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“It isn’t that simple! I wish it were, but shit, it isn’t. Just like your addiction is about you, mine is about me, okay? If I want to keep any semblance of myself, I need time away from you. Otherwise, you will consume me and I won’t even be the person you wanted at the start.”
Nothing. No words. No reply. No fight back.
I turn the door handle and pull it open.
“There isn’t a single day I can think of where I won’t want you. Even when you’re walking away from me, I want you. And not to fuck you. Not for your body. I want you. Because I hurt when you’re not there, too. I want you always. I’m as addicted as you are.” His words fill the silence.
“You’re not allowed to be addicted to me,” I whisper as he steps up to me and envelopes me in his arms.
He pushes the door shut with his fingertips. “I’ve never been very good at doing what I’m told,” he says softly into my hair. “Because tell me not to do something and you bet your hot arse I’m going to do it.”
“Why do I believe you?” A smile twitches my lips despite the tears rolling down my cheeks.
He smiles against my temple. “Getting addicted to you was never a choice. It was always inevitable. I couldn’t resist you if I tried, baby girl. You’re my kryptonite.”
I drop my purse and wrap my arms around his waist tighter than I ever have. Because the escape his touch gives me anchors me at the same time. It’s contradictory, hot and cold, ice and fire, chalk and cheese. Everything about my growing addiction to this gorgeous man is a big fucking ping-pong game.
“What are you doing later?”
“Nothing. Why?” I answer.
“I have another shoot. Want to come with me?”
I pull back and look at him. “After last time? Really?”
A heart-thumping smile stretches across his face. “It’s not that kind of shoot. I promise. You won’t want to leave.”
I don’t want to leave.
Ever.
There are little girls dancing around in front of me in the most beautiful frilly dresses. They’re accompanied by the cutest little boys in suits, who are holding flowers and teddy bears and lollipops for their “dates.”
They’re giggling at each other. The girls are blushing. The little boys are bowing. They’re all jumping around and smiling the most adorable smiles… And laughing at the funny man behind the camera.
He’s holding my attention as much as the cuties he’s taking photos of. He’s making funny faces and singing silly songs—I have no doubt that he knows that he looks like a total idiot.
“Stefanie!” Tyler calls the name of a little blond girl. “Why aren’t you singing?”
“Because you’re silly and my mommy said not to talk to silly men.” She pokes her tongue out and laughs.
He gasps. “I’m not silly!”
“Are too!” the kids all cry. Some of them echo after, keen to be included in the chorus. They all break into giggles, and almost instantly, Tyler clicks on his camera.
I’m not even sure what this shoot is for. Party dresses and bridesmaid dresses, I think… But all I’m thinking right now is how amazing this man is with these kids. He’s so patient, so tender. It’s a whole other side to him I haven’t seen.
A side I’m quickly coming to adore.
It’s like he’s finally found an outlet for that childish, playful side of himself he keeps hidden so often. Like when we were in Santa Monica and he tapped my hand until he finally took it.
I wish he’d let that side out more often. Because it’s a side that invokes more than base attraction. It’s a side that tugs on real emotion. It’s a side that shows more than the addiction.
It shows me the man beneath it all. The handsome, soft, gentle man beneath the rough addiction and the ugliness of our everyday reality.
It’s a little slice of something that shows me how it could be. The kind of man he truly is. The kind of father he could be one day.
I wrap my arms around my stomach and watch him as he continues to tease the children and make them feel completely at ease with him. You’d think he was ten years old the way he’s laughing with them. My lips curve upward as I study them all. I could sit here and watch him make these kids laugh all day.
