Chapter 19 #2
Lucy thinks again, slower this time. “Then it’s different,” she decides. “But when Lenzin is here, it’s like last night.”
I smile before I can stop myself as I settle in next to her, as Hildy reaches for the book on the nightstand. Lucy immediately scoots closer, tucking herself between us like she’s solved a puzzle.
I rest my arm around her as Hildy opens the book.
“This is a good rule,” Lucy says, already yawning.
It isn’t a tradition yet, but it’s close.
Hildy begins with the title, “Guess How Much I Love You.”
“Do you love me, Faulker?” Lucy asks.
I don’t have to ponder this question; I already know the answer doesn’t require it. “Yes, very much.”
“I love you too.” She yawns and looks at Hildy.
She quickly schools her shocked expression and begins, “Once there were two Nutbrown Hares…”
When Hildy closes the book, Lucy is fast asleep.
I tuck her in, and we both quietly sneak out of her room like teenagers, door clicking shut as softly as possible. The hallway light is dim, and the house is quiet.
I take Hildy’s hand and head down the hallway toward the calendar and turn toward her.
Hildy turns to me, “You took me a bit off guard with the kiss, well, both,” she says as she grips my shirt. “I should have reciprocated.” She pulls me down and does just that.
It’s hot, real hot, and so is the moan that escapes her, that my groan tries to swallow up. This woman…
I pull away and exhale a deep growl that even surprises me. “I like where this is heading.”
“But it’s not, you have a schedule we need to be mindful of while we’re here and —”
“While you’re here?” I shake my head and step into her space, pinning her against the wall very gently as I place my hand on her little bump. “No one is leaving here. The house is your home, Lucy’s home, our child’s home, and God willing mine too.”
“You don’t have to do—”
“Hildy,” I shake my head. “I was hugely turned on by not just your looks, but your mind. So much so, I almost contacted Matthias Eberhardt to find out who the professor was who arranged the lecture, just so I could track you down. Then I remembered I was a man who doesn’t play with things that can’t be his,” I chuckle, “Well, not more than once.” She sags against the wall.
“I take family obligations seriously,” I rub my thumb across her belly.
“You and Lucy are part of that. No, not just part, you matter more.” She blinks a few times.
“If you decide one day that you don’t like my boots in your entry, or my cleats hanging by the door, all you have to do is tell me, and I will leave.
This is your home as much as it is mine.
No, I take that back, it is more yours, as before you and before Lucy, and before fate brought you both here, it was just a place. ”
She swallows hard, “I—”
“Logic and reason do not fuck with fate, Hildy.” I wink, and she smiles that gorgeous, wide smile.
“Now,” I step back and take her hand, pulling her behind me.
“I saw the doctor’s appointment on the calendar, and I wanted to know,” I continue, honest now, “if that was an invitation. Because if it were, I would very much like to go with you.”
I don’t say anything else. I don’t push. I just look at her.
Inside, everything feels full. Heavy in the best way. My girls. This life. The quiet certainty that I adore them more than I have words for.
I wait for her answer.
She hesitates, then exhales again, softer this time, like she is choosing honesty instead of deflection.
“It’s not just me,” she says. “Lucy has an appointment at the same time. Kind of a fake one. Same family practice. Her doctor offered to keep an eye on her while I go upstairs to OB.”
I nod slowly, needing her to give in; hell, I’m praying for it.
“It might feel strange to her,” Hildy adds. “Even though she likes the doctor.”
“I can make it work.” I lean in, “I’ll leave practice early, drive to the appointment alone. I’ll send a car for you and—”
She laughs, sharp and disbelieving. “Lenzin, no. The subway is fine.”
I move closer, close enough that the space between us disappears. “You’re not taking the subway.”
Her chin tips up, lips ghosting mine. “I’ve been doing it just fine on my own for years.”
I tilt my head, my mouth brushing her ear, my hands settling at her hips. “Same boat, different ocean. Let’s sail together.”
She scoffs, but her body betrays her immediately, “You’re demanding too much too soon.”
“Mmm,” I say, kissing her jaw, then her mouth, slower this time, deeper. “And you like it.”
Her fingers curl into the fabric of my shirt, pulling me closer.
