“No restaurants.”
He chuckles. “I wasn’t going to take you to one anyway.”
My gaze narrows and I glare, trying to crack him down when I’m really just looking at him for the sake of looking at him because he’s back. I can look at him whenever I want now. At night, sometimes, knowing he’s downstairs isn’t enough.
I won’t say it to him or anyone, but sometimes I’m scared to go to sleep while he’s here. What if I wake up and he’s gone again? And I’m trying, I swear I am. I’m putting my faith in him, I’m giving him all of the hope I have in my heart in his hands to hold.
I suppose that’s the funny thing about trust, right? It’s all blind. Every day is a version of the trust-fall game, with everyone you know.
What’s worse though? I know Christian would catch me—I know that in the depths of my heart and in the far back of my mind.
“Fine,” I breathe out like I hate the idea. “Okay.”
Smiling, he grabs his keys and phone from the island, his gym bag from the floor, and comes around to kiss my cheek. “Eight o’clock.”
“Where are you—” I blink. “I mean, what are you doing today? Wh?—”
“I’m gonna go to the gym right now,” he says, his hand coming up to cup my cheek and his thumb tracing my bottom lip. “I’ll be back in a few hours. Tend to the garden and stuff.”
I huff a laugh that makes him grin.
“What are you doing today?” Christian asks.
I shrug and kiss his thumb, leaning into him. His hand cupping my cheek sifts through the hair at the back of my neck and holds me steady—or himself, I’m not sure at this point. “I was going to go to the gym too but there’s this guy who keeps stalking me,” I tease. “He goes to my gym…”
Christian cackles. “Come to the gym withmethen. I’ll protect you.”
I laugh, shaking my head. “Christian…”
“Why not? It’ll be part of the date.”
“You said eight o’clock.”
“It’s almost eight.”
“In the morning.” I cross my arms. “Don’t be greedy.”
“When it comes to you? Impossible.”
I poke his chest. “Go,” I tell him. “I’m going to read, clean, and maybe nap. I have a date tonight.”
Christian smiles and he needs to leave.Now.Before I do something stupid like kiss him. But he kisses my cheek again, then my forehead. His lips linger there, just in the center of my forehead, pressing. My eyes fall closed and I want him to stay home today and lie here with me.
I want to do nothing with my favorite person to do nothing with.
“I’ll see you later, baby,” he says quietly, pulling away.
He walks away, leaving me with weak knees and an even weaker heart. Yes, my heart is weak for him, but in a goodway. In a way that your best friend, your greatest love,allowsyou to be weak with them. In a way that means I don’t always have to be strong with him because he can hold me up when I can’t carry the weight—the way I’d do for him. The way I’ve done.
I fell in love with him when I was nineteen and it wasn’t with just the good parts. Love doesn’t work with only the good parts of you. Love functions with the ugly too. Loveneedsthe ugliness to prosper, I think. I saw his ugly, I matched it with my own. We traded our ugliness, our darkness, our weaknesses, and our secrets, and none of it—none of it, made me ever stop loving him.
And soulmates are real because I have mine and he brings me flowers three times a week with a silly little note. He’s made me a garden. He’s made sure I eat every morning before work. He’s here everyday, cooking and cleaning and making himself at home. He’s…here.
Christian is here.
I’m fifty percent into this book I started after my shower, and I’m determined to finish before tonight. But that plan goes out the window when the front swings open and from the living room, I see them.
“Lana!”
