My heart beat in my ears, blocking the last of it out.
With our bodies still joined, Adair lowered me to the bed and took my face in his hands.
Hesitantly, I opened my eyes, and I saw in his hazel ones what I hadn’t heard from his lips.
What I hadn’t let myself hear.
Adoration. Disbelief.
Love.
As my heart soared, the only thing I feared more than the long drop below was forgetting how high I’d flown.
“Phone,” I said brokenly, throwing out my arm toward my nightstand. “Please.”
Adair, still nestled inside me, reached over me, casting me in shadow as he did as I asked.
Concern pinched his brow as I took it from him, and he stroked my legs soothingly, waiting for an explanation.
I looked at him through my phone’s screen and took a photo.
And another.
And another.
On the next, I captured the moment his concern turned to a shy smile.
Satisfied, I tossed my phone beside me on the bed and opened my arms to him.
Accepting my invitation, he fell on me, wrapping his arms around me and turning us so we were lying side by side. His left foot trembled where it rested below my feet, but before I could ask him if he’d hurt it, he hugged me even closer to him, nuzzling into me.
“Don’t,” he said softly, kissing my hair.
I didn’t.
Even when he got off the bed and used his crutch to go to the bathroom, his movements careful, I said nothing. When he returned to the bed and spread my legs, gently applying the cloth, I let him keep my surrender.
Once we were back in bed, the bathroom lock firmly back in place though still relatively useless, Adair arranged me against him, each place our bare skin touched electric.
When he tilted my head toward him and kissed me, I melted into the pace he set, slow and languid, with no destination in mind except here, with him.
He reached over me and turned off the lamp, and on the way back, he put my phone into my hand, brushing his thumb over my fingers.
“The hydrangeas,” he whispered. “And now… me. What do they have in common?”
He was in the big spoon position again, so I braced my elbow on the bed and opened my photos where he couldsee over my shoulder. My screen reflected in his glasses as I selected all the photos I’d just taken of him and sorted them into my “happy” album.
His grip on me tightened before he reached for my phone. “May I?”
I hesitated, but then passed it over to him.
My heart thumped faster the longer he scrolled and looked at what had made it to the album. It felt more exposing than standing naked in front of him. Than being pressed against him like this.
The room went dark as he shut off my phone and laid it gently on the bed.
He was quiet for a long time, stroking my skin until my heartbeat returned to normal.
“Delly told me what you said,” he whispered, “that day you flipped the world upside down and kissed me in the Cadillac.” He smiled against my hair. “That even when Pops forgets her, he won’t forget how she makes him feel.” I felt the rise and fall of his chest against my back as he took a deep breath. “I’ll remember how it feels to be in the same room as you for the rest of my life. How it is to walk through the world knowing Ireland Sewell doesn’t just have my back, but… my heart too.”
