Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
WELLS
Allison snored in the middle of their bed. He shut the door, not wanting to bother her.
He was still too keyed up, and he’d just toss and turn if he got in bed.
After changing out of his wet clothes, he’d been on the phone with his father as Allison’s legal counsel for three hours.
Renegotiating the contract.
He’d enjoyed waking the fucker up at 11:00 p.m. His father had hung up on him twice, and when Wells had finally called his father’s mistress that he was cheating on his third wife with, his father had relented and entertained the conversation.
Wells had explained thoroughly and repeatedly how he wanted to renegotiate.
Propose the option of a romantic relationship, a clause to reconsider legal partnership.
He was nothing if not thorough.
He’d made his father promise to call Allison the next day and talk through the proposals.
He contained his emotions as he barreled through negotiations with his father. Focused on that, instead of the crashing waves of feelings banging at his door.
The sheer terror of having his heart on his sleeve again.
Somewhere between his jeans and boxers being soaked on the walk to Allison’s cottage that night, he’d realized he’d fucked up.
Done the one thing he’d promised himself he’d never do again.
Feeling overwhelmed with emotions swirling—the good, and bad, and confusing—he paced in the living room so he wouldn’t wake Allison up.
He struggled to keep a lid on all of it.
For fifteen years, he’d managed to keep his heart intact. He’d traded companionship for loneliness so he didn’t have to do this, angrily wiping tears from his eyes.
Be weak and vulnerable.
Terrified at what she’ll say when I ask her for more.
The world saw his bluster and aggression. They didn’t know it was a mask because he felt so afraid of rejection. He’d had almost twenty years of rejecting others first—putting limits on romantic relationships, eventually limiting himself to one-night stands.
He’d never wanted to feel like this again. Feel so much for one person that it could bring him to his knees.
“Wells,” a husky voice called in the moonlight to him. Allison’s belly appeared around the corner before she did.
She was rumpled and gorgeous, her thick hair tousled and falling down her shoulders. She wore a nightgown, looking like a fairytale princess. Puffy sleeves, a plunging neckline curving around her breasts, the skirt billowing out from her bump in thick, long ruffles of white fabric.
Delectable.
Her face was full of sleepy concern as she shuffled over to him. “What’s wrong?”
His heart ached for her. He wanted to hold her, bury his face in her hair.
“Go back to bed. You need your rest,” he said instead, his hands at his sides, refusing to look at her so she couldn’t see he’d been crying.
She frowned up at him. She slowly slid her hands up his chest, turning his face toward her. “I’m worried about you.”
She might be the only person on the planet who’s ever been worried about me.
Fuck it.
He gathered her up in his arms, holding her close. Nuzzled his face into her hair, inhaling the sleepy scent of her.
It felt like heaven.
Mine. Everything felt better when she was right here.
“You do too much, Wells. You work so hard, going over the top for me and the baby.” She pulled back. “You care so much about everyone. Make everyone’s life better. I want you to rest. You matter too much to us. To me.” Her soft fingers stroked his cheek, and he leaned into it.
The concern in her eyes was a balm for his agitated, chaotic soul.
All the emotions he’d tamped down for years and years boiled to the surface.
“People, um…” He inhaled a shaky breath, sliding his hands through her hair. “People think because I’m big and loud and have strong opinions that I don’t need to hear that.”
He shrugged, looking everywhere but at her as he fought to keep a lid on the tears. “People just see the bluster. They don’t notice how hard I care,” he said, sobbing on the last word, his hand coming over his mouth. “All I’ve ever done is try to love people, but it comes out wrong sometimes—”
She wrapped her arms around him, pressing his head into her neck. “Your heart is never wrong, Wells.”
He pulled her tight against him. “And you always do that, don’t you?” he whispered through the emotion. “You always notice how hard someone cares, how sensitive they really are, how much they need a kind word.”
“I’m afraid…” He sniffled, teetering on the edge with a frown. “I’m afraid I’m in breach of contract.”
She pulled back from his arms, confused. “The date? It’s okay—”
“No.” He shook his head like a madman.
Tried to keep the feelings in.
Failed, as she smoothed a gentle hand over his cheek.
