Chapter 37
“That was insane,” I say, feeling my cheeks redden thinking about what just happened only thirty minutes ago.
“That’s one way to put it,” Liam says from behind me.
After coming down from our high, I saw him wince and rub his left leg.
When I asked if he was okay, he admitted that he might have pushed it a little.
That maybe we should have taken it a little easier, since it was the first time we did anything like that.
Usually, I’m the one on top because of his leg.
So, after grabbing him some water, along with his pain meds and an anti-inflammatory, I suggested we make use of the bathtub.
“How’s your leg?” I ask, still concerned that he pushed too much.
“Good. Just a dull ache now—no different than if I would have pushed myself on a run before the accident,” he says, lessening my worry.
“You’ll tell me if it gets worse,” I double check.
“Promise,” he says, dropping a kiss onto my naked shoulder. “Do you promise to tell me the truth?”
I sit there, confused. “Always,” I promise, wondering where he’s going with this.
“Was I too much earlier?” he asks, grabbing one of my hands and playing with my fingers. He’s nervous.
“Not at all,” I say in a confident voice so he knows I’m not lying.
“The spanking was okay?” he asks.
“Liam, that was two smacks to my ass. That wasn’t really a spanking,” I sass.
“Is that so?” he asks, but I feel his body relax behind me, no longer stressed thinking that he might have done something I didn’t like.
“I promise. I liked it—loved it even. You turn off my brain with all your ‘do this, do that’ commands. It lets me get lost in the feeling of it all; I lose myself in my body. It’s perfect.
And I know that if I ever have to tell you to stop or slow down or that it’s too much that I can and you’ll respect my words.
I know you, Liam,” I say, squeezing his hand in mine.
We silently sit in the tub, holding hands until the water gets cold.
When we decide to get out, he softly pats me dry with a towel.
Back in the bedroom, he goes to the dresser, grabs me a pair of underwear, then proceeds to bend down to help me put them on.
If I wasn’t already in love with him, this would have done it.
Once standing in front of me, he gives me a boyish smile that I rarely see from him, holds up a finger, telling me to wait, then moves to the closet and comes back with one of his well-worn T-shirts for me to put on.
I go to grab it but he silently shakes his head and holds the T-shirt out for me to slip on.
The smile on my face gets wider as he keeps silent, moving to the bed and tapping my butt before pulling the covers back and tilting his head for me to get in.
Finally, he says, “Be right back,” before dropping a kiss to my forehead and leaving the bedroom. Not five minutes later, he’s back with a box of pizza and two bottles of water.
“Where did you get that?” I ask, grabbing one of the bottles and taking a long drink.
“I was hoping that I could get you to stop avoiding me tonight. I hated not talking to you—being in your space but not being able to talk to you, touch you. I was trying to give you space, but I’d had enough.”
It’s in this moment that I realize how much I hurt him by avoiding and ignoring him. “I’m so sorry, Liam. I was so caught up in my own feelings and fears that I didn’t even think about what I was doing to you,” I tell him, feeling tears pool in my eyes.
“Hey,” he says, cupping my face and dropping a small, comforting kiss to my lips. “No crying. It’s okay; I get it. How about we just make sure it never happens again.”
“Promise,” I say.
“I feel like there’s been a lot of promises made tonight,” he comments, making me giggle and effectively changing the mood.
“What kind of pizza did you get?” I ask, grabbing for the box.
“Your favorite,” he says, opening the box for me. My eyes light up as I see the canadian pizza in front of me.
“Double cheese?” I ask.
“Always,” he answers, snatching a piece.
“God, I love you,” I say, taking an unlady-like bite.
Liam stays silent.
“What?” I ask, noticing that he hasn’t taken a bite yet. He’s just sitting there, looking at me with a smile and a look I’ve never seen on his face.
“I don’t think I’ll ever get used to hearing you say that,” he says in a soft voice.
“What? That I love you?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says, still not looking away from me.
“Well, get used to it,” I say, leaning in to give him a quick kiss before taking another bite, making him shake his head with a small laugh before eating his pizza.
It’s only once the pizza box is empty on the dresser that I realize how late it is. It’s past midnight, but I don’t want this day to end. It feels like we’ve hit a major turning point in our relationship—
Oh my God, I’m in an actual relationship with Liam Jones. If only thirteen-year-old me could see us now!
“What’s that look for?” Liam asks, coming back to bed from having gone to the bathroom.
“Nothing,” I say.
“That blush and smile isn’t nothing. Come on, tell me,” he nudges, getting back in bed with me.
“I was thinking, if only thirteen-year-old me could see me now, in an actual relationship with the Liam Jones,” I say, shaking my head.
“The Liam Jones?” he repeats with a raised brow.
Rolling my eyes, I say, “Oh shut up,” smacking him in the stomach with the back of my hand. “You know what I mean!”
“No, I really don’t,” he teases.
“We’re not doing this again,” I tell him.
