Page 93 of All the Beautiful Things
“But by then, Dad was already looking into you and I was hooked.”
I fell in love with a girl in a photograph.
“This makes me feel all that more stupid for the way I behaved earlier.”
“Come here.” He held out his hand and I placed mine in his, went to him until I was sitting on his lap.
“All relationships have issues, even the best ones. Hell, even my parents fought. There will be disagreements and arguments and fights so bad the entire house chills ten degrees. I know you didn’t grow up in a home where that kind of fighting was normal, but it is. I also understand why anything uncomfortable would make you want to run. But you have got to stop doing that. I promise I will never again hurt you intentionally. And I am not the guy who would cheat.”
He brushed his thumb over my cheek until tiny fissures of pleasure sparked all over my skin.
“I’ll work on it.” I turned and kissed his palm, leaning into him. “So what’s the deal about your marrying her?”
“Nothing that’s going to happen. Ever. From what I know, her brother Patrick has started taking over more of the business and he’s so dumb he’s worse than a box of rocks. The only reason she was here is because I wanted to have time alone to talk to her and see why she was okay with being used like that.” He squeezed his eyes closed and shook his head. When he opened them again, there was a glimmer of lingering pain melting away. “I was an asshole when things ended. I knew it then, but now, having you, how much I care about you, I realized how unfair I was to her. I thought if we could talk, I don’t know… I thought maybe she was having a hard time getting over our break-up and that’s why she was willing to do what her dad wanted. Instead, I realized she was colder than I ever remembered her being.”
“So why was she in your office today?”
“To let me know she’d be there at dinner. She didn’t want to surprise me. After we broke up, she moved to Chicago to work for an investment company. She just wanted me to know she was in town. It was totally innocent.”
I cringed. Stephanie had tried to tell me. Insisted on it.
“I’m such a fool.”
“You weren’t. I’ve been a jerk to you, too. And this morning. I’m sorry for how I treated you. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I have so much on my mind, I don’t always realize I’m being a jerk until it’s too late. But I am sorry.”
He leaned in and kissed me, tasting of tequila and his own manliness.
We still needed to talk about that, but with his body surrounding me and his tongue sliding against my lips, begging for entrance, I lost all sense of conversation.
I gave it easily, because I was learning there was nothing I would deny this man.
His hardness pressed to my hip, and I ran my hands down his chest. He drove me wild, and I only had so much to give him… but I could give him me.
Just like I’d realized earlier and yet so far, I’d let him take and followed his lead.
What would happen if I took control?
27
Hudson
Ihad no idea what raced through Lilly’s mind, but one minute she was docile, letting me guide her as usual and the next, she was taking charge in a way that made my dick demand freedom from its confines.
“Shit,” I gasped, holding her firmly against me.
She shifted on my lap until she was straddling my thighs, her knees digging into the small space between my chair and hips.
I’d intended to kiss her slow, to seduce her smoothly, but all those plans flew out the window when she settled her lap against me and rocked.
I dropped my hands from her cheeks and slid them to her ass. I squeezed and with a shove to my feet, I stood. She dug her heels into my lower back while I moved. Once I was at the bed, I crawled up on a knee, and then another until her head would land on the pillow before letting her go. The entire time, she clung to me, kissed me like she’d never been kissed before and would never be kissed again.
She kissed me in a way that told me all I needed to know even if she hadn’t said the words. This girl loved me with a passion and depth so fierce she’d fight to the death to keep me.
Pieces, hesitancies I’d been holding back chipped away like a rocket heading into outer space, burning into the atmosphere as it fell back to Earth. All those concerns and worries I lived with. All those wretched goodbyes I’d had to say.
Lilly wouldn’t leave me. Not until we’d both fully lived and could leave each other in peace.
“Fuck.” I pulled back, gasping at the overwhelming emotions pummeling my blood and veins with tenacity.
