Chapter 9
nine
NIALL
I scrubbed the dishes in Liv's sink violently, fighting hope, confusion, and worry.
Why wasn't she answering her fucking phone?
The front door opened, and my relief was unreal.
Followed by my anger.
I stepped into the hallway, dish towel hanging over my shoulder, and Liv blinked at me. She was sweating, her skin was flushed, and her hair was disheveled.
She looked me up and down.
Then did so again.
"Did you go running alone? In the middle of the fucking night?" I growled.
She blinked. "How'd you get in?"
"Who were you drinking with, Livvy? Where did you run from?" My voice was dangerous.
She glanced at the door behind her, like she was considering making a run for it, as she rubbed her eyes.
I crossed the foyer, locking the door behind her and taking her by the waist when her knees knocked together.
"Liv."
"It was a girls' night. At Merrily's place. I brought cider. We..." she looked over her shoulder, at the door again, as I led her deeper into the house. "You have a dish towel."
"Your sink was full of dishes."
"I changed the passcode." She was talking about the door.
"It wasn't difficult to figure out the new one." I'd guessed it on the third try. She preferred patterns over numbers. "You texted me but didn't answer your phone. I wasn't going to wait until you decided to explain."
"Thought I deleted that," she muttered. "Didn't mean to hit send.
"Is it true?"
"Which one did you get?"
I eased her into one of the barstools we'd picked out together. It felt like a lifetime ago. A much happier lifetime ago.
When I handed her my phone, standing beside her, she read the messages she'd sent.
Three words in the first. Five in the second.
Liv
I believe you
I'm trying to, at least.
"Is it true?" I asked again, still fighting to keep my cool.
She set the phone down and lowered her face to the countertop. "I'm too sleepy for this."
"You just jogged three fucking miles. In the dark. Alone."
"I can protect myself," she said into the countertop. "I still have magic."
"Magic that might accidentally energize someone."
"Only Jonah."
"Fuck Jonah. You shouldn't be running home in the middle of the night after drinking cider. So talk."
"I'm tired, and my magic is driving me crazy, and I'm suddenly starving."
"I'll order pizza." I would beg if she wanted me to. The levels I would descend for this woman were fucking madness.
"They're probably closed."
"It's not midnight yet. The place you like on Colland street is still open."
"I hate that you know my favorite places," she mumbled into the countertop.
"I hate that you're not mine anymore."
Liv peeled her face off the counter, leaning back against the chair and staring at me.
"Is it true?" I repeated. "You believe me?"
She nodded. "You have no reason to lie to me anymore."
The relief that flooded me was a living, growing thing. "I never had a reason to lie to you. I loved you, Livvy. I still fucking love you. I would never sacrifice you. Not even for Larson."
Her eyes grew watery. "You can't break in and do my dishes and tell me you love me."
"I guessed the code. That's technically not breaking in."
She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. "Order my pizza before they close."
I picked up my phone and sat down beside her.
She climbed onto my lap and wrapped her arms around me, pressing her face to my throat. It fucking swelled as I pulled her tighter, holding her as close as I could.
Lowering my nose to her hair, I filled my lungs with her scent, breathing through the intense emotions that accompanied it.
Fuck, I'd missed her.
I managed to put the order in. They recognized my number, and promised to have it to us in ten minutes or less. Liv would end up with way too much pizza, but she loved the leftovers.
I'd buy her a whole fucking pizza place if it would get her to let me in again, anyway.
I felt her tears on my throat and collarbone, and had to close my eyes against the onslaught of emotion.
Her magic was vibrating the way it did when she needed to move to keep it from sending her into a panic attack.
"I shouldn't have gotten drunk," she mumbled.
"You're not drunk. Cider puts you to sleep."
"No. I'm sure I'm drunk."
"You're not. Just tired."
"You don't know that." The way her lips moved against my skin would've made me hard if I wasn't already there, but I was. The smell of her alone was enough for that.
"I do."
She pulled her face away from my throat, tipping her head back. Her white hair was wild, those sexy blue eyes piercing. "How?"
I met her gaze. "When you're drunk, you're horny enough that I can smell your desire from across the room. You're barely turned on right now."
A blush spread slowly over those pretty, pale cheeks. "That can't be true."
"Think about it."
I could practically see her mind turning, and her blush darkened. The woman basically jumped me on the rare occasion that she got drunk, and I was more than willing to let her.
The smell of her desire thickened.
"I need to go for a run," she said, changing the subject.
"How are your feet?"
The face she made said not great.
"You're not running."
"Do you have a better idea?"
I met her gaze without speaking.
Her blush spread further. "That's a terrible idea."
"I didn't say anything."
"You didn't have to. It was all over your face. You're looking at me the way I look at pizza."
