I roll my eyes. “You weren’t supposed to know that.”
“Oh, but now I do know it, and I can’t unknow it. Tell me, Mystery Girl. What exactly did you imagine? Give me all the details—the dirtier the better.”
I narrow my eyes at him and bite my cheek to keep from smiling. “No.”
He leans down and kisses my neck. “Would it change your mind if I told you I fucked my fist a thousand times over the last six months thinking of the gorgeous, brown eyed mystery woman I met on a plane? Or that I dreamed of you while I slept and woke up hard and already leaking for the girl I didn’t even know but who was already a part of me?”
I feel my face heat at the intensity in his gaze and the sudden urge to give him back some of what he gave me. “I dreamed of you, too. I didn’t understand it. I still don’t.”
Elliot rolls us so I’m sprawled on top of him and cups my face in both of his hands. “I don’t understand it either. I’ve never felt anything like this. But I know it feels right, and I don’t want to let you go.”
I lean down and press a kiss to his sternum. “I don’t want to let you go either. Except maybe for a minute right now so you can go find those snacks you were on your way to find before we got…sidetracked. I’m starving.”
He chuckles, pressing a kiss to my forehead. “Your wish is absolutely my command.” He rolls us to the side and gets upfrom the bed, strolling to the door, turning back to me just before he reaches it. “Oh, and don’t think I forgot about that whole app thing. The best sex of my life may have distracted me for a minute, but my memory is impeccable.”
“Ugh, I thought you forgot.”
“Never.” He tosses me a grin and a wink. “Gather your thoughts, Ames. It’s story time.”
“You’re annoying.”
He shrugs, the smile never leaving his face. “Maybe, but I think you like me anyway.”
He saunters out of the room, unbothered by the fact that he’s completely naked. I flop back onto the bed, listening to him rummaging around in the kitchen and chatting with his dog, and I know, without a doubt, that there is not one single part of this man that I don’t like.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
ELLIOT
“A-plus snack choices, El, seriously. I bow down. The Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Oreo, gummy bear combo is inspired. And don’t think I didn’t notice that you’re stocking my favorite candy. Any particular reason you have ten pounds of gummy bears just sitting in your kitchen?”
Amelia grins at me and tosses a handful of cereal into her mouth. She’s sitting on my bed facing me, one leg bent under her and one stretched out next to me, wearing one of my T-shirts with nothing on underneath. Her eyes are sparkling, her hair tumbled and messy, and her face flushed. She looks adorable and freshly fucked, and having her here in my room, swapping stories and eating post-sex snacks, is making me feel things it’s entirely too soon to feel. Things like love and always and the burning desire to beg her to stay here with me in my apartment forever.
I mentally shake those thoughts away because absolutely, definitely, too soon. “I got into the habit of eating them after the plane. They reminded me of you.”
Amelia reaches out and runs a hand over my bare leg, smiling when goosebumps break out over my skin at her touch. “You’re a secret romantic, aren’t you?”
I shrug. “Nothing secret about it, but only with you.”
“No ex-girlfriends out there pining for the romantic professor who got away?”
“She’s definitely not pining,” I mumble, suddenly very interested in the bowls of snacks between us.
She lays her hand back on my leg. “Did I hit a nerve?”
I look up at her concerned face and lay a hand on her calf, stroking absently. “Definitely not, just bad memories. There was someone, a few years ago. A serious someone. We met in grad school and dated for a long time. For a while, I thought she was the one.”
Amelia runs her thumb over my leg in a soothing rhythm. “What happened?”
I shrug. “She didn’t understand depression. Didn’t understand that even though I’m one of the lucky ones who found the right combination of medication and therapy and mostly lives a normal life, my mental health is always something I have to be careful with. When I had a bad day or needed to disappear into the darkness for a while, she took it personally, so then I felt like I had to comfort her, and that’s hard to do when my brain is spiraling, so it was an exhausting cycle. I can’t even tell you how many times I explained it to her. I offered to bring her to one of my therapy appointments so my therapist could explain it to her. She just didn’t get it, and that meant she didn’t get me. Not the whole of me, at least. It’s a part of who I am, for better or worse. She’s not a bad person; she was just the wrong person for me.”
I didn’t realize quite how wrong until the person who I’m almost positive is one hundred percent right sat down next to me on a plane.
Amelia blows out a breath. “I’ll say. I’m sorry you experienced that, but I can’t say I’m not glad she wasn’t the one. Because if she was, I wouldn’t be sitting here, half naked, after three bone-melting orgasms, eating the best snacks in the world with the hottest man alive.”
I grin at her, wondering if anyone has ever been this happy in the history of ever. “Hottest man alive, huh?”
Amelia scoffs. “Please, you know what you look like. You have mirrors. Why do you have so many amazing snacks anyway?”
