Sonny was looking round, and he got up and walked to the window again to look out. He pressed his face right up against the glass and I saw it mist up with his breath. He gave an annoyed huff and wiped it, peering into the whiteness outside.
“Any sign of him?”
“No. I can’t see anything.”
“Sonny,” I said, and had to wait several long seconds before he turned round and met my eyes. “I loveyou.”
“You didn’t tell me.”
“I thought I was dying.”
Sonny flinched, and I realised thathe’d thought I was dying, too, all those times he’d whispered those words to me in the hospital ward.
The only thing I could say was, “I’m sorry.”
I meant sorry for everything. For getting injured. For not telling him I loved him back. For falling for Erik as well and making Sonny feel like he wasn’t enough. Just… for everything.
Sonny came back over to the couch and sat beside me. “I’m sorry, too. It was only when I thought you were being snatched away from me that I realised you might die without knowing how I felt, and then I wished and wished I’d told you sooner. But then you got better and I was so glad to have you back that I didn’t want to risk losing you again. What if I said I love you and you didn’t feel the same way? Then you wouldn’t want me around.”
“I always want you around.”
He gave me a weak smile.
“I was going to tell you this Christmas. I’ve been talking myself into it for weeks.”
I managed to smile back at him as I heard those words. Sonny was brave enough to do it.
“You did tell me.”
“Yeah.”
I was about to lean in and take Sonny’s lips, to kiss him the way I’d wanted to for so long. His kiss this morning had been slow and languid, so different from Erik’s scorching hot kiss. But then, Erik and I had been building our pleasure, chasing orgasm and desperate for each other, whereas Sonny and I had both been sated and satisfied this morning, our come cooling on our skin and our pleasure spent.
Sonny leapt off the couch and walked to the front door, opening it and sticking his head out. A swirl of frigid air slipped in and made me shiver.
“Close the door.”
He slammed it shut and said, “Nothing. I can’t see him. You need to tell Erik too.”
“That you can’t see him?”
“That you love him. He deserves to know. We both know now how bad it is to wonder.”
“But I want you, Sonny.”
He shrugged. “You want him, too, right?”
I opened my mouth. My denial froze on my tongue, chilled like my skin in that cool air.
Sonny gave me a triumphant look. “So tell him.”
Struggling up, I grabbed for my borrowed crutch and hobbled across the small room as quickly as I could. “I can’t lose you.”
I wrapped my free arm around Sonny, as though I could keep him beside me just like that, and Sonny leaned into me, fitting his body so perfectly against mine.
“You won’t lose me, Declan. I told you, we’re going to work this out.”
“How?”
