Chapter Twenty-Eight
I was gone only twenty-four hours, but still, the sense of calm that washes over me as I return to Lachlan’s place is lovely, and startling in its intensity.
I guess on some level I spent those hours worried that I might not be able to get back in, or that our situation would be irrevocably changed.
It hasn’t changed, though—or at least not in the way I was expecting.
If anything, since Claire’s visit, it’s only gotten more intense.
Something big is looming in the ether. Every event of the past few weeks has been an escalation, a steady, small step forward.
Seeing how miserable he was with his wife has only added fuel to the fire.
We’re building to a tipping point, this thing between us burgeoning and blossoming and demanding to be addressed before we both go mad.
The World Cup is also approaching its climax, and part of me thinks I should say something, one way or another, before it ends and life returns to normal.
In the last few days, I’ve decided that Amina’s theory about Scottish divorce law is correct and Lachlan has a big countdown clock running somewhere.
When it hits zero, we’ll be freed from this arbitrary, archaic force keeping us apart.
I need to let him know I know, need to let him know I’m okay to wait for all the I’s to be dotted before he can put his hands all over me the way I want him to—and the way I know he wants to.
The thought of this fills me with a nervous energy, for which there is only one remedy: Erica’s List.
While it’s true there have been other distractions in my life recently, I have it taped on the back of my bedroom door so I still see it every day, and it’s been a lovely assistant in helping me slough off the funk that was wrapped around me when I arrived in Liverpool.
The things that are left are mostly out of the question (Go skydiving—yeah, right!), but “Run three miles” is there, taunting me as it has been since June.
I haven’t run that distance since high school, but since moving into the penthouse I have become a somewhat regular gym user, even once (once!) using it at the same time as Lachlan.
My face got so red (from exertion and embarrassment) that said feat has yet to be repeated… But still.
Bashie’s coming over later to watch a World Cup match, which gives me a good window to go out and attempt this run (though not as big a window as I’d like given that I need to build in time for Lachlan to find me passed out on the side of the road and the inevitable hospital visit thereafter).
It’s freezing outside, but not raining, which is a welcome surprise.
Through the intervention of some combination of deities, spirits, and profound denial of the creak in most of my bones, I complete the three miles without dying—though it’s close.
Sure, sometimes my run was barely more than a walk, and there may have been a minute or five where I totally stopped moving, but I’m counting it.
And you know what? It wasn’t entirely awful, except for the parts that were.
I mean, saying I felt a runner’s high is probably the equivalent of a teenager smelling weed for the first time and becoming convinced he’s absolutely blazed, but… baby steps.
In the lift back up to Lachlan’s, I put my hands on my wobbly knees and catch my breath, and while my breathing does inch back toward normal, my legs are moving more toward the Jell-O end of the spectrum.
I drag my useless limbs through the flat and into the gym, where Lachlan is just finishing a workout—with barely a sheen of sweat on his brow, in a humiliating addition of insult to injury.
He wipes his face with a towel, then takes it in both hands and tosses it over my neck, lassoing me like a steer and pulling me a step closer to him. “All hail the conquering hero. How was it?”
“I’m not trying to be dramatic, but if I don’t sit down soon, I will die.” I crumple onto one of the stretching mats and splay there like a starfish, using his towel as a neck rest.
He cranes over me and looks down, a kidding sort of pity in his eyes. “Do you want me to bring you a pillow and blanket so you don’t have to move for the rest of the night?”
“You joke, but I’m not sure my legs still work.”
“You need to stretch before your muscles seize up.”
“That ship sailed around mile two.”
Lachlan crouches near my feet and rubs a tentative thumb across my anklebone. “Do you want me to show you what to do?”
“No, I know what to do. Step one: Get the defibrillator.”
His head rocks back with laughter, but he taps my hip.
“Sit up. Here, let me help.” He grabs my useless putty arms and pulls me into a sitting position, then coaches me through a couple of stretches that make me feel somewhere between a pretzel and a Mobius strip.
But, I reluctantly concede, it does feel good on my muscles.
