36. Ten Times
36
TEN TIMES
Bridger
I’ve been pacing back and forth outside her apartment. Debating whether to knock.
Wondering if she’d even want to see me. This thing with Harlow is completely uncharted territory. I don’t have the map to navigate it.
I should have handled that moment in my office so differently when she confessed she was scared, then when she asked what we were doing.
My bright answer? I’m not sure .
But I know this much.
I should have insisted Harlow leave with me.
I should have told her that yes, this is terribly risky, but she’s worth the risk.
I should have said I’d figure something out.
Even though I have no answers to anything…except for the too-fast, too-frantic beating of my heart.
No answers…except I walked around the block ten times in the pouring rain, trying to talk myself out of showing up, figuring she’d be with friends, she wouldn’t want a visitor, she was over this thing already.
No answers except…
She swings the door open, her eyes narrowed, her brow knit. “What are you doing here?”
I take that on the chin. Her defenses are all the way up, and I deserve that. But I can’t let her go. I just can’t. Without thinking, I ask, “Should I have said something to him? Tonight? Did you want me to?”
Speaking that harsh possibility—hell, acknowledging the huge challenge, that’s only a first step, that doesn’t even solve the problem—unlocks something in me. It turns the door on my own emotions for her, the way I’ve tried to keep them tamped down. I’m not sure I can any longer.
“Tell him?” she repeats, looking thoroughly confused, like I’ve spoken a dead language.
“Do you want me to? Because I’m so sorry for what happened in the office,” I say, afraid she might kick me out. She might slam the door. But I have to try.
“What part?” she asks fiercely, challenging me.
I can’t let her think I regret touching her. Not for a second. “For the part where I made you think I was willing to let you go.”
She’s still for a few seconds, frozen in place. But her eyes flicker with hope.
Before I can say anything else, she opens the door for me. “Come in.”
Somewhat relieved, I step inside, drag a hand through my wet hair, and look down at the tiled floor. There’s no puddle, but there are a few drops.
“Do you want a towel?”
No, I don’t want a fucking towel. I want you. I want to talk to you. I want to see you. I want to touch you.
But I ruined things earlier.
And I have to fix them. I have to earn the right to touch her again, to hold her again, to deserve her.
The second the door shuts, I waste no time. “I’m sorry for what happened after the phone call. When I didn’t kiss you goodbye. When I didn’t tell you it’d be okay. And at dinner, when I didn’t steal a moment with you,” I say.
She swallows like there’s a knot in her throat.
But she just waits.
“This is risky,” I say, my eyes locked with hers. “This is the riskiest, scariest, most dangerous thing I’ve ever done. And it’s true that I don’t have a clue what we’re doing, Harlow,” I say, desperation clinging to me. Fitting, since I am desperate for her.
“But are we doing something, Bridger? It didn’t sound like we were when I left your office,” she says, not yet bending, not yet forgiving.
“I was…thrown off then. But the truth is…I just don’t want to stop whatever this is. And I don’t mean the physical,” I say, imploring her as I try to put my heart on the line, hoping she’ll have it. “I mean this thing happening between you and me.” I stop, then clarify, “Between… us .”
Her lips twitch in the hint of a smile, but then it vanishes. Still, it gives me hope, especially when she softens, saying, “When you said what are we even doing… ” She stops, shakes her head. “I thought you were ending things. But it’s okay.”
But no.
She doesn’t need to make this easier for me.
“I can’t stop,” I admit, helpless to these feelings for her. I step closer, lift a hand to reach for her, but then drop it. I’ve still got more to say. I bunch my hands into fists at my sides. My emotions might be galloping away from me, but I’ve got to get a handle on the situation. Start small, not big. “Are you okay? The whole night must have been awful.”
“I was really hurt. But I’m okay now. I’m tough,” she says softly.
“I know you are, but I was worried about you at dinner.”
“You were?” It comes out with a touch of wonder.
“Of course. I always worry about you. I always think about you. And I knew seeing your dad after the way the afternoon ended, and the things I said, couldn’t be easy. You’re so strong. So tough. And I shouldn’t have let you go into dinner thinking anything but the absolute truth of what’s happening.”
“What’s the truth?” she asks, sounding desperate too. “What is happening?”
My hand aches to touch her cheek, to hold her face. “I want to spend the evening with you. I want to spend the next night with you, and the next, and the next.” I draw a soldiering breath. “I am absolutely enchanted with you.”
On those words, a smile shifts her lips. Spreads to her eyes. Takes over her whole face. “Enchanted?”
With a small laugh, I stare down pointedly at my soaked clothes. “Yes. So enchanted I walked around the block again and again in a downpour.” I exhale roughly. “Harlow, I don’t have a plan. I don’t know what we’re doing. I don’t know a thing. But…do you want me to tell your father?” I ask again.
Her eyes pop. “Oh god,” she says nervously, perhaps finally processing the scope of what telling her father means, the sheer scale of that mountain. “I don’t know,” she adds slowly, weighing each uncomfortable word.
“If you wanted me to right now, I would,” I say, offering something I have no idea how to deliver.
