“You should always feel like you can speak your mind to me.”But don’t call it quits on me on Christmas Day. Just one more week...
“Always.You keep on saying things like that—one day,someday,always... But you’re not open to there being analways, or even aone dayor asomeday. You only want there to be anowbecause you can’t face the past and you refuse to think about the future.”
“What future can I offer you, Samira? I fucked up my future and I’m not going to fuck up yours. I used to be a bloody surgeon.ThenI could have offered you something. I’m nobody now, just a penniless grunt who can’t operate in the real world.”
“I don’t care about what youdidfor a job or what youdo. I care about who you are. I’m not asking you to give me anything but yourself.” She fumbled with the knot on her scarf, yanked it off and tossed it on a chair.
He turned, on the pretense of checking the fire, and chucked another chunk of wood on it. Sparks jumped. “You’re asking for something I can’t give.”
She stepped up to him, took his face in both hands and coaxed him to look at her. “All along I’ve thought I was the fearful one. But it’s you who’s afraid. You’re stuck in this mind-set that you’re defined by your achievements, rather than by the man you are. You’re scared to take the risk of just being yourself. You, of all people—scared.”
He raised his eyebrows. That struck where it hurt. “Aye, that’s...pretty much it. You see right through me.”
She slid her hands to his neck, then to his chest, gripping his jumper like she was scared he’d run. “Does that concern you, honestly? And for God’s sake, no jokes.”
He dropped his hands to her jean-clad hips. “I don’t think anybody’s ever tried to look that hard. As you say, people like the happy-go-lucky joker, so I guess I stick with that. He’s a fun guy to be around and that’s all anybody wants.”
“And I like that side of you, too. But I like the many other sides. You’ve given me so much, and I’m not going to let you give up on yourself so easily. Jamie, ever since we met, you’ve made me feel like this confident woman I thought I wasn’t. But now, after everything that’s happened, I realize I am that woman. That just because I worry about things, because I feel things deeply, because sometimes my body panics, because I don’t have that tough-girl bravado of, say, Tess or Holly, it doesn’t mean I’m weak. That I can be reserved and careful, and strong and brave at the same time.”
“You can. And so many other things. But I don’t want to be the man who ultimately messes that up. You deserve more than I can give.”
She flattened her hands onto his chest. “So I finally feel likeI’mgood enough foryouand—what? Now you think you’re not good enough for me?”
Oh why did she have to choose Christmas Day? “Samira, you were always good enough for me. And I was never good enough for you—I’m still not. I just pretended to be what you needed me to be, as long as I could.”
“Can I be the judge of that? Because...” She patted his chest. Her tone was forceful but it trembled, like she was exploring a new part of her voice she hadn’t yet mastered. “You aresogood for me. Trust me to know my own mind and make my own decisions.”
“Oh I do. I just don’t trust my future self. What happens when I fall off the wagon again?”
“Maybe I can help you stop that happening. Maybe you can get some help. Maybe I can be there to pick you up. I don’t know. I know nothing about addiction but I can learn. It’s a journey we can make together.”
He took her hands, clutching them to his chest. “I don’t want to disappoint you, Samira. And I will, sooner or later. And that would break both our hearts.”
Samira leaned her forehead against their linked hands. The fire popped. After half a minute she pushed away again. “What if I told you that you already have my approval and it’s not going to change? What if you didn’t have to worry about winning my...?” She looked down a few seconds, her eyes hidden under flickering eyelashes, then up again, jutting her jaw a little. “Okay, I’m going to say it, because I feel it and I don’t want to pretend this is all a holiday fling anymore because to me it’s not—and I don’t think it is to you, either, if you’re honest with yourself... What if you didn’t have to worry about winning my love, or losing it? What if you just considered it won? How would that change things?”
Her whole body seemed to be fizzing. Her fear had given way to a fight.
Damn, she was fighting for him, for them. And why washefighting this, when he wanted it so bad, wanted her so bad? He swallowed. “You know, when you first started seeing through my jokes, seeing my many flaws, I felt physically sick, physically smaller, even. That night at the cottage, the way I let you down, the disappointment in your eyes...” Nausea bubbled in his stomach at the thought. “But after that passed, it was kind of a relief that you knew the worst, that you understood where I was coming from, even if it meant you lost respect for me.”
She opened her mouth to speak.
“And I know you did lose respect, Samira,” he said, jumping in. “But somehow that made this thing between us more honest. I’ve never let anybody this far in. You say I’ve given you so much? Well, you’ve given me more, in such a short time. I liked you the minute I met you—you had this quiet strength. And I keep finding more and more things to...” Hell, she’d said theLword. So could he. “To love.”
She smiled, but she still had a sadness in her eyes. “I’m glad. I feel that way about you, too. More and more things...”
He released her hands, cupped her jaw and leaned in, with a pang of guilt that he wasn’t quite giving her what she wanted. Was she right? Could there be someday, a one day—an always? As they kissed, she wound her hands around his back, burrowing under his clothing until she found bare skin. Her hands were cold but he bore down on his muscles to stop from flinching. The kiss was soft and pliant but insistent. A kiss of love, not just passing lust. A kiss with a future in it.
She pulled back, and nestled her head against his neck. “It’s all so perfect here,” she said, wistfully. “I wish we could stay in this borrowed life.”
His stomach coiled tight. He didn’t want a borrowed life. He wanted to own his life. He wanted a future he could strive toward, not this effortless rolling away of days. Samira wanted him and he wanted her. She was good for him and he was good for her. So why was he pushing her away? He was fighting himself, which made no sense at all.
He wrapped his arms around her. Maybe he did have a choice here, after all. Maybe all the poor choices he’d made in the past didn’t have to determine what happened to him forever.
“Corsica is nice, too,” he said, his lips grazing her silky hair, his voice a little shaky. “You’d like it there.”
* * *
SAMIRAPULLEDBACK, her heart thudding. Jamie wore the slightest of frowns.