Lachlan has me lie back down with my knees bent and I obey, because despite the ridiculous shapes he’s putting me in, he knows what he’s doing.
He kneels at my feet and runs his hands up my calves until he reaches my knees.
With a slow, practiced motion, he pulls them apart, pressing me gently down toward the floor into a butterfly stretch. “Does that feel okay?”
The stretch is the good kind of painful, the tension in my muscles begging for the release provided by Lachlan’s strong hands. I swallow hard and nod at him.
He leans forward and presses one of his hands on my hip, pinning me down. “You’re really tight here.”
“I’m tight everywhere.”
A flush creeps up his neck and the tips of his ears go red.
His fingers slip under the hem of my shirt and I suck in a shocked breath that rolls through my body, my chest rising up as my head tilts back.
Lachlan lets out a little grunt, an involuntary shudder of noise as his eyes hungrily take in the movement of my body.
His other hand pushes down on my knee again, and I sink into the stretch.
I focus on the gentle pressure of his hands and try to ignore how exposed I feel, how distracted I am by the heat between us.
As he deepens the stretch, his breath comes out in a ragged gasp.
There’s an intensity to our contortions now, almost an urgency.
Like we know we shouldn’t be doing this, shouldn’t be pushing it, but can’t stop.
“Now hamstrings.” His voice is jagged, scraping over me and setting my nerve endings alight. It’s a command, not a question; either way, I’m not saying no.
He slides my legs apart and moves in between them, kneeling in the space I’ve created. He slowly lifts my left leg, pushing it backward toward the floor. “How does that feel?”
“Good. Don’t stop.”
His fingers wrap around my ankle like a musician caressing the neck of a cello: lovingly, respectfully.
His other hand he wraps around my thigh, guiding it into the stretch.
I want to close my eyes because I’m sure he can see the hunger there, the lust. But I can’t look away, and neither can he.
His expression has clouded over, sliding into the darkness that comes with his goal-scoring eyes.
My skin prickles with goosebumps and my nipples pinch underneath my sports bra.
He picks up the other leg and repeats the move; this side is tighter, and I exhale sharply, biting my lip as he presses my leg backward. A small grunt slips through his lips as he holds me there. “More?”
“More.” It’s all I can get out, it’s the only thought in my brain. I want more of this. I want more of this forever.
His fingers are on my ankle again, lifting it up, but this time he shifts his body closer, hooking my upright leg over his shoulder as he straddles the one on the floor, positioning himself on top of me.
His eyes are still locked on mine, dark and serious, but as he lowers himself down half an inch, pressing himself against my thigh, his gaze shifts and there’s a brief smile, hard-edged and carnal.
My body reacts on instinct, a primal, feral response.
I arch my back up toward him and a warmth spreads from the places our bodies meet, coloring my chest and ending with a florid, vivid flush of pink on my cheeks.
Lachlan has one hand braced by my head, one curled around my hamstring.
He rolls his fingers, sinking them one by one into my flesh as he presses his body harder into me, rocking his hips against mine, pushing my leg back just one more inch.
I close my eyes as the sensation floods my brain.
Small fires smolder at all our points of contact and I’m so painfully aware of his presence.
Every part of me is coiled and alert, attuned to the tiniest shifts in his movement above me.
A sound flutters out of my mouth, a light and rapturous sigh, let slip as I roll my head back in the exquisite pain of the stretch, the exquisite pain of his body finally meeting mine.
I barely catch his response through my bliss, but it’s there, as solidly as he is, a soft and guttural, “Oh, fuck.”
My eyes fly open to see what’s happened, what I’ve done wrong, but I can’t read his expression.
It’s shaded with something indefinable, anguish or ecstasy, heaven or hell, I can’t tell.
“Abby…” he starts, his voice like molten lava, and I’m ready to give him anything he asks for, my body loose and willing in his capable hands.
A look passes between us, something white-hot and dangerous, but then it’s gone.
Lachlan shakes his head like he’s emerging from a fugue state, his expression shifting into a studied neutrality.
He rocks back onto his heels and stands in a flash, turning away from me quickly.
“I need to go shower before Bash gets here.”