Baby.
God, I love that.
I waste no time doing as she says, pistoning into her as hard as I fucking can as I press gentle kisses to her lips, which fall open as she struggles to catch her breath. She’s clenching around my cock in no time, and that alone has me twitching with anorgasm in seconds, spilling inside her just as she reaches her climax.
Maeve collapses on top of me, her face pressed into my neck as our chests heave in sync with each other. Wrapping my arms around her, I brush her hair away from her sweaty neck, running my fingers through it as I press a lazy kiss to her forehead.
“I…”
My eyes widen as my throat constricts.
“What?” she asks softly.
How could I even begin to tell her my head and my body weren’t communicating properly and I was just about to blurt out that Iloveher? I can’t say that. I didn’t even know I did until I… Until I almost blurted it out, like it was nothing. Like I say it all the time.
Is that how you know?
When the words just want to pour out of you?
“I don’t know,” I backpeddle. “My mind is mush.”
Maeve just laughs, a melodic sound that vibrates against my chest as she cuddles up to it, and I blink up at the ceiling, wondering if I’ve actually fallen in love with her.
Statistics, facts… None of that helps when it comes to this. None of that can tell me what I’m feeling right now. I have nothing to prepare me for dealing with this, this overwhelming weight that feelsgood, and for the first time in my life, not having that control doesn’t send me into a spiral. Instead, it feels like something just clicked into place. Something that wasn’t there before. I feel…whole.
I feel like I may be in love with Maeve Gray.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
MAEVE
Tuesday, December 28th
St. Joseph Medical Center is positioned right near Mount Rainer, and even from this far, it’s one of the most amazing views I’ve ever seen. I don’t know what I thought Washington would look like, but it’s more beautiful than I expected it to be. I’d never traveled this far up the West Coast before, and now I’m disappointed I haven’t.
But I only get a tiny glimpse before I follow Tate into the hospital, where the views get much more bland and much more…unsettling. Medical personnel bustle around every corner and every hallway, donning blue scrubs and some wearing white coats. I haven’t been in many hospitals, only when Gran had a fall three summers ago, and even then, I had this awful pit in my stomach. There’s something about the white walls and checkered linoleum floors and the smell that sends off warning signals in my brain.
And to think this is what I’m choosing for a career. But that’s why I wanted to be in the baby wing. If I was going to be in a cesspool of doom, I wanted to be around the babies. The moms. Thejoy.
He wanted to get to the hospital the moment we crossed the state line, didn’t even care to check into a hotel first and drop off our things, but I was okay with it. I was okay with whatever made him feel better, or as better as hecouldfeel. Really, it just seems like he wants to get this over with, and I don’t blame him.
His hand ends up finding mine as we make our way to the front desk, and I immediately notice how clammy he feels. I peek hesitantly up at him as he talks to the lady manning check-in, chewing at my lip as I observe how rigid he looks.
He looks scared, anxious, and angry all at once.
There’s this strange feeling in my gut, a defensive one almost, like I feel the need to protect him from what’s about to happen. Even thoughIdon’t fully know what’s going to happen yet. The unknown has me throwing my guard up. I’m ready to tug him out of this hospital the second things go haywire.
I’m planning our escape in my head as he figures out what room his mother is in, before he’s pulling me down the nearest hall and ripping me from my thoughts.
“I could stay in the waiting room?—”
“Maeve,” he cuts me off, stopping abruptly, and I almost run into him, before he’s turning slightly to look down at me, “that is the very last thing I want right now. I’m freaking out. I don’t know if I c-can do this, and I need your help?—”
“I’m right here,” I say, cutting him off right back. “I am right here with you. I won’t go anywhere, not if you don’t want me to.”
Even if the thought of being in the same room as Tate and his mom for their first reunion in years has me absolutely shitting myself, I know this is a huge deal for him. And if he wants me there, I’m there. Nerves aside.
“I don’t want you to go anywhere,” he manages to say, taking a deep breath, “doyouwant to go anywhere?”
