That’s a no.
I let it go for now—pretend it doesn’t sting and make me want to reach for a drink or anything to make it go away. I put my hand to my chest and rub hard over my heart.
My forehead presses into her thigh, and I try to stay here as long as I can with my eyes closed and hands on her skin.She makes it go away.
I tell myself that I may never touch her again so I don’t take this for granted. So I can cut myself open and allow this moment to buries itself inside me before she tells me to get away from her forever.
But then I feel her fingers push through my hair and a tear falls out of my eye. “Stand up, Christian.”
I shake my head and croak, “I’m begging.”
“Come beg up here.”
I stand, my eyes on her, and cup her face in my hands. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t just tell me anymore, Christian,” she whispers. “You have to show me. I need more than just words.”
“I know,” I breathe. “I know. I know, Lana, I’ll give you anything.”
“I don’twantanything,” she whispers. “I just want…”
Lana inhales shakily through parted lips and my eyes drop to them, waiting for the next words to come out of them.
“I just want you,” she whispers, and I watch her lips take the shape of each word. I look back into her eyes and they’re so soft, so warm. Sad, even. “Maybe I’m an idiot, but I just wantyou, Christian. We can’t go back to who we were and that’s fine. I never expected us to, but this will take a lot of work and?—”
“We’ll be better than that,” I say. “We’ll be better than who we were—I’llbe better than who I was and I’ll show you. I’m here now and I’m not going to keep waiting or living without you.Please.All I want is the chance to try. If it isn’t enough… IfIam not enough, I’ll go.”
She only blinks slowly. Doesn’t say anything else as I graze my thumbs up her cheekbones.
“Just trust me a little bit, baby, please,” I ask quietly, lowering my forehead to hers. “That’s all. I just need a little bit of faith.”
Lana wets her bottom lip before sucking it in. “A little bit of faith.”
I barely nod.
A string of silence stretches between us where all I hear is our breathing, and I think the hammering of my heart echoing.
“Fine,” she breathes and her eyes drop to my lips, and I don’t even think about it.
My lips move over hers and her tiny gasp turns into a moan, her small hands coming to my waist and fisting my shirt as she presses herself into me.
“Christian, we—” she breathes.
“I love you,” I breathe against her lips. Four years.Four years.
“You aren’t allowed to say that.”
“Says who?” I ask between kisses.
“Me,” she moans. “I’m supposed to be holding my ground. I’m… I’m supposed to be a shark. Ma-Make you beg.” Another breathy moan.
“Fuck that,” I breathe against her lips and she pulls me in harder. “I’ll beg for the rest of my life.”
I’ll beg until my knees are raw and bloody.
Her hands are in my hair, pulling, and she’s arching against my chest and my arms wind around her. In a second, I’ve got her pressed against the wall with my forearm over her head to keep me steady.
Lana has a habit of making me weak. She could poke me with her slender finger and I’d crumble like a sand castle because my entire existence is at her will. And it feels, and has always felt, like I only ever exist when I’m next to her.
