When she opened the door, I stood for a moment, unmoving.
The room was her in every way: timeless, like the antique wrought-iron bed frame and delicate wooden furniture. Unapologetically feminine with the frilly bedspread and floral wallpaper, but tough, too, with scuffed wooden floors and well-loved bookshelves.
But on those shelves… I pulled off a book with an entwined couple on the front. Another with a shirtless man. Very interesting. I moved to the nightstand, where a stack of dog-eared black-spiked books sat, little colored tabs sticking out of all of them.
“Oh, you don’t need to look at those,” she said, flustered.
“Her Wicked Sins,” I read aloud.
She snatched the book from my hands, cheeks flushed. “They’re not for everyone.”
“But I think they’re for me,” I said, my tone letting her know I wasn’t mocking her. Au fucking contraire, I would bestudyingher with these. I filed away the author’s name, mentally adding it to my next shopping list for Sal.
“You read romance?” she asked skeptically, shoving the book back into the pile.
“Not normally. I will now. My mom loves them.”Loved them.
An image of Mom when I’d gone to say goodbye flickered in my mind. She’d been holding a book on her lap in her chair by the window. It was the same book she’d been holding for months. I swallowed away the guilt at not being home in Seattle. It had been creeping in more and more, that need to return. This was my last window, the doctors had said, before the rapid decline was more likely to set in.
“Right,” Winona said. “Only distinguished literary fiction for you, right?”
“No.” I slanted a look at her. “Well, a little lately. Because that’s what I’m trying to write.” It was the only type of book that would matter to my father. “But that’s not my first choice.”
“What is?”
As always with Winona, I considered lying. At least making up something more respectable. But I could only ever be all cards on the table with her. It’s like the way we met—everything dialed up to a hundred. We’d set the bar at full throttle.
“My favorite book is calledFelled by a Scaled Wing. My second favorite is theArk-3 Dilemma. The sequel to that one is also fantastic. It’s over a thousand pages, though.”
“Mr. Harrington.” Winona clapped her hands over her chest. “Those sound like genre books.”
My lips lifted. “Fantasy and Sci-Fi. The deepest, dorkiest kind. I fucking love them. Always have.” I loved her delighted little smile. “You could sell that information to certain tabloids for a good amount of money, Winona. Just tell me if you’re going to do that so I can buy you out first.”
Her laughter was bright, and between that and the brilliant sparkle in her eyes, I came apart almost more than in that moment downstairs last night.
This was so fucking dangerous. I wanted nothing more than to drop down onto the plush bed next to us. To lie back next to Winona, my feet up, arm around her. I wanted to read together, or maybe out loud to each other. The image held the kind of bliss that felt…impossible. Like it would burn you if you thought about it too hard. Funny that last night I’d wanted her naked, and now there was this. I still wanted her naked. But I guessed, with Winona, I wanted it all.
I stayed at Winona's place all morning. We talked about our shared interests, and everywhere they diverged. We shared funny stories about our mother and siblings, skirting carefully around the bad ones, at least for now. We sat on the couch, our knees and feet brushing as we changed position, each time the sensation of touching her burned into my cells like a permanent record. I wanted to spend all day with her. And all night. But it finally occurred to me she probably had other things to do on a Saturday morning—afternoon, now that I checked the time. She looked half relieved, and half disappointed when I told her I needed to get back. If she’d asked meto stay, I would have in a heartbeat. But she didn’t. She needed time, and I wouldn’t push her.
At the door, I could have said goodbye with a hug.
But as we stood there, all the barely-there touches combined with the memory of what we'd done yesterday in this very spot came crashing down on me. I think it did her, too, because she brushed a hand along her collarbone, her cheeks suddenly flushing.
“I forgot to bring you your bra,” I said.
She closed her eyes, clearly embarrassed. “That’s okay.”
“Would you say that if I told you I was lying?”
Her eyes flew open.
“I’m holding onto it so you’ll see me again.”
Winona's lips twitched upward, and I think right then was the moment I knew I was well and truly fucked. It was definitely the moment I forgot I wasn’t going to let her feel any pressure to do anything with me if she didn’t want to, because I reached my hands out and took her gently by the hips, pulling her toward me.
“I wasn’t going to kiss you,” I said, bringing my fingers to her chin to tilt it up toward me. “But then I thought you might think I didn’t want to kiss you, and I really fucking do."
“Well, good,” Winona said softly. “Because I was wondering when you were going to get around to it.”
