My heart stumbled in my chest.
His Jacket discarded on the ground.
No.
I looked ahead at the water, at where he could’ve gone.
“Christian!” I screamed—full on sobbing my words out.The currents rapidly moved in insane rhythms leaving me no room to breathe. He wouldn’t survive.
Piece by piece, I started taking my own clothes off.
If he went down, then we’d go down together.
I had to tell him there was no living if it wasn’t with him.
There was no point to this life if I couldn’t love him.
Not him. Please.
Stumbling onto the ledge, my jacket and sweater fell to the ground with his. With shivering fingers, I began unbuttoning my jeans when a
“Adelaide!” His voice boomed through the air. I turned around, he marched over to me—tears streaming down past his reddened nose. Pure anguish painted over his face and with choked emotion he pulled me down into him.
He was here.
He was alive.
My arms tightened around him as I buried my face into his neck, both of us crying into each other. “I thought… I thought,” I hiccupped.
“I’m okay, baby.” He held me tighter. With each pull, each grab, each comforting kiss to my neck, he told me he was here, that he loved me. “What were youthinking?” His voice dipped in fractured longing.
Pulling back, I cupped his cheeks while my legs wrapped around his waist. “I was thinking that where you are is where I belong.” My voice broke with each confession. “I was thinking that I couldn’t bear the sight of losing you when you’ve stolen my heart from its space to fill in your chest.”
“You were going to jump in the water for me?”
“No,” I said. “I was going to jump inwithyou.”
He stared at me with those soft eyes of his. Looking at me like his senses existed to master the art of learningme.
I brushed a thumb over his fallen tear. “I’m sorry for giving up when you never did. The truth is, I was scared. I thought I was doing the right thing by putting distance between us. You’ve spent a long time withthis, you never got the chance to grow, to be alone—I wanted you to have that for yourself. But then, when I saw the ring disappear into the water, I realized I couldn’t. I need you. Call me selfish, but I want you.”
“Baby,” he begged with a curved palm to my cheek. “Let me learn the way you’ve grown, and I promise I’ll catch up to where you are.”
Another broken sob as I pressed a haste kiss to his cheek. “I love youand I’ll only love you for the rest of my life.”
He responded with an earth-shattering kiss.
Christian's hands were on the side of my face, drawing my mouth into his as we enjoyed a scorching but slow kiss that began with playful anticipation and progressed to white-hot ferocity. Our lips and tongues danced with furious hunger. He then nibbled and lightly sucked on my bottom lip, chuckling lopsidedly. Christian slid his left hand to the back of my head, while mine stayed on his face.
The hum of rotor blades whirring in the next sky pulled us apart.
We broke apart exactly when a helicopter lowered itself near the water, its lights flashing down while a group of people dived with full gear.
“What are they…”
Christian kissed my temple.
His sheepish look told me everything.
