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“Do you want to see all of mine?” he asks, and I freeze with the glass halfway to my mouth, ready to take another sip. He hitches a thumb toward the bathroom. “Anxiety, allergies, digestive problems, take your pick.” I quirk a brow, returning the glass to the table.
“Digestive problems?” I lean forward, resting my elbow on my knee and my chin in my hand. “Does Fitzwilliam get an upset tummy?”
He makes a disgusted face.
“Please don’t ever say that sentence again,” he pleads. I laugh, falling back onto the pillows behind me. “You didn’t take the sleeping pill,” he says after a moment, and I glance down at him.
“I wasn’t sure if I was sleeping here,” I say honestly, and wave a hand in front of my face. “You may get sick of looking at all this before it’s time to hit the hay.” For emphasis, I fold my chin down, giving him a serious look with emphasized neck rolls and wheezy breathing that borders on physical comedy.
To my surprise, he lets out a sigh, and then yanks one of my feet out from underneath me, pulling it into his lap and working his thumb into the arch with surprising vigor. I close my eyes, unintentionally letting out a little moan.
“Stop that,” he says, tapping at the top of my foot as if in warning, “or I’m going to fuck you to kingdom come.” My eyes snap open, but when I look at him, he’s just focusing on my foot, his thumbs kneading back and forth.
“Who are you and what have you done with Fitz Westfall?”
Without looking up, he responds “Who are you and what have you done with Piper D-"
He stops himself, and I realize when he doesn’t look up, heat suddenly flaring on his cheeks, that he doesn’t know what my last name is. I sigh back at him. It’s valid.
“Legally, Davis.” I monitor his face, but nothing changes. “For the most part, I still go by Delmonico.” There’s a momentary silence where Roscoe scratches at his ear, and I take a deep, steadying breath, staring at the smooth white ceiling. “I’m not good with intimacy anymore.”
He glances up at me, just for a second, before returning his attention to the task at hand. I continue, only seeing him out of the corner of my eye.
“I used to be really good at this - dating. I think everything with-“ I pause, “I think everything that’s happened over the last few years has made me wary.”
“Wary of me?” I look down at him, but his fingers are still working, massaging into the balls of my feet where I’d been putting all my pressure in my heels.
“No,” I breathe, half out of desperation and half trying to stifle the groan his hands elicit. “Wary of this.” I gesture between us. He pauses, and then presses harder into my foot. I grit my teeth, but through the pressure, it feels amazing. “Fitz, I’m sorry - we’ve been on one date and-
“Don’t,” he says, and stops completely. Part of me is concerned - the other part wants to beg him to keep going. “Don’t apologize for panicking because you felt something.” Looking down, with the palm of his hand, he pushes on the top of my foot, where my toes end, and the stretch up my calf makes me wince, but then my entire leg relaxes. Not looking at me at all, he continues. “Because I did too.”
“Did?” He smiles to himself.
“Do.” He pulls out my other foot and starts the process all over again, digging into the arch. “I do feel something.”
“Marble Man Fitz feels something?” I ask with a smirk. Here we go again, always trying to make other people feel comfortable by compensating with humor.
“Don’t,” he says again, and glances up at me. “I’ve always felt something. I just don’t let people see it.” The way he clenches his jaw makes my heart break into a million little pieces, watching him work his hands into my bare feet like it’s the only thing keeping him from falling apart in front of me.
“Oh, sweetheart.” At my words, he looks up, and I see something flash in those deep eyes of his. I’m not sure what the look is, but I pocket it. He avoids my gaze, focusing on a spot behind me, as I continue, “Who made you feel like you couldn’t show your feelings?”
Fitz pushes down on the top of this foot, same as the other, and then lets it rest in his lap, fingers working idly across my calf. I push myself up against the headboard, losing contact with him, and he grimaces, finally meeting my gaze. Gone is any glimmer of the time we’ve just shared, of the way we’d been pressed together moments before. The look on his face is cold, so much so that tears prick in the back of my eyes.
“Fitz.” I hold my hand out to him, and when he takes it, lips pressed together in a thin line, I pull him up to me. His head rests in the crook of my arm where I sit up against the upholstery, his ear against my chest, and run my fingers through his hair, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. A shiver runs down my back when a slight breeze hits me, and before I can even ask, he’s helping me bring the duvet up over us until we’re nestled underneath.
For a minute, he just sits there, and I listen to his breathing. His hand wraps around my waist, and I’m thrown back to that night in my bedroom all those weeks ago. When his fingers tighten on the shirt I’m wearing, it feels like he’s gripping me for support.
“How much do you know about my dad?”
Chapter 33
Fitz
“Notalot,”Pipersays quietly, and I pause, unsure of what to say next.
My heart may be beating faster now than it was minutes ago, coming down from that delicious high while still inside Piper. But that’s only because I don’t talk about this, not with anyone, really.
Not even Olivia, because, while she’s known me since kindergarten, she didn’treallyknow me until we were much, much older, and now I question whether she ever did at all.
