40. Chapter Forty
And the psychic lays down the tarot card in front of Ella Malloy. “There is about to be great loss.”
“I’m going to lose something?”
The psychic lays down another card. “Great loss for someone in your life. Your daughter maybe.”
“Oh, she has nothing to lose. She’s fine.”
* * *
There is a fine line between savage and gentle, and I can’t seem to find it.
With her taste on my tongue and her sweet moans in my ear, I might just explode.
I finish kicking out of my pants and open the drawer to her nightstand for a condom. I know they’re there because I put them there. Since the moment we tumbled into this physical relationship, we haven’t kept our hands off one another, and last night was the first night we’ve spent apart.
It’s not the sex. It’s the connection.
But I’ve made sure that that connection has protection—in our bedrooms, trailers, cars, her purse, my wallet. You can’t be too safe.
Handing Christina the condom, she tears it open as I rid myself of the rest of my clothing. She hands it to me, and as I sheath myself, she pulls the sports bra she’s wearing up and over her head.
Those dark eyes look up at me, and the flush of passion is pink in her cheeks. She told me she loved me. Women tell me that all the time, but this one—I believe her.
As I ease inside of her, and she arches beneath me, I have to push away the conflict that’s tearing me up inside.
This thing between us was never supposed to be more than a sham, but it’s more. It’s full of feeling. It became physical. It became personal.
Christina pulls me tightly against her. Her breath pants in my ear. Her skin is slick beneath mine. Her heart beats so hard I can feel it in time with my own.
Fingernails claw into my back.
My fingers grip her tender skin as we move together.
Simultaneously we spill over, that sensitive quake of nerves shaking us both.
I collapse against her, and she wraps herself around me. I can feel the need from her. She’s holding on for dear life as if she knows what’s eventually coming.
I press my lips to her ear. “I love you, Christina. I love you,” I say, because she can’t stop me from saying it now. “I love you.”
Her arms wrap even tighter around me, holding me in place against her. I can feel her move beneath me, but I’m afraid it’s the quake of tears that has her shaking.
Easing back, I look down at her, but she turns her head.
I roll to the side of her and reach for the edge of the comforter to bring up and around us. The air is cool on damp skin.
When I look down, I see the streaks of tears on her cheeks, and I wipe them away with my thumb.
“Did I hurt you?” I ask, because that might kill me if I did.
“No,” her voice is soft.
“What happened?”
“You said you love me,” she says, her breath hitching.
I can’t help but smile down at her. “I do.”
“No one—no one—has ever said that to me.”
Swallowing hard, I take in what that means. She’s not saying that a man or a lover neglected those words. She’s telling me that no one has ever told her they love her.
Fuck!
“Christina—”
She presses her fingers to my lips. “You said it. It’ll stay with me forever,” she says, as if she knows what’s coming our way.
* * *
After eating lunch, some frozen meal in Christina’s freezer, and a shower that started an afternoon that landed us back in her bed, we decided to drive back to my place and get Loki. I swear this damn dog loves this woman as much as I do.
We drive up to Griffith Park to take Loki for a walk.
I’ll never admit to Christina that I’m hoping someone will post pictures of us, and my dog, looking happy and in love. I want that narrative to continue. I want her father to see that we are happy, and this won’t get in the way.
“Are you going to ask me about this morning?” I finally ask Christina as we walk the trail.
“No,” she says, her head lifted as she takes in the view of the city below us.
“Maybe we should talk about it.”
Christina stops and turns to me. “I know what it was. I just hope it’s everything you want. But this isn’t where we should talk about it.” She rises up on her toes and presses a kiss to my lips. “I love you. That’s all you need to know,” she says as she takes the leash from my hand and starts walking with my dog.
I run my hand over my mouth as I watch her walking.
Charles Malloy has offered me exactly what I want. He has a trilogy of movies with a new action hero, and he wants me as the face of that hero. This is an iconic moment. This is what makes me a legend.
He’s offered to buy out my contract at the Love Is in the Air network. We will film through Italy, London, and Paris.
Movie premieres will be worldwide, not just some small theater with a staged red carpet to make it appear bigger.
The money is outrageous.
The opportunities endless.
The caveat is crushing.
The woman, who is now running ahead with my dog right in stride next to her, can’t be part of it. Her father added that little tidbit right before she and her mother walked up to us.
I can have my name synonymous with the next greatest role in the history of movies, but I can’t have the producer’s daughter in my life.
Christina stops and turns back to look at me. Loki barks as if he’s calling out to me.
“We have today, Graham,” she calls back to me and it rips my heart in two.
I don’t know what she knows, but she’s an intelligent woman. No matter what her father may or may not have said to her, she knows.
I will break that confidentiality if it means she understands. What I don’t know is if I can take this role and lose her.