“Awe, why not? I like hearing how obsessed you were with me,” he continues, tickling my side. “Wait, are you still obsessed with me? Because it feels like you are.” He winks.
“Okay, Mr. I-Wrote-You-Notes-For-Years-But-Never-Called-Or-Texted-You!” I say, sticking my tongue out at him.
“Watch that tongue of yours, Miss Callahan,” he says, eyes darkening with lust.
“Or what?” I ask, swinging my leg to straddle him.
Smiling he says, “As much as I like where this is going, I think we need to talk about a few things first.”
Immediately, my smile falters.
“Nothing bad,” he says, pulling at the ends of my hair. “We just need to talk about logistics, that’s all.”
“Logistics?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says, wrapping his arms around me as if he’s afraid I’m going to disappear.
“Like when we can go get my stuff in Vancouver. I work from home so that shouldn’t be an issue, but we also need to figure out how to tell your brother, and Summer invited us to this party Levi and his friends are throwing in a few weeks.
I told her we would go but we don’t have too if you don’t want to.
Although, Summer did say she was looking forward to seeing you again.
I mean, we could always invite her to the house, make her come to us.
Or next time—Hey, why are you crying?” he asks, voice full of concern.
“You just . . .” I start, but the tears get the best of me and I just lean into him, wrapping my arms around him.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—” I cut off his words with an aggressive shake of my head. So he just holds me, running calming fingers through my hair.
Once I finally calm down, I pull back a little to wipe my eyes with the back of my hands. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to cry like that—”
“Don’t apologize.” He cuts me off. “Just tell me what’s wrong,” he says, concern still written all over his face.
“It’s just . . . you really want this,” I say, making him laugh, which makes me frown.
“Silly girl, I told you, you got me. I’m all yours and you’re all mine,” he confirms with a soft smile and long, simple kiss.
“I know but . . .”
“Seems like a dream?” Liam asks in a teasing tone.
“Exactly,” I agree. “It sounds like you have a plan, though.” I bring us back to the original topic at hand.
“I do, unless you tell me otherwise. I was thinking we use your Family Day holiday in a couple of weeks to take the ferry to the mainland so we can go pack up my things and spend some time in the city, maybe go see my parents,” he starts.
“Yes, I’d love to see you mom! I haven’t seen her since I moved to the island!” I love his mom. She was the closest thing I had to a mom, really.
“You talk to my mom?” he asks.
“Of course,” I say.
“Even when we weren’t talking.”
I stop at that, feeling my eyes widen. “About that . . .” I start, then pause. I hope he’s not mad. “She knows about the, umm . . . incident,” I confess.
“She knows?” he asks, shock written all over his face.
“Well, she doesn’t know the details, just that something happened, we got into a fight, and that I didn’t want to hear your name ever again,” I tell him, giving him a wide smile.
“She’s never said a word,” he says, dumbfounded.
“Well, no. Girl code, duh,” I tease, rolling my eyes.
“But not a word, really?” he questions, shaking his head.
“What can I say, the woman loves me,” I say jokingly.
“Must be the eye-rolling that got to her,” he jokes back.
“Okay, so, Family Day weekend, we go to the city. What else? I guess we have to figure out how to tell Ronan,” I say.
“You mean your dramatic-as-hell older brother?” he asks with a raised brow.
“Yeah, him,” I say, playing with the hair at the nap of his neck.
“Either I tell him, or we tell him together, but—” he starts but I cut him off.
“Or we get Cassie to tell him. She already knows and you know as well as I do that she could burn the world down and he would be following her like a puppy.”
“We could get her to hint at the topic—introduce him to the idea. That could work,” he agrees.
“Perfect! Now, what were you saying about Summer?” I ask him.
“Oh, yeah. Apparently, Levi is having a party in a few weeks with some of his teammates. They had a game on New Years so they couldn’t celebrate that, then two, long away stretches so they’re doing a New-Years-Eve-slash-Valentine’s-Day bash or whatever.
She said she and Hannah took over so it won’t be a total disaster,” he explains.
“I get to see Summer, Levi, and Hannah all in one weekend? Of course I want to go! Plus, I get to meet Ian. From what I’ve seen, he is quite the looker,” I tease.
“Excuse me?” he says, feigning insults and going in with both hands to tickle me. He flips me over so he’s on top, pinning my hands above my head
“Okay . . . enough . . .” I say through uncontrolled laughter.
“Take it back,” he says, pausing his assault.
“Okay, okay, I was joking! You know I only have eyes for you,” I promise.
“You better,” he says, keeping my hands above my head and dropping a kiss to my lips. “For the record, I only have eyes for you too. It’s always been you,” he says, before giving me the most soul-searing possessive kiss he’s ever given me.
Suddenly, we’re not joking anymore and the air in the bedroom becomes electric, charged with love and lust. Then, he makes love to me, slow and gentle, like we’ve never done before.