37
I can’t sleep.
Tessa’s guest bed is comfortable enough, and the room is quiet except for the distant sound of late-night conversations drifting up from the terrace below. But my brain won’t shut off.
Tomorrow is the wedding. Tomorrow I’m going to confess my feelings to West in front of a fountain while wearing a dress that Tessa swears will make him “forget his own name.”
Tomorrow everything changes.
Or everything stays exactly the same, and I make a fool of myself in front of his entire family.
Both possibilities are equally terrifying.
I check my phone: 12:17 AM.
Tessa’s been asleep for an hour, and I’ve been lying here staring at the ceiling, running through every possible scenario of how tomorrow could go wrong.
What if he doesn’t feel the same way? What if his mom was wrong about him loving me since high school? What if he really does just want to keep this casual and I’m about to ruin everything?
What if I freeze up and can’t say the words?
What if I say the words and he looks at me like I’ve lost my mind?
What if—
I throw off the covers and grab my room key.
I need to see him. Not tomorrow, when there’s pressure and an audience and a carefully planned romantic gesture. Tonight, when it’s just us and I can look at his face and maybe figure out what he’s actually thinking.
The hallway is dimly lit and empty, my bare feet silent on the carpet as I make my way to room 337.
I stand outside his door for a full minute, trying to work up the courage to knock.
This is insane. It’s after midnight. He’s probably asleep. I’m going to wake him up looking like a crazy person in my pajamas and—
I knock before I can talk myself out of it.
Soft footsteps, then the door opens to reveal West, looking rumpled and sleepy and completely beautiful.
And shirtless.
“Liv?” He blinks at me like he’s not sure I’m real. “What are you doing here?”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“So you decided to wander the halls?”
“So I decided to come see you.”
“At midnight.”
“Is that okay?”
He steps aside to let me in. “It’s more than okay.”
His room is identical to Tessa’s but somehow feels completely different. Maybe because his clothes are draped over the chair, or because there’s a glass of water on the nightstand that he was clearly drinking from when I knocked.
Maybe because it smells like him.
“Can’t sleep either?” I ask, noticing the unmade bed and the fact that he answered the door pretty quickly.
“Not really. Too much on my mind.”
“The wedding?”
“The wedding. My parents. You.”
“Your parents?”
“My mom cornered my dad after dinner. Apparently, she’s convinced we’re about to give her pro athlete grandchildren.”
I ignore that thought completely and ask, “What did your dad say?”
“That he likes you and doesn’t care either way as long as I’m happy.”
I nod, lips perching. “Are you? Happy?”
He looks at me for a long moment, and I can see him considering how much truth to give me.
“I’m nervous,” he says finally.
“Aren’t you always nervous?” I tease.
He chuckles.
I look at him now, starry eyed in the night of his room. Shirtless, hot, adorable. I mutter, “You have nothing to be nervous about.”
He stares back at me with a soft expression.
I continue, “You’re West Carmack. You don’t mess things up. You overthink them and stress about them and plan for every possible scenario, but you don’t mess them up. Your heart is too good.”
He takes a moment to think and then says, “I messed up my last relationship. I stood there holding that glass of water and said ‘okay’ when she broke up with me.”
“That doesn’t sound like you messed it up. That sounds... mature.”
“It was a low moment. One where I held that glass of water realizing I had no idea where we stood in the relationship, but I let it go on. I should have done something. Or at least asked why.”
Shit. Is he talking about me? Hinting? I don’t know, but I do anything that I can to––
“I don’t want to do that with you, but I think I’m too late.”
I can’t help the smile pulling at my lips. “Maybe, but to be fair, I don’t know what I want.”
“You don’t?”
I inhale, feeling a little dizzy. “Come here.”
He crosses the small space between us, and I reach up to touch his face.
“Want to know a secret?”
He nods.
“I’m terrified I’m—”
He silences me with a kiss. Soft and sweet and tasting like toothpaste and something that’s uniquely him.
“Don’t be,” he says against my lips.
I kiss him again, harder this time, cutting off whatever else he was about to say.
“Will you stay? Tonight?”
“Tessa will notice if I don’t come back,” I answer.
“You were supposed to stay with me, and you let Charlie bribe you stay there. It’s fine if you’re with me. The kids won’t notice. Tessa will understand. She’s the one who’s been pushing us together.”
“That’s true.”
“So? Will you stay?”
“Yes.”
We climb into the hotel bed, and I lay against him.
“Liv?”
“Mmm?” I hum.
“Thank you for coming here tonight. For being here tomorrow. For putting up with my family and my neuroses and all of it.”
“You don’t have to thank me for that.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Why?” I turn to look at him.
“Because you could have said no. To all of it. And I’m really glad you didn’t.”
“Me too.”
We lie in the dark, talking softly about tomorrow, about his cousin, about whether his parents will embarrass him during the toasts.
Normal things. Safe things.
Things that don’t require us to acknowledge the weight of what happens when this weekend ends.