AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“What was all that about?” he asks into my hair.
“Girl talk.”
He pulls back to look at me, his hand leaving my back to swoop up to my hair. He takes a piece that fell free and twirls it around his finger. “Girl talk doesn’t leave you both crying.”
“The usual. Her telling me how amazing I am, and that I make everything better. Life of the party. Can’t live without me. That sort of thing.”
A chuckle rumbles from his chest as he finally drops his other arm to pull me in for a real hug. “Now that I can believe. Promise me you’re okay?”
I squeeze him tighter, breathing in his scent and letting my eyes shut. “I can promise this is the happiest I’ve ever been in my whole life.”
His arms pull tighter, one coming up to rest on my shoulders, and he buries his face into my bun as he whispers softly to me, “Me too.”
~
“I’m fucking beat,” Emmett says as he softly clicks the bedroom door shut. After opening presents, we had dessert and played board games. An after-dinner cocktail led to sitting around the fireplace while the kids played with their gifts and the adults chatted. In the end, his family stayed three hours past Allie’s usual bedtime.
We decided to call it a night when all the kids were becoming whiney and ornery, the lack of sleep and multitude of Christmas cookies finally taking a hit on them.
“Me too.” I’m snuggled under the blankets in his bed, watching him slowly undress and change into pajamas, all the while looking at me.
“What’s that look for?” he asks, folding his jeans and laying them on top of his dresser.
“What look?”
“The look you’ve had on your face ever since you and my mom had your ‘girl talk’.” he says, using air quotes aroundgirl talk.
All I can do is shrug, but he doesn’t see it because I’m bundled under the blankets. I feel the words catch in my throat. I’m too chicken-shit to say them. Tears start to prick at the back of my eyes, and like the baby I am, I duck my head under the covers.
The bed shifts with his weight as he crawls in, the click of the bedside lamp telling me the room is dark.
His fingers come up to curl around the edge of the covers, tugging them down until he can see my face. “You alright under there?”
I’m fine. It’s that I’m in love with the most wonderful man, and my scarred upbringing has me paralyzed and unable to say the words. I think he loves me. I know he cares about me; I know now how hard he tried to find me, to tell me what had happened, but my stupid determination kept us apart.
“I love you,” I finally murmur, unsure if he can hear it through the blankets still covering my mouth. My face heats up, waiting for his reaction.
And there isn’t one.
His eyes soften a little, but he doesn’t cringe, doesn’t freeze. I half expect him to tell me we’ve only been dating a month or so; it’s too soon, etc.
Instead, he chuckles softly, pulling the blanket down further to expose my whole face. “Did you say what I think you said?”
“Depends on what you think you heard.” I sit up further, pushing the blankets down to my waist so I can face him. I exhale a deep breath, ready to grow the fuck up and tell him how I feel. “I love you, Emmett. I think I’ve loved you for a long time, but I didn’t recognize the feeling because I hadn’t experienced anything or anyone quite like you my entire life. But I’ve seen you grow from this sweet teenage boy into the sexiest, most wholesome man there ever was, and I know now, I guess.” I shrug, eyes falling to my hands.
The silence lingers between us for hours. Not hours, really, probably only a few seconds. But when you confess your devotion to someone, any second they pause afterwards feels like an eternity.
Until he closes that silence by kissing me. Wrapping his arms around me and tackling me to the bed, kissing me with such passion I gasp into his mouth. Our clothes start to come off. My shirt, his pants, one by one they’re thrown around the room until we are skin on skin.
“You love me,” he finally says, surprise lacing his voice.
“I love you,” I tell him again.
When he moves in to kiss me, I hold him still, searching his face for how he feels.
“Well,” I playfully slap his chest, “are you going to say it back or what?”
An adorable flush crosses his cheeks as his head dips down to my neck. His shoulders shake with a silent chuckle before he raises his head again to look me directly in the eyes. “Did I ever tell you about the day we met, when I saw you standing in the front of our Home Ec room?”
