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“Eloquent.” She smiled into a kiss, and I squeezed her waist.
“For a long time,” I started, skimming the tip of my nose along hers, “I didn’t think I could love anyone.”
Taylor backed away a few inches, her eyes rapidly shifting between mine. I could feel her strain with nervous tension.
“I feel like I’m too broken for anyone to love me,” I said, and the wrinkle between her eyebrows deepened as she shook her head.
“You’re not broken.” With one shoulder shrug, she cut through the dense wire around my heart and burrowed there. “Just a little bent. Like me.”
“Think we could bend toward each other?”
She kissed me again, a soft, sweet brush of her lips over mine before sliding her tongue along mine. I held her close, one hand at her lower back, the other at the nape of her neck, while I tasted her. Like she was a flavor I’d never tried before.
Maybe she was.
I’d met Taylor Novak, the bitch.
I’d known Taylor Novak, the pain in my ass.
I’d become familiar with Taylor Novak, the gentle woman in need of assurance.
But this Taylor Novak, the one offering her heart to me, was new.
And I imbibed until I was punch-drunk.
I don’t know at what point we ended up lying down, but I lifted up onto my elbow and brushed my fingers over her pink cheek then down to her throat, where I felt her pulse fluttering beneath my fingertips. The sign that she was alive and working her way into me with every breath.
I inhaled her exhales, and we stared at each other, our silent admission settling between us. But right as I opened my mouth to confess my love, her cell phone buzzed with a phone call. We both glanced to it and, on mutual agreement, decided to ignore it.
The buzzing continued.
“Lemme check who it is.” She snagged it from the coffee table. “It’s my sister.” She brought it up to her ear. “Hey Ken, what—” She sent me a panicked look then stood up. “I can barely understand you.”
I sat up, absently running my hands over my hair and beard as I watched Taylor rub her forehead. “Kennedy, you have to try to calm down. I can’t understand what you’re saying.”
A few moments later, her eyes went wide, her jaw dropping. “Hewhat?”
I hopped up, not liking that reaction.
“Where are you right now?” Taylor asked, pacing the length of the living room. “Are you safe?”
I stopped her on the next lap, my hands on her biceps. Her fury was palpable. Her eyes met mine as she told her sister, “I’m coming to get you. I’ll take care of it. Keep the door locked, and if he tries to break through it, call the cops.”
As soon as she hung up, we both spun in opposite directions, another silent yet mutual decision.
“You have the address?” I asked, pocketing my cell phone and keys.
“She’s dropping me a pin,” she said on her way upstairs. By the time she’d returned with socks and sneakers on, I had my coat on and offered hers to her. My nerves had me chomping away on gum.
“I’m driving,” I told her, and she didn’t argue. Merely ran out of the front door to my car.
I waited until we were on the highway headed north to Tannersville to ask what was going on. “What happened?”
She turned down the heat. Even though it was cold outside, I suspected she was hot from stress. She flipped her cell phone around in her palm, a constant action she’d been doing since we’d gotten in the car. “My sister and her boyfriend got in a fight. She was in the middle of taking her pills, and he smacked them out of her hand. When she bent down to pick them up, he shoved her back.”
My fingers tightened around the steering wheel. “Is she hurt?”
“I don’t think so, but I didn’t get much out of her besides that.”
