Chapter 38
Natalia
Rowan pulls into a spot in front of my apartment building just as I wake up, groaning from the short nap I must have accidentally taken in the fifteen minutes it takes to get from Lana’s to mine.
“Rowan.” I frown and turn to face him, only to find him smiling. “You didn’t wake me?”
“You’re tired, sweetheart.” He takes my hand in both of his and kisses my palm, then places it against his slightly stubbled cheek. I can’t decide if I love a freshly shaven Rowan, or Rowan who hasn’t shaved in a few days. “Let me walk you up and I’ll go home so you can rest.”
“But…” I gnaw at the inside of my cheek. “Okay.”
“I love you,” he whispers and leans over the console to kiss my cheek. “Let’s go, sweetheart.”
“I’m not tired.” I yawn.
He chuckles and steps out of his SUV, jogging around the hood with puffs of air coming from between his lips. The passenger door opens and he takes my hand as I step out of the car. He intertwines my fingers with his, locking the car with his other hand in his pocket.
He gave me his gloves earlier tonight while we all stood outside in the expansive driveway, prolonging our goodbyes. I’m still wearing them and I wonder if his hands are cold, but he prefers that I’m warm. I prefer that he’s warm too.
I stop halfway up the concrete path to the building entrance and remove my right hand from my pocket.
“Nat, what—”
I pull the glove off by biting into the tip of my middle finger, sliding my hand right out of the giant leather glove. “Give me your right hand,” I say.
“Sweetheart—”
“No,” I say and grab his hand, trying my best to pull the glove over his fingers. “If you’re going to hold my hand, then both our hands will be warm.”
I tug and tug, but the glove hates me.
Rowan gives me that golden retriever smile. “Need help?”
I groan, surrendering. “Yes.”
Laughing, he pulls the glove on himself, easily. Then my hand is in his again and I never want to let go of him ever again. I’ve determined that I can’t not touch him, I can’t not be with him—not spend time with him.
I think I need him the way the sky needs the sun. The way fish need water. The way he needs me.
For the first time, at the door, I look at him and say, “I’m going to give you top secret information.”
He smiles—he’s always smiling when he looks at me, this one. “Okay.”
“The code to the building,” I say. I type it in and I say the numbers out loud. “Zero-Five-Zero-Three. Then, pound.”
The door buzzes but I leave it untouched.
“Do you, um, want to try it?”
That damn smile. “Okay.”
His left forefinger—because his right hand is still holding my left one—presses each number on the key pad. Zero. Five. Zero. Three. Pound key.
He knows the code now.
The door buzzes and he pulls it open, allowing me inside first. We move through the second door, and into the elevator.
“So, that code,” he says, his eyes watching the numbers increase as we pass the first floor. He turns, peering down with a half smile. “You gave it to me.”
“You can use it,” I say, matching that same half smile. “When you come visit. Or…” I offer a small shrug. “Whatever.”
“Whatever?”
“Whatever,” I echo.
“Okay,” he breathes, his ocean eyes bright. “I will use it for whatever.”
At the third floor, the doors slide open and Rowan urges me out first.
I haven’t let him go since getting out of the car, and I don’t let him go as I pull my key from my pocket and push it into the top lock. The click of it unlocking makes my heart drop a few inches in my chest knowing that he might just go home. It’s been a long day, and I wouldn’t blame him.
I step in, toe off my shoes, and stand at the threshold with my hand still locked with his. “Ro—”
“Go to bed, sweetheart.” He brings my hands, both gloved and ungloved, to his lips for a kiss on each. “It’s been a long day.”
I frown. “But—”
Rowan’s kiss interrupts me, his hands cupping my face gently as his lips press softly into mine. “You fell asleep in the car, sweetheart. It’s okay.” One more soft as a feather kind of kiss. “I’ll let you know when I get home.”
“Please,” I rasp.
“Goodnight, Natalia.” His lips brush my forehead.
“Goodnight,” I breathe and he steps back from the door, pulling it closed with him.
Then I’m miserable, and I hate it. All I ever want to do is be with him, to spend time with him, even if it’s us on separate ends of the couch on New Years, watching a movie in silence.
Sasha, through therapy, has been helping me with asking for what I need. And damn it, I need Rowan tonight.
Love and stuff is complicated, right? Yes. Always. But I think it’s quite simple when you know. Because once you know, you can’t unknow. It isn’t that I feel broken away from Rowan, and it’s not that he makes me whole, but he makes me feel like me. Like it’s okay to be wholly myself.
He reminds me that it’s okay to be a bit broken.
He reminds me that there is light in the darkest of tunnels, and that I deserve love—that I’m worthy of it and worthy of someone like him.
Love and stuff can be so complicated, but when it’s like this, it’s the easiest thing in the whole goddamn world.
I should have just told him I needed him to stay. I should have asked for what I needed and told him it’s him—always him.
Grumbling in a mixture of English and Korean, I pull off my coat and hang it up. I’m still wearing his left glove so I slip it off gingerly, not wanting to ruin everything it holds, as I set it down on the entryway table.