“I don’t know how to handle that yet, Bridger,” she says, a touch embarrassed maybe over her answer.
“It’s okay. I don’t know how to either,” I admit.
More relief. More deep breaths, this time from both of us.
At last, we’ve voiced the big issue.
Maybe that’s what we need for now. To breathe it out loud, even if we can’t solve it tonight.
I take a small step closer. “Once they left, I started to go home. But I couldn’t even bring myself to hail a cab. For the last hour, I’ve just been wandering around New York, thinking about you, trying to figure out what the hell to do. I didn’t want to text. I didn’t want to call. I just wanted to see you. But I didn’t know if you’d want to see me.”
She softens, her eyes shining. “I always want to see you.” She steps closer, gazing up at me, then she cups my cheeks.
Tingles race down my spine. Her touch is everything I can’t give up. “Always,” she repeats, soft, but confident. She lifts a hand, slides it up my damp shirt. “Even when you’re drenched. Maybe especially when you’re drenched.”
And with that, I have permission to hold her. That’s all I want in the world. I curl my hands around her hips, lift her up. She moves with me, wrapping her legs around my back.
Enchanted barely covers the way I feel for this woman.
My mouth crashes down on hers, and I kiss her like she’s all I’ve thought about all day.
Like she’s all I need tonight.
And like I’m falling so far, so hard, so fast for her, and the last thing I want is to scare her away.
She kisses me back hard. Powerfully. Emotionally. And deeper than she has before.
Here in her foyer, in my rain-ruined clothes and her dry ones, we come back together with a kiss that sends my world spinning out of focus.
Spinning closer to her.
All I want is to get closer to her.
Somehow, we find the will to stop, coming up for air, both panting.
She plucks at my damp shirt. “You look really good after a rainfall, Bridger.”
I laugh. “Glad you like the look.” Then I let go of the laughter, letting it die as I gaze at her with want, with desire, and with the start of a wild hope. “Let’s finish what I started on the desk.”
She nibbles on the corner of her lips, then shivers, arching a brow. “I want that, but you’re a little cold and clammy.”
“Well, we can’t have that.”
She hooks her thumb toward the inside of the apartment. “Go get in the shower. Warm up quickly. Really quickly. ”
I take off my shoes and walk to the bathroom, Harlow right behind me.
Once inside the small white room, she hands me a towel. “Hang your clothes up on a hook.” Then she shuts the door.
I take the world’s fastest shower, warming up my cold body so when I touch her, she’ll feel the heat.
I turn off the water, dry off, and wrap the towel around my waist. When I open the bathroom door, she’s perched on the edge of her bed, wearing only her white tank and panties—no more sleep shorts.
I growl in appreciation. “You look incredible.”
“Same to you,” she says, her eyes traveling over my bare chest, then to the towel cinched around my waist. She points at me, circles her finger. “Strip.”
I love her command, but first… this .
“In a second.” I close the distance, stalk over to her, cup her chin. Bending, I bring her face to mine. Kiss her once—a firm, declarative kiss that says I’m here and I’m not leaving. When I break it, I say, “Thank you.”
“I’m really glad you’re here.”
“Me too,” I say, then I let go and take off the towel, dropping it to the floor.
Her breath comes in a staggered gasp as she stares at my naked body.
Stares with a hunger that matches mine.
I reach for her hand, tug her up, and strip off her tank. “Now lie down and spread those beautiful legs so I can feast on you properly.”
With sparkling eyes, she obeys. I crawl between her thighs, tug down her panties, and kiss her once more.
And just like that, we’re back.
She is naked before me and I am in awe.
It is such a privilege to touch her like this. It’s like being given a Stradivarius, something precious and rare, and you must treat it with reverence.
I start slow, listening to her cues. Soon, I am touching her and tasting her again. She responds like a dream, moving like water, sounding like pleasure. She becomes a blissful mix of noise and motion, and then complete abandon as her hands grip my hair and my lips consume her. She arches, then cries out, and nothing, nothing, nothing has ever been better than this.
I feel like a king as I move next to her while she comes down. With a woozy, giddy look on her face, she turns to me, then glides her hand down my chest. “Finally,” she whispers.
“You wanted my mouth on you that badly?” I ask, laughing and ridiculously turned on all at once.
She shakes her head, naughty and seductive. “Finally, this .”
Wedging her body next to mine, her fingers trace the artwork on my pecs, then travel through my chest hair. I’m not furry, but I don’t manscape. She seems to like it, her fingers nimble as she explores. “I’ve wanted to touch you for so long,” she says, and she is fearless as she spreads her hands across my chest, then my waist.
My desire is a tightrope stretched as far as it can go. But I will wait for her as long as she needs. “I love your hands on me, but I can wait for you, Harlow.”
She meets my gaze, her eyes wide and not at all innocent. “Don’t wait. Fuck me now,” she says in a desperate plea.
My body burns.
I move over her, grab her wrists, and pin them above her head. “I’m going to fuck you whenever you want, but I’m always going to make love to you too.”
She nibbles on the corner of her lips, then says all lingering and bold, “Start now.”