His lips quivered, a tear sliding off his nose as he finally met her eyes. “I tried so hard not to love you.”
The admission fell off his shoulders, free at long last.
She stared back at him, wide-eyed with shock.
“Fooled myself that planning for the future, keeping you close here was me being smart. But the thought of losing you to anyone else is too much to bear.”
He rubbed at his chest as his vision blurred with tears.
“I love that line between your brows. I love how you fucking sparkle when you’re actually yourself.
I love those stupid fucking ceramic kittens.
You’ll have to bury them with me now because they remind me of you and I love them so much.
I love that you’re strong and you don’t scare easily at my crazy ideas. ”
She pulled away from him, and his chest heaved with the loss.
“I need someone strong I can take care of. On”—he gulped—“a molecular level, apparently.”
Her hands covered her face, and she turned away from him, her shoulders shaking.
He gently pulled her hands down. “Allison, I’m so sorry. If this isn’t what you want, I understand.”
Tears streamed down her face as she looked out the window, looking so forlorn. “All I’ve ever wanted was to be loved. As me.” She poked a finger at her heart, as if she was the only one who knew where it was.
He tilted her chin back to him. “My darling, you are the easiest person to love I’ve ever met.”
She shook her head, lips shaking. “No. My parents, family, Keith. I’ve never been enough, and this is just the baby making you think that—”
“It’s easy for me,” he said firmly. “It’s not your fault the world is full of fools. Do you know how many people take a sunrise for granted? Bright and pink and full of hope. A sunrise is no less magical because the fools in front of it don’t appreciate it. You are my sunrise.”
He kissed her slowly on her temple. “I need you,” he whispered against her skin. “I didn’t want to, but I do.”
She tugged his mouth down to hers.
He wrapped his arms around her tight and sighed at the miracle of her still being here. At tasting her, the sweetest berry of her lips between his teeth. At feeling her fisting her hands in his shirt.
He didn’t need her to say it back. He just couldn’t let her go.
If they didn’t stop kissing, she couldn’t say she’d never love him.
He walked them backward to the couch and sat on the arm of the sofa, settling in to enjoy her mouth. To appreciate the gasps between her kisses.
“Wells—”
He cut her off with his kiss, squeezing her hip. “Not yet,” he muttered, kissing her again.
Let me enjoy this fantasy a little longer.
She clamped a hand over his mouth. “Yes, now.”
Christ, he loved her so much.
“You taught me to put myself first, worried about my safety when no one else cared. You make me feel safe.”
Oh god, here it comes. The “but.” The letdown.
“But…” She bit her lip, looking pained.
He gulped, squeezing his eyes shut.
“…I think I fell in love with you the night you brought me pineberries.”
His eyes flew open, miraculous hope springing in his chest.
Love?
“Say it again,” he whispered, not trusting himself.
“For the first time in my life, I don’t feel like I’m alone. I feel taken care of in this”—she shook her head—“all-encompassing way. I love your bluster and sweetness, your chaos and care for everyone. I love you so much it hurts,” she said with an overwhelmed smile.
He cupped the back of her neck, bringing her mouth to his. The delight in his chest was too miraculous to name. “Do you know what it’s like to fight something for almost a year?”
She laughed against his lips. “Believe it or not, I really do.”
The pile of papers and pen on the coffee table called to him. “I drafted an amendment to the contract.”
“Wells,” she laughed his name as if he was adorable.
Again, miraculous.
A statistical improbability that will stump scientists for centuries.
“We’ll revisit it every two years. It gives us the option of romance or a relationship of any kind. Including legal partnership.”
Marriage.
“Don’t sign it,” he added quickly as she uncapped the pen. He’d already added his signature to it by default. “Review it. Ask for what you want—”
She pushed him back onto the couch and ripped her billowing nightgown off over her head.
He was about to ask what the hell she was doing, but her glorious, sexy naked body lit by moonlight straddled him. All the thoughts went fuzzy in his head.
“Allison—” She ripped his shirt over his head. “Woman,” he thundered through a mouthful of cotton poly blend.
“Listen to me,” he panted as she slapped the pile of papers on his bare chest. “Review it with a lawyer.”
“No.” Her pen pressed against the beating of his heart.
