Chapter Sixteen #3
By the time he pulls back, his lips are wet, and his eyes are softer than I’ve ever seen them.
“My sweet girl,” he murmurs. “Your heart touches mine so gently, yet somehow you feel every bruise.”
I let out a shaky breath.
“That sounds exhausting for both of us.”
His mouth curves.
“It’s also beautiful.”
“Maverick.”
“I lost them,” he says quietly. “I’ll always carry that. Nothing changes it.”
I nod because I know.
Not the same pain.
Not even close.
But I know what it means to carry something no one else can fix.
“But you and Olivia don’t make the grief worse,” he says. “You make the love bigger.”
My chest aches.
“I don’t want to hurt you just by being here.”
“You don’t.”
“But I could.” My voice drops. “Maverick, my fear is that I’ll become some kind of replacement.”
His arms tighten around me.
I force myself to keep going, even though every word feels like it scrapes on the way out.
“I don’t want to take her place. I don’t want to sleep in her shadow. I don’t want Livy to become the daughter you lost because losing Elena broke something in you.”
His face stills.
“I don’t want you to love us simply because there are holes shaped like us that need filled.”
“Baby.”
“No, I need to say it.” Tears burn my eyes again. “I know you loved them. I would never ask you not to. I would never want you to stop carrying them. But I can’t be your second chance at Adriana’s life. Livy can’t be your second chance at Elena.”
Maverick cups my face.
“You’re not a replacement,” he says.
I try to look away, but he won’t let me.
“Listen to me, Amelia. Adriana was my wife. Elena was my daughter. They were mine, and I was theirs. Nothing takes that from them. Not death. Not time. Not you.”
My breath catches.
“But you,” he says softly, “are not a ghost wearing her face.”
A sob trembles in my chest.
“You are loud when you are nervous. Stubborn when you are afraid. Soft with every wounded creature except yourself. You carry cold in your hands and fire in your heart. You are Amelia Moore. No one else.”
My tears spill.
“And Olivia?” he continues. “She is not Elena. She is fierce. Nosy. Dramatic. Too smart for peace. She walks into my home and renames my brother before breakfast. Then takes claim to my empire.”
A broken laugh slips out of me.
“Elena was gentle,” he says, voice roughening. “Quieter. She would hide behind my leg before she warmed to anyone. She loved music and tiny glass animals and the color yellow.”
His eyes shine.
“I love Elena for who she was. I love Olivia for who she is.”
My heart twists.
“And I love you,” he says, the words low and steady, “because you made me want a future I had stopped believing could exist.”
I stop breathing.
He brushes his thumb across my cheek.
“You are not filling holes, bella. You’re making new places in me.”
“You can’t love me, Maverick,” I whisper. “You never even made it to first base, remember?”
“Hmm.” His face goes deep in thought. “You’re right.”
“Exactly,” I say softly.
I’m glad he understands.
At the same time, that hurt.
“Bella.”
“Yeah?” I answer, staring at the buttons on today’s dress shirt.
“Amelia.”
Sighing, I look up, knowing that’s what he wants.
“Yeah,” I repeat.
He smiles.
Then he lifts my chin a little higher and brings his mouth down on mine.
The kiss steals every thought from my head before I can form a single defense.
His hand slides into my hair, cradling the back of my head while his other arm wraps around my waist, pulling me close.
My fingers curl into his shirt and the fabric wrinkles beneath my grip.
Maverick makes a low sound against my mouth, like that one small touch cost him more control than he expected.
Then the kiss changes.
It slows…deepens.
Turns from hunger into promise.
His lips move over mine like he has all the time in the world, like he plans to learn every breath I take and every little sound I try to hide. Heat rolls through me, slow and heavy, pooling in places I have no business thinking about while standing in a child’s borrowed bedroom.
My knees weaken, and his arm tightens around me, holding me steady while his thumb brushes along my jaw.
I forget the room.
The house.
The fire.
The grief waiting outside this moment.
There’s only his mouth.
His hands.
The solid wall of his chest under my palms.
The terrifying, beautiful truth that this man is not asking to borrow pieces of me.
He wants all of me.
When he finally pulls back, I follow him without meaning to.
His lips curve against mine as he places one final kiss on my poor abused mouth.
I blink up at him.
Words are gone.
Entirely gone.
First base, apparently, has casualties.
Maverick rests his forehead against mine. His breathing is not as steady as he would like me to believe.
Good.
I hope I ruined him too.
His thumb strokes over my cheek.
“Can I love you now, baby?”
My heart stops.
Then it starts again, wild and foolish.
I should say something smart.
Something cautious.
Something mature.
Instead, still dazed from his mouth, I whisper, “Yeah.”
His eyes darken.
“Good,” he murmurs.
Then he kisses me again.
This time, softly.
Like he already knows he has forever.