Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
Soren
Coming back after a long weekend, pretending the outside world didn’t exist and it was just us? It’s fucking jarring. It’s like waking up from the best dream of your life with no souvenir but your own damn thoughts.
The service car feels like a hearse for our temporary fantasy. We’re both quiet. Too quiet.
It’s not the “comfortable silence between lovers” kind.
More like the “was that a weekend-long hookup or a preview of something deeper that I’m not allowed to want?” kind.
No background music, no breakfast tray, no warm cinnamon haze convincing us we’re spending a holiday weekend as a couple.
There’s just the awkward hum of the car engine and me trying not to look at her mouth because I kissed it like it belonged to me for five straight days.
Her body isn’t sprawled across clean hotel sheets anymore, flushed and wrecked and laughing at me between orgasms. She’s not breathless under me, begging, swearing, straddling me with her hands fisted in my hair, and that look in her eyes like I ruined her, and she liked it.
No quickies in the shower.
No lazy morning sex with her legs over my shoulders.
No two in the morning, “I can’t sleep, let’s see how loud you can make me come” missions.
Just the cold Colorado air pressing in through the cracked window, the slap of tires against worn pavement, and the unspoken truth sitting between us like a third party in the backseat:
We were everything this morning.
Now we’re two strangers playing cool while our driver pretends he can’t feel the tension clogging the air.
I drop her luggage on the curb outside her townhouse like it didn’t just travel back from a sex vacation we both agreed never happened.
She’s a few feet away, coat buttoned, keys in hand, as if she’s bracing for a high wind or something worse. Her hair’s pulled into a loose knot that’s already coming undone, and she looks beautiful in that ruin-me-against-the-wall way.
I stare at her driveway because it’s easier than staring at her, or asking what happens now. How am I supposed to continue when my heart wants to stay with her?
Should I pretend it was nothing, that I don’t love her?
“I guess this is us,” she says, forcing a smile so thin I can see every crack beneath it.
Us.
As if “us” ever meant less than everything.
I nod, stuffing my hands deeper into my pockets like that’ll somehow keep me from saying something stupid like, ‘Don’t go inside yet.’ Like, ‘I don’t want this to end.’”
But I don’t say a damn thing.
Because that’s what I’m good at—shutting up when it counts, backing off before someone gets the chance to walk away on their own. Call it a talent. Or a character flaw with excellent timing.
She looks at me. One second. Two. It’s long enough to make it obvious—this is it.
She’s giving me a shot, her final Hail Mary. One last chance to say something that matters. And I just stand there, hands useless, mouth frozen, while the silence turns into this loud, aching thing filled with all the words I couldn’t get out.
Then she moves. Reaches for the door handle.
“Wait.” The word comes out low and rough like I haven’t used my voice in hours. As if I almost forgot how to ask someone to stay. Maybe it’s not that I forgot, but I’ve never asked before. I’ve never dared to think about more—or love.
Winnifred stills. She doesn’t turn or speak.
“I can’t,” I say, knowing that if I don’t convince her, I might lose her. “I can’t do this. I can’t pretend you’re just someone I crossed paths with. I can’t walk away like Boston didn’t happen. Like I didn’t memorize the sound of your laugh when you were naked in my bed, and everything felt—”
I stop myself because, fuck, it’s a lot. Though if I don’t finish—if I leave it hanging—I might lose her. And that’s not an option.
She asked me to fake it ‘til Christmas, but I can’t fake anything anymore, not with her. I have to lay it all out now.
“I can’t do the polite goodbye and act like I haven’t had you pressed against me for five straight days. Like I’m not still feeling it everywhere.”
Slowly, she turns.
Her eyes glisten. Her lip trembles.
And fuck me—I did that.
I hurt her by doing what I thought would protect us. Protect me.
“I know we said this was temporary,” I say, stepping toward her, “but it stopped feeling temporary when we kissed in my family’s house, and I forgot we were pretending.