Right where she signed the papers saying she just might be in love with him.
A legally binding contract. His favorite kind of promise.
“I trust you.” She kissed him hard. “Implicitly,” she said with a flourish of the pen.
He stared in horror at the pile of papers next to him, but his attention was caught by her mouth on his. “Legally, that’s a disaster,” he sighed as he licked into her mouth. “I can’t in good conscience let you do that,” he muttered as she kissed him.
She pushed a hand onto his chest as she panted above him. “Let’s make one thing clear,” she said, her face alight with smiling, victorious fire. “You’ve never let me do anything.”
“Fucking hell, I love you.” He wrapped a hand around the back of her neck, finally devouring the mouth he planned to taste for the rest of his days.
Big, mushy feelings swam inside of him as he kissed every part of her.
Her shoulders, arms, forearms. Kissing each wrist as her mouth nuzzled into his neck.
Stroking the curve of her breasts, savoring the swollen curve of them for a little while longer.
Licking down between them as he worshiped her breastbone.
He lingered over her heart, kissing her there, the pulse of it under his lips so precious to him.
He held her face above his and cherished the wonder that was this woman. Her beauty, creativity, sensuality, kindness, ability to nurture and dream, even after all she’d been through.
She was a kaleidoscope in his black-and-white life, a beautiful fractal explosion of colors, each one better because it was surrounded by the others.
“I don’t want to sleep in a bed that doesn’t have you in it.
I don’t want my black-and-white life without all the color you bring.
I want to protect you from yourself and the world and your family. ”
She leaned into his hand, staring down at him with such love.
How had he missed it? All this time?
She nuzzled into his neck, rocking against him. “You couldn’t pay me to sleep anywhere else but with you.”
His hands slid to her ass, under her panties, and rocked her harder.
She arched her back with a sigh as her clit hit the right spot. Splashes of moonlight lit her face, lost in the pleasure he was giving her.
Looking like Aphrodite.
He needed her to know all the pieces he’d bottled up inside for so long. “Love your cheeks, how they look like they belong on a Greek statue.” He sucked on a spot on her neck as she ground into him. “Your long neck. Pictured kissing it every time I’ve seen it since February.”
Her lips curved into a smile as she sat up on her knees.
“Your lips. Love when they make that little ‘O’ shape when you’re shocked or mad.” He slid two fingers under her panties and into her wet heat, and her face contorted in pleasure as her jaw dropped. “I don’t want anyone else to kiss them. Ever. Please.”
She licked into his mouth, raking her nails through his hair as her hand grasped his cock.
Goddamn, he wanted her. Couldn’t quench his thirst for her. He tugged his pants down further, tugged her panties to the side, and slid up into her. She cried out as he bit back another curse at how good she felt.
How his she felt. His hands grasped every part of her—back, thighs, ass, breasts, belly swollen with their baby.
With their future together.
He gripped her hips, lifting her to ride him harder. “I want to argue over Valentine’s Day presents,” he panted. “That we say we’re not going to do, and then I do and you get mad but then you also got me one.”
She huffed a laugh against his lips. “Obviously.” Her hips scooped into his, chasing the friction.
Fuck, she felt so good, tasted so good.
“I want to sneak in sex during nap times and in the morning when the house is quiet. I want your haunted furniture in this house because I need more of you. It’s never enough.”
“Even the doilies?” she muttered, raking her teeth against his earlobe and squeezing his pec territorially.
Fuck.
“Especially the doilies. I want to eat those terrible multivitamins and drink smoothies because it’ll make you worry less.”
“Such a talker,” she teased, though her voice was wistful. The love and care in her eyes as she stared at him, tracing his lip with her thumb, was overwhelming. “How on earth did I ever get a word in edgewise to fall in love with you?”
He’d never get tired of hearing her say it.
“Again,” he begged, grinding her clit harder as she moved over him.
“I love you,” she said through a whispered sob. “I love you—” The sound became a chant from her lips as they wrapped around each other, pouring their hopes and dreams into each movement.
Promising a future together saying I choose you, again and again, as their fingers threaded together.
The feeling of being chosen washed over them as their lips met and they climaxed through tears and moans in the moonlight.