Chapter Twenty-Seven
Autumn
Iwake up with the decision already made.
After everything I've put myself through over this man, it feels almost insulting that my brain has finished the argument without inviting me.
I lie still for a while anyway, staring at the ceiling and waiting for fear to make it more complicated. It doesn't.
I want Sam. I want to try again. Neither of those things means I trust him like I used to. They don't erase the bar or Bex or the months between Chicago and London. They don't make yesterday some magical finish line where Sam finally said the correct combination of words and won me back.
But I believe him, and I want him. Those are enough to get me out of bed.
I reach for my phone and type, Where's your hotel?
His answer comes almost immediately. A hotel name, the address beneath it, nothing else. I stare at the screen long enough to notice what isn't there. He doesn't ask why or whether I'm coming, and he doesn't turn the information into another decision I have to make for both of us.
I send a few messages to move what can be moved and leave alone what can't. My calendar will survive me being unavailable for a couple of hours. Nix will survive. London will continue functioning without my direct supervision, which is personally offensive but probably healthy.
By the time I get into a car, my certainty has developed nerves. That's fine. I can be scared and still go.
Sam opens the hotel-room door before I've finished the second knock, and for a second neither of us speaks.
He has jeans on, no shoes, and a black T-shirt that looks soft enough to be irritating.
His hair is still damp from a shower. There is a suitcase open near the wall and a jacket folded over the back of a chair, evidence that he is planning to leave today.
His eyes move over my face, then he steps back. There is no hand at my waist or touch at the small of my back guiding me through the doorway. He gives me room to enter and waits until I do before closing the door behind me.
When I turn around, he's still several feet away. Sam Reeves has never looked less comfortable standing still. I take off my coat and drape it over the chair beside his jacket. "I'm saying yes."
His expression changes so fast it almost hurts to watch, but he doesn't move toward me. "What does yes mean?"
The question surprises me enough that I look at him properly. He rubs one palm against his thigh. "I want to make sure we're saying the same thing."
Of course he picks now to become sensible.
"It means I want us." My pulse starts climbing, but I don't look away. "It means I want to try again."
His eyebrows lift slightly.
"I'm going to ask you things when I want answers. I'm going to tell you when I'm pissed off instead of waiting to see whether you notice. If something scares me, I'm going to say that too. And I'm not going to make myself easier to love because you're uncomfortable."
Sam takes that in without flinching. "Good."
"You say that now."
"I mean it now."
I fold my arms. "And when I'm asking you a question you hate?"
"Ask me anyway."
"When I tell you something you don't want to hear?"
"Tell me."
"When I need something from you?"
His jaw shifts. "That one's probably going to scare the shit out of me, but tell me."
I almost smile. The smile wins.
Sam's eyes drop to my mouth and then come back. I uncross my arms. "I love you."
Whatever discipline has been keeping him on his side of the room takes a visible hit.
"I fucking love you," I say. "I've loved you while I've been furious with you. I've loved you from another country. I've loved you while actively wishing I could stop, which has been deeply inconvenient."
His laugh comes out rough. I take one step toward him. "I don't want to stop."
Sam doesn't move, so I take another. By the time I'm close enough to touch him, his hands are clenched at his sides.
"You're standing very still."
"You asked me to let you choose."
"I chose."
His eyes close for half a second. When they open, there is nothing cautious in them anymore.
"Come here."
I do.
His hand closes around the back of my neck as he kisses me, and the first contact wipes out every clever thing I might have said next. I catch the front of his shirt in both fists and pull him against me. Sam makes a low sound into my mouth that sends heat straight through me.
I've missed the weight of him, his beard against my skin, the way his hand fits around my waist when he wants me closer than close already allows.
My back reaches the wall beside the door, and Sam stops himself before I do. He stays close, both of us breathing too hard.
"Still yes?"
I slide my hand into his hair. "Very."
His mouth is back on mine.
After that, we make a terrible job of getting anywhere gracefully. One of his shoes nearly takes me out, and I laugh against his mouth. Sam laughs too until I drag my teeth over his lower lip and the sound disappears.
His hand slides beneath my dress, warm against my back, and every place he touches feels horribly, perfectly familiar.
When his mouth moves to my neck, I tip my head without thinking.
