I continued to thread my fingers through his hair, luxuriating in the thickness of it. “And now you do?”
“Yes,” he told me before he leaned forward, laying his lips on mine. “Now, I have you.”
“Yes, you do. I’m not going anywhere.” I gripped his hair, tugging on it. He relaxed and let me pull his head up. “Is that what you’re worried about? That I’m going to go somewhere?”
I felt a brush of air as he touched my cheek.
“Where would I go, you crazy man?” I asked. “I will only be as far as your heart lets me go.”
“They won’t understand.”
“Who won’t?”
“The world, your parents—they won’t understand what I see when I look at you, how I feel when you play, or the way that I love all of the simple things that make you whole. Some might even say it’s wrong.”
Turning, I told him, “I don’t care about everyone else. I care about you, and I care about me. Do you feel like this is wrong?”
“No,” he replied, letting out a deep breath.
I stroked the shell of his ear. “Then that’s all that matters. Share this with the world. They need to see it. They need to see me as you do.”
Phillipe Tibideau had one fear, and I planned to help him conquer it by never leaving.
As I sit here on a soft chair that Phillipe moved into the corner of the music room, I look at him over the journal. We’ve been down here a little over two hours.
After the soul-destroying way he took me earlier, I’m finding it hard to concentrate on anything other than the man who is sitting directly across from me as he sketches my portrait.
At first, I rejected the idea because I wasn’t sure if I was ready to be studied so closely, especially after having him inside my body so intimately. Who knew what he would see on my face?
His voice intrudes into my thoughts. “What did you just read? You look…pensive.”
I read the last line to him. “Share this with the world. They need to see it. They need to see me as you do.”
He stops sketching. Frowning, I decide to just ask him what I want to know.
“Do you think they did?”
“Do I think they did what?”
“You’re doing it again,” I say, lowering the journal.
“What can I say? I don’t like journalists, but this you already know.” He blows out a breath and runs a hand through his hair.
“Do you really think that I’m going to write something terrible about you?” I ask.
Shaking his head, he moves the sketchpad as he crosses his ankle over his knee. “I don’t know, Gemma. For all I know, you might go home and write a story about how I seduced you and clouded your mind.”
“Would it kill you totrustme?” I snap, closing the journal.
“No,” he states calmly. Those green eyes are now frigid as they connect with mine. “But it might kill you.”
Phillipe watches as Gemma digests his words.
Her shoulders straighten. “You can’t scare me away.”
Raising a brow, he nods. “Okay.”
“You can’t.”
