Chapter Thirty-Seven #2
“I wanted so badly to come after you and deal with Allard,” he says.
“I was going to make Eric follow you, but I knew he wouldn’t fight for you.
Then I considered making him take me, but in the end, I was bleeding too much.
I had to get stabilized. But knowing the 1982 would be tracking Allard… I was kind of crazed about it.”
“How crazed?” I face him, keeping a foot of space between us. Resisting the urge to touch him is much harder in the warmth of the covers.
“They had to sedate me.” His tone is grim, but I smile.
“I’m just glad the 1982 was primarily after Allard,” I say. “He figured out pretty quickly that we were after the real fifth puzzle.”
“Luca told me. It could have gone so many other ways…” He inhales sharply.
“Those two would have taken each other out sooner or later. Allard killed one of the 1982’s players in the last challenge, and in return, the 1982 put Allard’s sister in the hospital.
She ended up dying. Both were nasty pieces of work.
I don’t think the 1982 would have let you leave alive. ”
“I’m positive he wouldn’t have.” I exhale a shaky laugh.
“Zoe,” he says. He lifts a hand like he’s going to touch me but then drops it. “I know that trust is huge to you. I know that more than trust, it’s being able to rely on people to be who they say they are. Stability matters to you.”
I nod. All true.
He opens his mouth to continue but closes it. Instead, he reaches out and cups the side of my face briefly before running the hand up into my hair. My resolve not to touch him back is slipping away.
“I’ll never break that trust again, if you let me,” he says.
“Let you not break trust?” I murmur against the sensation of his hand.
“I’ll do anything you want,” he says, and suddenly I’m moving toward him like a magnet.
I give in to the inescapable pull and nuzzle my face into the hollow of his throat, breathing in his skin.
He pulls me as close as my cast and his leg will allow.
If there’s anything the Enigma Challenge has taught me, it’s that despite the years of study and sacrifice to get where I am in academia, I have a low tolerance for both pain and resisting Dane Seaver.
“You can’t break my trust again,” I warn.
I feel him nod over my head. He wraps his arms around me and pulls me as close as possible against the heat of his chest, as though he needs to remind himself that I’m here, that my blood is pumping. I burrow into his arms, our cold skin warming every place we’re in contact.
“Will you tell me about the hike?” he asks. “I need to know you’re mentally okay.”
“I’m okay.” I run my fingers down his chest. I am okay—or I will be. “I’ll tell you about it later. I don’t want to think about Allard or the 1982, especially when you’re naked.”
“I’m not completely naked, but if you just—”
“I’m not helping you with your boxers.”
He gives a soft laugh. “Fine. Punish me.”
I nod. “And the percentage split on the prize money is definitely changing. It’s one hundred percent me, zero percent you.”
He laughs again. There’s relief in it now. “Fair.”
I already knew he wasn’t going to ask me to split it with him. We say nothing for a long moment before I ask, “What happens? After Scotland?”
“What do you want?” He’s careful, tense as he waits for my answer.
In reply, I take his face in my hands and guide his mouth to mine. There’s no resistance, and his mouth is deliciously warm and soft. The kiss is slow and lush, and in it, I know I’ve forgiven him. We take our time, using our lips to come back to each other, to make new promises.
“I want to be with you,” I say. “In case that wasn’t obvious from the fact that we’re in bed.” I press a kiss to his neck, tasting salt and the faint smell of bandages, but above all, him. He breathes out, perhaps in relief. His hands are hot down my back.
“Anywhere you want to be, I’ll be,” he says. “If you want to fight for your postdoc at Chessmont, I’ll move there with you, if you want me to.”
“That could be arranged. If I go back there.”
“My work isn’t tied to any one location. There’s nothing keeping me in Seattle. We can move to Paris if you want. London. It doesn’t matter.”
Once, not long ago, I saw my future in much narrower terms. I looked at the years ahead of me as a succession of adjunct contracts, tenure, and some kind of murky Eric future that I wasn’t sure I wanted.
I didn’t see myself moving on from Chessmont only because I didn’t know where I’d go.
I simply hadn’t thought that far ahead. One of the gifts of being with Dane is looking ahead. Planning.
I press my cheek against his. “How does the win work?”
“They’ll deposit money into your account. They’ll know how.”
“And you have to delete people?”