A knock on my door pulls me out of my meaningless tantrum.
I grunt as I swing it open. “What?”
Twin bright, sky blue eyes stare back at me, blond hair disheveled like he’s been pulling at it.
“What are you doing—what happened?” I ask. Rowan takes two large steps in, urging me to take a few steps back, and he shuts the door behind him. His hands take my face and before I can question anything else about his presence, his lips are on mine and my back is pushed against the nearest wall.
Oh thank god.
“Fuck,” he groans.
My fingers twine in his hair, his hips press into mine, and his hands are bruising on my ass. I’m arching and bucking, searching and asking for relief. “Rowan,” I gasp against his lips.
“New Years,” he says huskily, peeling me off the wall and walking through my apartment. “I didn’t get a New Year’s kiss.”
“Yes you did,” I breathe, chortling. “You animal.”
“I needed more.”
“You greedy bastard,” I tease further and pull him back to my lips.
He chuckles as his lips move with mine. I allow myself to sink into this, to arch against him, wrap my leg around his hip, and devour him.
His lips leave mine as they leave a trail down my neck and across my shoulder. And as much as I try not to, it happens anyway. He kisses my shoulder and I yawn, louder than I mean to.
“Fuck,” I hiss quietly.
He lifts his head to smile down at me, laughing. “Tired?”
I stifle my next yawn, my eyes tearing up as I do. I shake my head.
Rowan kisses the tip of my nose as he begins to remove his coat and shoes. “Come with me.”
He takes my hand and leads me through my own apartment, taking us into the bathroom where he closes the door and turns on the shower. I fucking yawn again. I try to look at myself in the mirror but my eyes can hardly stay half open at this point.
He checks the temperature with his hand then closes the shower curtain. He turns to me with a smirk, and begins to undo his pants.
“Shower sex?” I ask, my voice hoarse.
He shakes his head with a cute smile. “No, sweetheart, just a shower,” he says. “Then sleep.”
I nod, doing my best not to fall asleep where I stand. “No offense, but I’d much rather do that right now anyway.”
He laughs quietly and comes to me. “Arms up.”
I lift my arms as he removes the dress then my bra. He kneels to remove my pantyhose and underwear. He finds my hair clip and a shower cap, leaving me fully prepped for the hot shower. Rowan helps me in before he removes the rest of his clothes.
He joins me and it becomes one of the best showers I’ve ever taken. It’s quiet and intimate, nothing about it is sexual—just loving. His hands brush over my back, my arms, my waist. He scrubs my back as I wash my face. He makes sure I don’t accidentally wet my hair.
He kisses my cheek. I kiss his chest. He kisses my shoulder, the length of my arm, my forehead. The kisses don’t progress tonight. They remain as they are for the moment we’re in—reverential and adoring. He rinses the soap from my body, I help him do the same.
When we’re done, he grabs my towel first and helps me dry off before I wrap it around myself. He dries himself off next and together, wrapped in towels, we head to my bedroom.
In my room, I grab a pair of boxers and a tank top, and Rowan finds a pair of his underwear I kept safe in my dresser.
I suppose it’s a good thing he’s forgotten a few pieces of clothing here and there within the last few months. At least now, he has something to sleep in.
Tomorrow, when I’m fully awake and conscious, I’ll tell him to start leaving his things here now. I want him here—evidence of him being here and staying with me. His toothbrush next to mine. A drawer for his underwear. A forgotten sock underneath the bed.
“Rowan,” I mumble, sitting on my bed.
“Natalia,” he says sweetly.
I lie down, my body sinking into the mattress as my eyes grow heavier. “Cuddle me?”
“Of course, sweetheart.”
His footsteps retreat then return before I feel the mattress dip with his weight before his arms come around me. “I had to hang the towels first.”
I hum happily, pulling his arm tighter around me. “Okay.”
Rowan kisses my shoulder, then my cheek. “You had a good night?”
I nod, my finger brushing over his forearm.“Did you have a good New Year’s?”
“The best in a long time, I think,” he whispers in my hair, his lips pressing another kiss behind my ear. “I’m just glad I got to spend these holidays with you.”
“But if you hadn’t?” I ask, turning in his arms to face him. “What would you be doing?”
He sighs, a sad breathy sound that pokes at my heart. “I’d still be with everyone, celebrating with our friends. Then I’d be home alone, probably much more sad and wallowing.”
“You’re thinking about her,” I whisper.
“All the time,” he breathes, sad. “But remember what you said about having someone be perfectly your person?”
I nod.
“I think, maybe, my mother did that for me,” he says. “I like to believe those things. That she magically pushed things into my life for me because even in death she knew best.”
“You think she knew best when it came to me?” I ask, my voice wobbling a tad bit.
“She definitely did.” Rowan kisses me, softly. “I really love you, Natalia.”
“I know,” I say. “I’ve always known.”
“Saranghae.”
“Saranghae,” I whisper and kiss his lips. “Goodnight, Rowan.”
“Goodnight, sweetheart.”
With every cell in my body, I love Rowan Asher.
He kisses my forehead and I fall asleep on his chest.