Chapter 34 #2
How did she do this to me?
What the fuck am I supposed to do now?
“It’s beautiful,” she says, smiling up at me.
You’re beautiful.
“Oh, Motor, don’t eat that!” she squeaks, darting over to the tree, where Motor is chewing on a fabric decoration. A smile spreads across my face as I watch her rearranging them so he can’t get at any more.
“Are we watching Christmas movies or not?” I ask.
She throws me a grin over my shoulder, and that’s exactly what we do. Endless crappy Christmas movies, where we boo at the ridiculous scripts, toss popcorn at the cheesy moments, and I’m laughing until my sides hurt.
Trying to forget that everything has changed.
When we finish watching Die Hard again, the only good movie of them all, Ella hands me a large envelope. She sits close, feet tucked under her, knees touching my leg.
“Merry Christmas, Grinch,” she says. I open it and pages slip out. “It’s everything I remember Asher saying about you.”
My eyes meet hers. “Me?”
She nods. “I started writing things down after I got here … just to make sure I remembered. Then it turned into writing about him and everything we’d ever said or done together.
I guess I forgot how much he talked about you.
” She taps the pages. “That isn’t everything I’ve written, but it’s the parts about you. ”
“ASHER it means he’s thinking of a time before us, and I’m excited because I like learning more about him. Maybe we’ll have a lifetime together to learn, but just in case, I want to know it all now.
Who are you, Asher Flynn? Who are you now? Who were you before?
And will you let me find out who you’ll eventually be?
“No, he’ll like you because he’ll see who you are, just like I do. The only difference between him and me is that I’m not as guarded,” he says. “Gable’s just careful. You could be a serial killer.”
“Then he’d be right,” I say. “I’m murdering people all the time. Got the cash? I’m your gal.”
Asher smiles again, turning on his side to pull me close.
He runs his fingers through my hair, and I’m not sure how one gesture can make me feel so much, but it does.
It isn’t just physical; it’s everything.
It’s goose bumps and butterflies colliding, giving me a hundred more reasons to want Asher Flynn.
“I think I might have to worry about him falling in love with you,” Asher says quietly, his smile small, his words kind, not a drip of jealousy. “I wouldn’t blame him if he did.”
Words are a writer's life. We understand the power of words maybe more than most because we use twenty-six letters to create worlds, and we’re lucky that way. Asher just used those letters to capture the parts of my heart he doesn’t have yet, because is he saying he loves me?
I think he is.
“What’s so special about me?” I ask, fishing for a compliment and maybe three words.
“Well, for starters, you’re so beautiful that sometimes I think you might be poisonous,” he says, and I make a mental note of that to use in my next book.
“And you have a good heart, a waiting room for a brain, and …” He pauses, mixing those letters together, searching for something.
“You quiet my mind. How do you do that, Ella Gibson?”
It isn’t “I love you,” but I’ll take it for now. To be the person who calms your mind and brings your racing thoughts to a halt seems pretty great, right?
“I’m very talented,” I say, because if I don’t make a joke, I’ll make a fool of myself.
“That’s why I’d fall in love with you,” he says. “That’s why he will, too.”
I place down the pages and rub the heel of my hand into my chest, attempting to ease the ache that’s grown since I opened that envelope. I’ve read through most of what Ella wrote but keep coming back to this scene, because it reminds me that Asher was right. He knew me better than anyone.
I hear a door close and get out of bed, going into the hallway. Ella is in her pajamas, her hair tied into a high ponytail.
She tilts her head. “Did I wake you up?”
I stare at her, fists clenched at my sides. It doesn’t feel like my body is my own right now. My mind definitely isn’t. I’m not the man I was a year or even a month ago. I’m not sure whether it’s losing Asher or knowing Ella, but something inside me has altered, and I don’t know how to switch back.
“I read it.”
“Oh.” She plays with her fingers. “Did you like it?”
“I loved it.”
Her smile is small. Cute.
Silence stretches between us, and she bites her lip, but for once, she doesn’t speak, and neither do I.
I just stare at her.
Think about her.
Obsess over her.
The way she searches my face. The pinkness of her lips. The rosy blush climbing across her cheeks the longer I stare.
I shouldn’t do what I want to do. I shouldn’t listen to every instinct that’s begging me to feel her.
I should turn the fuck around and go back to my room.
That’s what I should do.
But I’ve never chosen the easy road.
Fuck it.
I close the space between us, pull Ella to me, and kiss her.
Something in my chest sparks to life. My gut tells me I’m doing the right thing, and even if those feelings fade, I have to hold onto it for now.
She places her hands on my chest, her lips moving slowly against mine, and a strange mixture of relief, guilt, terror, lust, and happiness sweeps through me.
I place my other hand on the side of her neck and wish this moment could be written down, too. I let myself imagine a day when Ella wants all our moments on paper, where she wants to remember everything about me.
The kiss intensifies, her tongue sweeping into my mouth, her arms snaking around my neck.
Her body is flush with mine, and I press her against the wall, desperate to tear off her clothes and sink myself inside her right here.
The contact isn’t enough. I need to be buried in her, our bodies one, her soft moans filling my ears as I fuck her relentlessly.
The urge to own and devour her manifests as a clawing, aching thirst, and I deepen the kiss.
When I feel a tear fall down her cheek, I reluctantly pull back, my forehead pressed to hers, eyes closed, wondering what the hell I was thinking.
She isn’t yours, Gable.
“Thank you for my gift.” I let her go and return to my room, closing the door and leaning against it, head back, my lips warm.
She’s too good for me. Too good for me to ruin.
And I would ruin her.
I’ve ruined everything my whole life.