Chapter 25
She’s a fucking mess.
Hair tangled, slippers stained, pajama shorts half-hidden beneath a shirt slipping off one shoulder. Her eyes are swollen, cheeks blotchy, a faint streak down her arm that might be syrup. Or tears. Or both.
And yet, she’s still the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.
The only face that came to me when that structure gave way. It wasn’t my parents’. Wasn’t my brothers’.
It was hers.
And I left her sitting in that restaurant like a goddamn coward because looking at her meant facing everything I’ve spent years hiding. Pride’s a bastard like that.
She steps closer now, fingertips brushing the cut on my lip. The smallest touch, but somehow, it hits harder than the damn beam that fell on me. “You sure you’re okay?”
My hand catches hers, keeping it there, as I kiss the pads of her fingers. “I’m good, Goldilocks. Promise.”
A tear slips free, then another, her lip trembling. “I’m so sorry.”
The hitch in her breath knocks the fucking wind right out of me. I drag her against my chest, unable to hold back a second longer.
“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, Harlow.” My hand slides up her back, steadying us both. “I’m the one who should be apologizing. You were right, I was being a sensitive little bitch.”
That earns me a wet laugh. “I didn’t call you a bitch,” she sniffles. “I called you sensitive.”
My smirk brushes against her hair. “I know. But I was definitely being a bitch too.”
She shakes her head. “No, you were right to be upset. I freaked out. Acted like a big, fat scaredy-cat. Which makes no damn sense because what you said is everything I wanted to hear. Everything I waited for…” Her eyes lift, lashes damp, voice dropping to a whisper. “Everything I ever wished for.”
The soft words hit like a slow burn, crawling through my chest until there’s no air left.
“I meant what I said in there, Linc. Every word. I love you. Always have, even when I pretended I didn’t. I want the key. I want the wishes. I want the whole damn fairytale.”
The confession hits like a fist. A truth I already knew but wanted to hear anyway.
My hand moves to her cheek, fingers tracing the remnants of her tears. “Guess it’s a good thing scaredy cats and sensitive bitches go together, huh?”
Another laugh slips out, small and cracked, the kind of sound that undoes me every damn time.
I swoop in, claiming it with my mouth. Her breath catches as I take it all. Heat and history colliding, years of everything we didn’t say burning between us.
She melts against me, arms looping around my neck as I lift her clean off her feet.
“I love you so much,” she breathes.
“I love you too, Goldilocks.”
Long before I knew what that even meant. Back when she moved in next door, all sass and wishes. When I pelted her with slime balls instead of telling her I liked the way she smiled. When teasing her was easier than admitting she was the prettiest damn girl I’d ever seen.
The rivalry was never the story. It was just the mask.
The truth is, Harlow was always the dandelion bouquet I replaced, not the one I crushed.
The sweatshirt I gave and never asked to have back.
The only girl I would have ever faked a date with, because it was the first time I didn’t have to pretend.
She leans her forehead to mine, breath trembling between us. “Did you really make me a key?”
There’s light in her eyes again, open and unguarded.
“Damn straight. Made it weeks ago.”
Her mouth curves, soft and sure. “No take backs, Masters.”
“Baby, I’m a lifetime guarantee. No returns, no exchanges, and definitely no refunds.”
Another laugh breaks free—soft, sweet, and exactly what I was aiming for. “You’re ridiculous.”
Then she’s kissing me again. The kind that quiets the world and tastes like forever.