"If you're suggesting it…"
"We shouldn't," she said with a sigh. "I still might be fated to Jonah."
I let out a slow breath to counter the rage that accompanied his name.
He was lucky I'd had so much practice missing her, or I would've already killed the fucker.
"You're not fated to him," I said. "We both know you're mine. You have been, since the first night we were together."
She lifted a finger toward me. "No."
I didn't argue.
If she wasn't kicking me out, I would play nice.
Someone rang the doorbell.
I lifted her as I stood, and she held on easily as I carried her to the door. We'd done this at least a dozen times before.
The delivery driver nodded at me when he saw me holding my female the same way I had when we'd done this two years ago. It was always the same guy.
I nodded back, dropping my wallet on top of the boxes. He placed them in my one free arm, took the cash out of my wallet, and walked away quietly. Just like I'd asked him to the first time, more than seven years earlier.
I locked the door behind us, my bare feet quiet on the cold tile as I walked back to the kitchen.
Liv had never been conscious enough when I bought pizza to realize that it was the same guy. She'd been asleep, half the time.
"You shouldn't smell this good," she grumbled at me, lifting her head as we sat down in the chair. "Where did your earrings go?"
"I took them out after one snagged on a hoodie a couple months ago."
She lifted her hand to fiddle with my earlobe, and went still.
I didn't wonder why.
Her fingers brushed the tattoo slowly. It was the only raised piece of ink I had. I'd gone to the trouble of making Larson find a way to enchant the ink, so my tattoo would never feel smooth like most of them did.
He'd bitched about it until I told him why, then disappeared into his house for four days straight before coming back to my place with the labelled bottle of my artist's preferred ink.
"Niall." Liv's voice was rough but soft, like a brush of her fingers. "You shouldn't have done this."
"I wanted you on my skin."
"Did Larson do something to the ink? The whole thing is raised."
I nodded.
She ran her finger over the small battery tattoo, identical to the one behind her ear, but slightly lower on my own skin.
Then she lowered her lips to the tattoo, and slowly dragged the tip of her tongue over it, like I'd done to hers at least a hundred times.
I had to clench my jaw to fight my groan. My cock throbbed violently against her ass.
She sucked lightly, and fuck it, I could've come on the sensation alone.
I wanted to touch her.
Needed to touch her.
But I knew she wouldn't welcome it. She'd made that clear earlier. She was trying to believe me, but she hadn't moved past everything. And she was still affected by the cider.
She pulled her lips off my skin and turned around on my lap, opening the top box of pizza.
"You bought way too much again."
"I know." I couldn't stop my hand from landing on her thigh, right over a hole in her jeans.
"I think you just like watching me feast on cold pizza for days afterward."
There was no point in denying it. "It's cute."
"And my tits get all pointy when I eat it cold. You've said that a dozen times."
"Do they?" I feigned surprise.
She shook her head. "You were always a pain in my ass."
"The best kind of pain."
"Yeah." She leaned back against my chest with a slice in her hand. There were no words to describe how right it felt to have her in my arms again. "You should probably leave."
"So you can swim alone in the middle of the night? I don't think so."
"I didn't invite you to stay. Or to come over at all, actually."
"I bought most of the furniture in here, Livvy. I think that makes this place equally mine. No invitation required."
"If you redo the pool again, we can figure out a custody agreement for the house. The pebbles you picked are scratchy."
"You insisted on those ones, and they wouldn't be scratchy if your feet weren't wrecked."
"Then I consider all of your contributions a gift. The house is mine. I'm not sharing." She took a massive bite of her pizza slice, and her responding groan went straight to my cock.
"But since you believe me, we can be friends again."
"I guess," she said around a mouthful of pizza. "You can't talk about my tits anymore, though."
"If you don't want me to talk about them, stop distracting me with them."
She rolled her eyes, and I resisted the urge to lean down and kiss her.
"You can't stay the night," Liv warned.
"I'll leave after the midnight swim."
"You can't drive home at midnight. I guess you can stay… but you can't sleep in the bed."
"I have fur, if you recall. The floor's fine."
"I forgot," she lied, taking another pointed bite of her pizza. "You can have the couch. It's cozier."
So she could sneak off to the pool alone?
Not happening.
I'd sleep on the floor.
Liv changed the subject. "You stopped painting your nails black."
"You were the one who always insisted on painting them for me."
"I like them black. They're sexy. I liked the earrings, too."
"Maybe if you let me sleep in the bed I so benevolently gifted to you, I'll think about getting them pierced again."
"Nice try." She dragged her hair over one side of her shoulder, casually revealing the battery tattoo I loved so fucking much.
It took everything I had not to drag my tongue over it.
Everything I had wasn't enough, because my mouth dipped to it, and I licked it slowly.
A groan slipped free of her. "God, I missed that."
I had too.
So fucking much.