It’s impossibly sweet. Impossibly perfect.
Impossibly real.
Every movement is slow and deliberate, paced with a tenderness that breaks me open in the best way.
He’s strong. Careful. Fully present. And the way he presses his forehead to mine, breath catching as we find a steady rhythm together, feels like more than heat.
It’s something neither of us meant to start but can’t pull away from now.
My fingers grip his shoulders, pulling him closer as each pulse of pleasure builds and crests, sharp and sweet and overwhelming. He whispers my name with a roughness that sends me tumbling over the edge.
I pull him with me, our breaths tangling as we come apart together—slow, intense, unmistakably real.
He collapses gently beside me, one arm still wrapped tight around my waist, his chest rising and falling against my back. I feel his lips brush my shoulder once, soft and lingering, before he settles fully.
For a long time, neither of us speaks.
The room is warm. The world is quiet. My heartbeat finally begins to slow.
Kendrick exhales, low and unsteady, like he’s surrendering something he didn’t know he’d been holding.
“You okay?” he murmurs into my hair.
“I’m… yeah,” I say, smiling into the pillow. “You?”
His arm tightens around me. “Ask me again in a minute.”
I laugh, soft and breathless. He buries his face in the curve of my neck, and I feel the smile he doesn’t say out loud.
If I were a smarter woman, I’d be panicking about what this means, about how temporary things are supposed to be, about the fact that I’m leaving soon.
But wrapped in his arms, warm from his touch, the rest of the world feels far away.
For tonight at least, I let myself stay exactly where I am.
SIX
KENDRICK
I wake up warm.
That’s the first thing I notice — the kind of warmth that sinks under your skin and settles deep. For a second, half-asleep, it feels like she might still be here. Her laugh, her breath on my neck, her hand sliding down my chest…
But when I open my eyes, the space beside me is empty.
A faint imprint dents the cushion. One of my blankets is pulled halfway to the floor. Her hair tie sits abandoned on the coffee table like a little ribbon of evidence.
I let out a slow breath through my nose.
Of course she left.
She’s not mine. We barely know each other. And whatever last night was — heat, impulse, something that hit harder than it should’ve — it doesn’t mean she’s obligated to stick around until sunrise.
Still…
I rub a hand over my face, annoyed at the sting of disappointment tightening in my chest.
I should be relieved. It’s easier when things are simple, clean, cut off before they get complicated. She’s here for photos, not permanence. I’m here for my job, my Gran, my life that doesn’t leave room for people drifting in and out like passing weather.