His beard scrapes across my skin before his lips close over the spot beneath my ear that has always made coherent thought optional, and my fingers tighten in his hair when his breathing changes against me.
We reach the bed eventually, though calling what happens between the door and mattress walking would be generous. He catches me around the waist when I nearly trip over his discarded shoe, pulls me back against him and kisses me until I'm laughing again.
"Your hotel is trying to kill me."
"My hotel?"
"Your shoe, then."
"You're the one who kicked it."
"Details."
Sam kisses the complaint out of my mouth.
At the edge of the bed, his hands settle around my waist and the pace changes. He looks at me before touching the hem of my dress.
I catch his face between my hands. "Stop being so careful."
His eyes search mine. "Tell me what you want."
There is no hesitation in the question, and I feel that everywhere.
"I want you. I want this. If I want something different, I'll tell you."
He nods once. "Okay."
"Also, if you ask whether I'm sure every forty-five seconds, I'm leaving."
His mouth twitches. "That's oddly specific."
"Sam."
"Got it."
I raise my arms and he pulls the dress over my head, dropping it beside us.
His hands return to my waist immediately, but he doesn't drag me closer.
He looks slowly, his gaze traveling down my body without pretending it isn't, and there is something almost unbearable about standing there while he takes his time.
Months ago I would have filled the silence with a joke just to take some of the weight out of being wanted that openly.
This time, I let him look.
When his eyes come back to mine, I hook my fingers beneath the hem of his T-shirt and pull it over his head. He barely gets his arms free before I toss it somewhere behind him.
Sam glances toward the sound. "Don't."
"I wasn't going to say anything."
"You were going to say something."
"I liked that shirt."
I shove it from his shoulders, and the humor drains out of me the moment my palms meet his bare chest.
This body is familiar in a way that reaches deeper than memory.
The breadth of him beneath my hands, the hard line of his shoulders, the shift of muscle when I slide my palms down his sides.
I kiss below his collarbone and feel the exact moment his breathing catches, then move to the spot near his neck that has always betrayed him.
"Autumn."
I smile against his skin and kiss it again. His hands tighten on my hips.
"You're enjoying this."
"Immensely."
Sam's hand slides behind my thigh, and a second later I'm sitting on the edge of the bed with him between my knees.
He kisses me once, hard, then lowers himself.
He settles between my thighs, broad shoulders pushing them wider, his hands moving from my ankles upward slowly enough that I feel every inch of the path.
By the time his fingers reach the inside of my knees, I'm already shifting toward him.
"Sam."
His eyes lift to mine.
"You are taking your time."
"I've been thinking about this for months. I'm allowed a minute."
The admission sends another rush of heat through me, his thumbs moving higher.
"So have I."
Something darkens in his expression. "Tell me."
I catch the edge of the mattress in both hands. "I thought about your hands."
His fingers slide beneath the last barrier between us.
"My hands."
"And your mouth."
His jaw tightens.
"And exactly that look you're giving me right now."
He strips the fabric down my legs and tosses it somewhere behind him. Cool air reaches overheated skin for barely a second before his hands are back, his thumbs dragging along the insides of my thighs until my legs open wider without being asked.
Sam notices. "Anything else?"
"Put your mouth on me."
His eyes hold mine for one beat.
Then he does.
My hands fly into his hair as the first stroke of his tongue tears a sound out of me I don't recognize. He catches one of my thighs over his shoulder and pulls me closer, his other hand flattening against my hip when I move toward him.
"Oh, fuck."
Sam hums against me and the vibration makes my stomach clench. I look down and immediately regret it because his eyes are open, watching me.
"You're an asshole."
His mouth curves against me before his tongue moves again and I lose whatever thread of thought I had left.
He remembers me too well. He knows exactly what makes my thighs tighten and what makes my hips lift, and he uses every bit of that knowledge until I'm tugging his hair hard enough that I should probably feel guilty.
I don't.
"More."
One hand leaves my hip. His fingers slide through me before two push inside, and my head drops back.
"Fuck, Sam."
He curls them and I nearly come off the mattress.
"There. Right there."
He does it again. My hand clamps around his wrist even though I have no intention of stopping him.
"Don't fucking stop."