My confusion shifted swiftly to shock. ‘What?’
‘This all got too real for you, and I get it. But fuck, Rosie, I need to say something before you try and end this.’
He thought I was breaking up with him? I couldn’t fault his reasoning. As sad as it made me to think about, I understood why he thought that. It didn’t stop my chest pinching with sorrow.
I shook my head. ‘George, you don’t understand.’
Rising to his full height, he cupped both my cheeks in his palms. ‘Rosie, I need to say this?—’
‘I love you,’ I rushed out. The feeling swelling in my chest, solidifying every second since I stepped through the hospital doors. My lips parted as those three words, that I never thought I’d utter to another living soul outside my best friend and mum, landed between us.
George’s body stiffened, the hand cupping my face cinching tighter. ‘What?’
Glistening eyes searched mine with a level of intensity I’d never seen before. I reached up to grip his biceps, needing to feel him; to feel something solid as I tore my bleeding heart from my ribs.
‘I love you,’ I restated. Hoping the more I said it, the less nauseous they would make me feel. ‘And I can’t promise that I’ll be any good at it, actually the only thing I can promise is that I’m gonna fuck this up at some point. But I love you. And whether you like it or not, I’mgoingto love you, and why are you looking at me like that?’
My heart was already thrashing an impossible beat against my chest and it grew more erratic at the gob-smacked expression on his face. As if I’d just played him a Taylor Swift song for the first time.
‘You love me?’ The words were hardly above a whisper.
Tears pooled on my lower lash line. I nodded. ‘Unfortunately. I’m very sorry, but it is what it is.’
‘You’re sorry…’ he repeated my words as if he couldn’t understand. He blinked several times, trying to keep up. This was hardly the best time I could have chosen to make this declaration. In all my romance books, there were grand romantic gestures and sweeping statements of undying love. We were in a supply closet, half naked. And yet, I couldn’t find it in me to care.
‘I’m sorry because I have absolutely zero plans on letting you go and even though the possibility of this working out and lasting is, well, not great.’
‘Shut the fuck up.’
‘Okay, that’s not the sexiest thing anyone’s ever said to me.’
‘Neither is telling me that we probably won’t work out,’ he pointed out with raised eyebrows, a smile tweaking his lips.
‘Fair point.’ I rolled my eyes. ‘But I’m trying to be realistic?—’
My attempt to recover the situation was cut short when he crashed his lips down to mine. I let out a long moan as his tongue swept into my mouth like he wanted to taste thosewords for himself. He hoisted me back up into his arms. My legs encircled his waist where they belonged.
‘Your reality has the tendency to be fucking depressing, sweetheart,’ he said between kisses.
‘Does this mean you, uh, you know, feel it too?’ God, I felt like a teenage girl, hoping the hot guy liked me back. This felt just as monumental and just as potentially devastating.
‘I’ve loved you from the moment you kicked my arse at pool. And even if you hadn’t told me you loved me back, I’d have loved you forever.’
The tears that had been threatening to fall since we entered his closet spilled down my cheeks. ‘I love you,’ I said resolutely.
George’s shoulders sagged in relief. Lifting a hand to the nape of my neck, he threaded his fingers through the strands of my hair. Given the fact that we were both still naked from the waist down, I felt his cock start to harden once more. Sealing our mouths together, he said, ‘Say it again, sweetheart. Tell me you love me whilst I’m inside of you and let me feel that pussy clench around me as you do.’
His dirty talk was better than all the romance books I’d ever read combined. My core immediately responded to that gruff demand.
We made quick work of the condom—thank God for Prepared Rosie—and he notched his cock at my entrance, holding eye contact as he did so. The moment he slid into my body, those three words left my lips. With every thrust and muffled moan, the panic I’d felt over saying it receded. Leaving behind a warm glow that rushed through my veins.
I loved George Blake. And nothing had ever felt so right.
39
Rosie shiftedin the seat next to me, her hand still grasped firmly in mine. I stared at our interlocked fingers, barely able to believe that this was real. She was mine. She loved me. She’d said those words with such conviction, they’d branded themselves on my soul.
She offered me a soft smile, listening to my dad, who was sitting up in the hospital bed, tell her another story about when I was a child.