The kiss turns hungry, controlled, but barely. My hands slide up her back, feeling the tension there, the strength, the softness. I lift her just enough to make her gasp, her legs instinctively tightening around me before I set her down on the island.
“I want to be there,” I tell her, forehead pressed to hers. “Not just for the appointment. For all of it.”
She looks at me then, really looks, and whatever she sees or feels makes her swallow hard. “Okay.”
I follow her into the bedroom, our hands entwined.
The lamp by the bed is the only illumination, and it casts a golden ellipse across her cheekbones and arms. I watch her—really watch her—as she scans the room, as she unfastens her hair and shoulders off her cardigan, as she glances back at me over her shoulder with a look that complicates every earlier memory I have of her.
There’s a sort of gravity at work between us, maybe always had been, but this time it isn’t theoretical, isn’t something I file away as interesting and ignore for the sake of decorum. This time I’m allowed to.
She closes the door behind me and leans against it, as if considering whether to flee or pull me closer.
I already know the answer, and so does she.
I cross the distance, step by step—deliberate, so she can stop me if she wants.
Letting her feel the power she has over me because it’s obvious she doesn’t see it yet, but she will. I’ll make sure of it.
Her chin is tilted up, green eyes bright and tired and skeptical and open, all at once. I put my hands on her jaw, gently, and I kiss her. It’s not cautious, but it’s not frantic either. It’s the kind of kiss you remember, so you can make it a normal part of every day.
We begin to undress in increments, not in the way people desperate to get to the finish would, but as if undressing itself is the point.
I undo the buttons of her shirt one by one, not because I’m savoring the anticipation, but…
yeah, I kind of am. After the fourth, she gets impatient and shrugs the shirt off, and I do the same with mine.
Her hands are steady as she unbuckles my belt, but her breath stutters, and I hear it because we’re close enough now for nothing to go unheard. I love it.
She tugs me down to kiss her again, and her fingers are in my hair, then at my chest, mapping the bone and muscle as she learns my body in more detail.
I let my hands do the same, roam her shoulders, the wings of her back, her waist. I hesitate at the hem of her bra, and she rolls her eyes and reaches behind to unclasp it, flicking it to the floor.
I’m taller than her by nearly a foot, but she’s the one directing the choreography, pushing me back onto the edge of the bed and joining me, thighs bracketing my hips.
It’s not until she pulls my mouth to her breast that I realize how long it’s been since someone wanted me, not for the sake of a story or a conquest, but just for wanting.
I realize it’s never been anyone but her.
Fucking ever. Something cracks open in me, raw and humbling.
I bury my face in her and try not to let it show.
Her skin is warm and flushed, the curve of her breasts pressed against my palms as I knead them, slowly, reverently, like I need to memorize the shape that will be changing.
She arches into my hands, a wordless sigh escaping her as my mouth closes over her nipple.
I suck gently, then harder, feeling it pebble against my tongue; she shudders under the attention, her fingers winding through my hair, tightening as if she’s afraid I might stop.
I can’t imagine stopping. I lavish the other breast with the same care, tongue swirling, then drawing her in with a greedy pull, tasting salt and warmth and something almost like sunlight.
I didn’t realize how much I missed this, not just the mechanics but the giving of pleasure, the luxury of being wanted not for a headline or a family name but for the body I own, the hunger I bring, the person I am.
I realize it’s never been anyone but her. Fucking ever.
She rolls us so she’s on her back, and I brace above her, gazing down, memorizing her as she is—naked, hair loose on the pillow, a few freckles on her ribs, the faintest scar stretching alongside her hip. I kiss them all, taste them.
I hover above her, caging her between my arms and the mattress, my chest shuddering with the effort to hold back everything I want.
There’s a tenderness gnawing at the inside of my ribs, a need to see her, not just see but know her boundaries and her wants, like a map only she can draw.
With every slow breath she takes, every subtle shift of her hips under mine, I can’t help but believe this is the luckiest I have ever been—the gravity of her, the shamelessness of desire, the way she allows herself to be seen and wanted.
Still, I don’t let myself assume anything.
Not after the last time I failed to ask, to clarify, to draw the lines with both our hands together.
So, I force myself to pause, even as my blood pounds in my ears, and cup her face between my hands.
I angle her chin so I can read her eyes, bright as cut glass and full of every contradiction that makes her who she is.