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Chapter 22
We go to his hotel first to pick up his bags. I drive. I insist he shouldn’t stay in a hotel but should stay with me instead. Rory is quick to grab his luggage from his room and check out. He is back in the car with me in no time, winded.
He smiles at me and kisses me on the lips like we have been apart for a long time instead of the fifteen minutes it took him to get back to my car. He keeps his hand on my thigh the entire time as I drive to my place.
Pilar’s generosity has extended to getting me suitable living arrangements, but I’ve insisted on staying on the modest side, at least the ‘modest side’ by my family’s standards.
We pull up to my apartment building, and I park in the lower-level garage.
“Well, this is it.”
I help him with the smaller of his bags, and we make our way inside. I twirl the keys in my hand as we ride the elevator to the sixth floor. When we get inside my apartment, I glance around, hoping I haven’t left anything terribly embarrassing lying about.
For the most part, I keep the place clear of clutter. I’m a fairly neat person, but it comes as second nature from the years of disciplined training more so than from an actual desire to keep a clean home.
“It’s great,” says Rory. “Mind if I look around? I want to see what kinds of things you like for when we move in together.”
“Ifwe move in together,” I correct.
“Right. Assume I mean ‘if’ when I talk about plans, okay?” He asks.
“You could move in here,” I say nonchalantly.
“Sure. Then you need to see my place for the kinds of things I like.”
My apartment is small, with only one guest bedroom, and I follow Rory as he glances around every room. He enters my bedroom last, and I follow him there too.
Rory picks me up in his arms and carries me to the bed.
“I don’t know if we’ll live here or not, but just in case, I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to carry you in.”
“I’m not a traditionalist, Rory.”
“You sure?”
“Positive,” I say and chuckle into his neck.
He sets me down gently on the bed so I can sit on the edge. He sits next to me and cradles my face in his hands. He kisses my forehead, but it’s sweet, not sensual. He peppers kisses down my face until he reaches my neck. In that crevice between my jaw and my neck, the kisses turn hungry, and I feel his tongue tasting me. Rory lets out a groan from deep within his chest.
“Now, where did we leave off at the gym?” he asks. He reaches for the hem of my shirt, and I know he wants to take it off.
“Rory, wait. We have to talk.”
“Uh-oh. I know the sound of that.”
“No, it’s just . . .” I trail off, unsure how to word this for him.
My brain flashes back to our first time together. We had stood in my apartment, and he’d seemed so scared and afraid that I would judge his body for the scar on his chest. It had broken me a little bit at the time that he had something on his body he had no control over that he had to explain before any sexual encounter.
In a mirror-opposite situation, I now have to explain my scars.
And the scars are just the tip of the iceberg we will have to climb together if we are ever to be intimate again.
“Rory—” I say, but my voice hitches. “I want to give you an out.”
“An out?” he asks.
“Yes. An out. My body has changed significantly since we were together like this the last time.”