When you stayed up texting me ficus photos and made me feel like maybe I belonged to someone for once. Like I was someone worth belonging to.”
She lets out a breath. Shaky. Barely holding.
But I’m not done. I’ve already ripped the Band-Aid off, might as well bleed out with some dignity.
“I didn’t expect you, Win. I didn’t see you coming. But now I can’t see anything without you in it.”
She opens her mouth. Closes it again. Her jaw clenches, eyes shimmering—she’s holding it in, trying not to break.
I take another step, slow. Careful. Like she’s glass, and I’m the guy who keeps cracking her without meaning to.
“I ruin things,” I say quietly. “I pull away when I should lean in. I go silent when I should speak up. I get cold feet when I’m scared. But you . . . you made it feel like I could be more than that. Like I wasn’t just tolerable. You looked at me like I was worth choosing.”
A tear escapes before she can blink it back. I swipe it with my thumb. Her skin’s cool and tense like she’s pretending this doesn’t mean as much as it obviously does.
“I’ve never said this to anyone,” I whisper, voice shaking now.
“But I love you, Win. I love how you overanalyze everything and try to fix what isn’t yours to fix.
I love your mouth when it’s sassy and your heart when it’s running around like it’s got no self-preservation.
I love that fake little snort-laugh you do when you’re about to cry but don’t want anyone to notice. ”
She laughs. Just a little. Small and cracked and trying not to fall apart. She covers her face with one hand.
“I love you,” I say again, firmer this time. “And yeah, I’m fucking terrified. What if I’m not enough? What if I fuck up? But I’m not walking away. Not unless you look me in the eye and tell me to go.”
Silence.
Then she looks at me.
Eyes full. Shoulders shaking. Lips parted like a question she’s been holding in her mouth for days.
“You love me,” she whispers.
I nod.
“And you waited until I was halfway through the door to tell me?”
I give a weak smile. “Like I said. I’m not great at this.”
She lets out a sob-laugh and launches herself into my chest. Her arms wrap tight around me, face pressed to my neck, and I swear the second I feel her cling like that—like she needs me back—I break too.
I wrap my arms around her tighter than I probably should.
“You idiot,” she says, voice muffled. “I’ve been in love with you since . . . I don’t know. I wanted to avoid it, but our pre-Thanksgiving dinner blew my plans.”
I freeze. Pull back just enough to see her face.
Her cheeks are blotchy. Her mascara smudged. Her mouth trembling.
And she’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
“I thought you were going to shut down again,” she whispers. “That you were going to pretend none of it meant anything.”
“I wanted to,” I admit. “It was easier.”
“But?”
“But loving you feels better than being safe.”
And then I kiss her.
Not a thank-you kiss. Not a goodbye or a maybe someday kiss.
It’s all in. All the shit I’m bad at saying poured into her mouth like she’s the only person I’ve ever wanted to tell the truth to.
I kiss her like it’s the first time I’ve ever meant anything.
Her hands fist in my jacket. She kisses me back like she’s trying to memorize it—it’s as if she’s scared it won’t last, but she’s going to take every damn second of it anyway.
When we finally pull apart, she’s breathless, flushed, eyes bright with something that makes my ribs ache.
“I don’t want to go back to pretending,” she whispers.
“Then don’t.”
She laughs once, then swallows it. Her voice breaks.
“I want to be yours. For real. Not just for a weekend. Not just for a fake story we sell to our families. I want to be your too-much, says-too-much, feels-too-hard girlfriend who accidentally fell for the guy she was never supposed to keep.”
“You already are,” I whisper, leaning in.
I kiss her again. Slower. Like we’re catching our breath in the middle of something we both want to last.
She pulls back, lips still parted, eyes on mine.
And then she says it.
Low. Sure. Almost smiling.
“Come inside, stay with me.”
I follow her, heart in my throat, hope in my hands.
This time, I’m not running.
This time, I’m staying to be with her, to love her.