believe him. Not right now. What she felt in her bones was the impossibility of it. The sheer weight of beingout.
She wasn’t the Alejandra Callum had met. Not anymore. She felt broken. She wondered—would he see that? Would he look at her and think she wasn’t who she used to be? And then there was the other issue.
Sex? Practically out of the question. Any wrong move and her shoulder would throb like hell.
But fuck if she didn’t want to be manhandled by that man.
Callum could dowhateverhe wanted to her.
She tried to push through the two hours that separated her from seeing him again. Smiling at colleagues. Answering questions about her comeback. Making small talk when all she wanted was to be far away from the Athlete Zone.
Since arriving, that first conversation with him had been the only one that had made her feel… okay. Grounded. She loved all her friends. Amira and Ilias stood by her side the entire time, and yet they were the constant reminder that she had to give up on her dreams for that year. Maybe she could embrace what Mike said, and yet, she could only see the missed opportunities through that sling. She hated it.
26
CALLUM
Is This What You’ve Been Waiting For? - Amy MacDonald
Right on time,Alejandra appeared at the stand he’d spent the past two hours fixing up. Asma had called him twenty times. He’d picked up on the fourth and threatened to file a restraining order. She wasn’t even mildly deterred.
Alejandra walked up with a beer in her right hand and handed it to him.
“God, thank you,” he said with a grateful smile, waving goodbye to the volunteers. They had been nice, until they’d needed him to tell them where to put every single freaking box.
“How was it?” She looked around at the stand now branded with Lamina’s corporate logo and colors and too many brochures, in his opinion. “It looks good. I would’ve helped.” A smirk and a tiny wave with left fingers.
He shook his head. “It was horrible. You spared yourself hours of pointless Asma threats from afar.”
She chuckled, and he finally stepped out of the stand, putting on his jacket.
Fuck, he needed fresh air—real air, not the kind that came through a dusty event stall. The day was still gray, but Alejandra’s presence brightened everything.
Now he stood directly in front of her. No stall between them. Just the two of them.
“If I lean down and kiss your cheek, will you hit me with your sling?” he asked. “We didn’t say hello properly.”
“Not sure I can move the sling fast enough, but don’t worry. You can,” she smiled, cheeks flushing.
He didn’t waste another second.
His body closed the small gap between them with an almost predatory grace, and his left hand rose to cup the side of her neck, fingers brushing against the delicate skin just beneath her hairline.
He leaned in slowly, and pressed a soft, lingering kiss to her soft cheek. For a moment, the world shrank until it was just them.
When he pulled back, their eyes locked, and for what felt like forever, neither of them looked away. His blue gaze held hers, searching, teasing, and impossibly intense.
Time seemed to stretch, the air thick with unspoken words, with memory and desire tangled together, until even a single breath felt like a trespass.
“You cut your hair,” she acknowledged, stepping slightly back. Her cheeks were still pink.
