AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Well, I’m going to call Bill and get him to add another dish to the Chinese order… and I’ll do that in another room.”
“You don’t need to give us space,” I say, but she holds her hand up.
“I’ll be back in ten minutes. I need to get to know Casper.”
“Think ten minutes is long enough?” I ask, looking over my shoulder to make sure she’s gone.
Casper does the most adorable double take, shock etched into his features. “Please don’t say things like that if you don’t mean them. It’s not nice.”
“Casper, so we’re clear here and there are no more misunderstandings or—”
“You’re mine, Ainsley. There will be no one else. No dates, no dances with arseholes in my house… or anywhere else, and this one is the most important, no breaking up. Feel free to freak out as much as you like. I can handle it.”
“Are we together?”
“Do not be cute.”
“You’re a very strict boyfriend.”
He smiles at his new title, and something blooms in my chest, spreading warmth right down to my toes. “You need me to be, or you’ll overthink it. Am I wrong?”
“No,” I mutter. “This hasn’t been easy to figure out. Since, you know, you never said that you liked me or that you didn’t just want to get in my pants.”
He shakes his head. “I don’t know how you could be so blind, sweetheart. I moved to that shit street because I couldn’t handle not seeing you every day.”
“What?” I put my glass down on the counter before I drop it. “You didwhat?”
“How can a person be so intelligent yet lack—”
“All right, stop. Are you serious? Casper, I can’t believe you did that. I thought Marvin made you all move next door.”
“He’d found a flat about ten minutes from uni that he wanted us to move into. The plan was to have Imani there most of the time.” He cups my jaw. “I couldn’t do it. You wouldn’t come to ours, and I would have had no reason to go to yours.”
“But our house is hardly a mansion or a slick apartment in the city.”
“Doesn’t matter. I would live in shed to be near you.”
He moved his whole life to be near me. After the first year of uni, when we barely saw each other, and every time we did, he’d snap or ignore me.
He moved for me.
It makes no sense. We had no relationship at all.
“But you hated me.”
“Yeah, but I always loved you more.”
My heart trips at the sincerity of his words, the way his voice turned as rough as gravel, and the way he looks at me like I’m the centre of everything. “Fuck.” I clear my throat, my pulse thudding in my ears, trying to speak as well as see through the tears swimming in my eyes.
“I’m in love with you, Ainsley, and I’d move again if I had to.”
My throat clogs, heart beating so fast it might actually run off. “So, you’re a bit obsessed, huh?”
He laughs softly and presses his forehead to mine. “That’s one way to describe it.”
“I wish you’d told me,” I say, feeling the weight of the last three years pressing down on my shoulders.
“Don’t do that. We’re here now, and that’s all that matters.”
