18. Maman #2
“Take care of each other.”
“We will,” I say.
The door closes softly behind her.
Silence settles over the suite, warm instead of empty.
Matthias and I stand exactly where she left us, surrounded by canvases carrying the scent of drying paint.
He smiles first.
“Your mother is remarkable.”
“She is.”
“She also sees everything.”
“She does.”
He laughs quietly. “That explains a great deal.”
I cross the room until only a breath separates us.
“She was right.”
“About what?”
“My heart finding you before my mind understood why.”
His expression softens in a way that still surprises me every time I earn it.
“I don’t know what I did to deserve that.”
“You existed.”
My fingers find his.
“For three years, I painted a man I couldn’t name.”
I lift our joined hands between us.
“For weeks, I fought my way back to remembering him.”
A tear slips free before I can stop it.
“And now you’re here.”
He brushes it away with infinite care.
“I’ve never stopped being here.”
“I know.”
The words come easily now.
No hesitation or searching for the answer. No fog stopping me from my own mind.
Finally. I know.
I rise onto my toes and kiss him, slowly enough to memorize the feeling instead of chasing it. There is no desperation tonight. No reclaiming something stolen. No fear that either of us will disappear before morning.
Only gratitude and certainty.
When I draw back, I rest my forehead against his.
“I choose you,” I whisper. “Not because I finally remembered you, but because I finally remembered myself. Now I can choose you with my whole heart.”
His eyes close for a heartbeat, as though those words have reached somewhere no one else has ever touched.
When he opens them again, every careful wall he has carried for so many years is gone. He smiles at me with gentle wonder.
I take his hand and lead him toward the bedroom, where the night belongs only to us, and every promise waiting between us is finally free to be spoken without fear.
For weeks, every doorway opened into another test, another worksheet, another room where someone else decided what I was allowed to do or feel.
Tonight, I close that door because I choose what waits on the other side.
Freedom has never sounded so much like a quiet click.
There’s no urgency tonight, no frantic, paint-slicked rush to prove we’re still breathing.
It’s just slow, deliberate devotion. His touch is reverent as he begins to undress me, learning every inch of my body as if he’s committing me to his memory for the very first time.
Well, almost. There’s no fog, no clinical boundary, and absolutely nothing left between us.
He kisses my collarbone, my ribs, and the curve of my hip, worshiping me like a man who spent ten years in the dark and has finally emerged into the light.
I run my fingers through his short curls and whisper into the hollow of his throat that I choose him, clear and free and entirely myself. The relief of that freedom rushes through me, and I take control, pushing him back onto the pillows so I can climb over him.
I revel in the sheer liberation of letting go, of being completely, unapologetically myself with what I recognize as my soulmate, dictating the slow tilt of my hips as I slide down onto him. Our rhythms match in a deep, heavy friction that feels wonderful.
I love watching his face as he watches me, touching my body, my breasts, my legs. I grind against him wanting him deeper and he holds my hips as he pushes inside me, hitting that spot that makes me moan.
We move together in unison, our rhythms matching in a deep, heavy friction. Matthias sits up to gather me tightly against him, his strong arms wrapping around my back to hold me close. We move together faster and faster in a rhythmic ride as we peak together in a desperate, breathless release.
Afterward, he pulls the blankets over us, drawing me against his chest in the darkness while my fingers drift lazily over the steady beat of his heart.
We lie together in comfortable silence, listening to each other breathe.
Outside, the lights of Sausalito shimmer across the bay. Somewhere down the hall, my mother is sleeping peacefully for the first time in weeks. Around us, four other women are beginning lives Meridian thought it had erased.
Matthias kisses my forehead, his voice a low, rough rumble against my temple.
“The first time was fire and reclamation,” he says. “This time was a promise. I’ve catalogued the human brain for twenty years, Bliss. Nothing in it explains how it feels to be chosen by a woman who remembers exactly who she is.”
I smile against his skin.
Once, I thought love was another color Meridian had stolen.
I know better now.
They took my memories.
They took my paintings.
They took seven weeks of my life.
But they never took the part of me that found Matthias Cross in a crowded gallery three years ago.
My heart remembered.
My hands remembered.
Tonight, at last, the rest of me caught up.
I close my eyes beside the man my heart found years before my mind remembered him.
And for once, finally, every color inside me is finally home.