Chapter 20
One Morning, Eight Years Ago
Bea
I’m startled awake by a vibrating sound. Silas stirs beside me, and our eyes lock. We’re so close I see his pupils contract when the morning sun hits them.
“What was that?” I ask.
“What was what?” His voice is deeper, grittier in the morning.
“I thought I heard something.”
“Ravi snores loud enough to shake the walls. It was probably that.” His eyes heat when they scan over his shirt on me. “Bea. Last night was . . .”
I don’t have words for it, either. It was the most intimate night I’d ever had with someone, full stop.
I worried maybe the high and the mood of the night had made him feel sexier to me, but here in the light of day, it is worse. He’s golden and hot and rumpled. Every second of the night before is still crystal clear to me. I think if I look down, I’ll see his fingerprints on my skin.
I approach him slowly, the way he’d done for me.
His kisses are less finessed this morning, his hands more urgent.
When I kiss his neck, he whimpers roughly in my ear and that sound, fuck, that sound unhinges me.
I set my knees on either side of his hips and grind myself into him, then pull his shirt over my head, the cool air pulling up goose bumps onto my skin.
I grind down some more and bite my lip against a moan, and that’s when I hear the vibrating again.
My phone. I ignore it.
Silas sits up so he can nuzzle and suck my chest, his hips lifting mindlessly beneath me.
My phone starts up again.
“Let me fuck you, Bea,” he says into the valley of my breasts.
“Let me fuck you,” I say. I realize I’m smiling. I am more turned on than I can ever remember being, and I feel on the verge of hilarity at the same time. Silas bites down gently on a nipple, and I see him beaming, too.
My phone again.
“Do you need to get that?”
I don’t need anything other than him inside of me immediately. But it starts up once more.
“Shit. Let me see.”
I climb off him and search around for my jeans, then dig into the pockets until I find my phone.
My stomach thuds at my feet. Nineteen missed calls since four o’clock this morning, all from Merritt. She calls again, and I answer on the first ring.
“Bea?! Oh my god, where the hell are you?!”
I blow past the question. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”
She goes quiet before the sound crackles in a way that tells me she’s crying. I break out in an immediate cold sweat.
“No. I’m not okay,” she says, her voice warbling. “I was hooking up with Steven, and please, BB, please don’t lecture me, but he—” She scatters into sobs again, and dread grabs me by the throat. “He found a lump.”
I fire off every platitude, every denial. We don’t know anything until you get it checked out. There’s no use worrying too soon, Mer. It’s going to be okay.
But the truth is, I know it won’t be. I know it won’t be okay.