I look up at him. He wavers through the tears that have formed but not yet spilled.
"So, yeah," he says softly.
I wipe at my eyes and he offers me a wry smile. "That's why I didn't tell you I wrote the letters, because I thought you'd see right through them and know...I meant every single word."
I open my mouth to respond, but no words come. They're lodged somewhere in my chest with my hammering heart and my lungs that can't quite get enough air.
"And...to answer your first questions, I bought the painting because I adored it. And I adored it because...I adore you. And I didn't tell you, because you didn't adore me and I worried you'd think it weird that someone without a lot of money would spend that much on something they couldn't really afford from someone they'd just met."
I nod. Like an idiot.
"I didn’t want to ruin our friendship," he whispers.
I draw a shaky breath. It's the most I can do in this moment and Ed's smile turns even sadder even though there's nothing sad about this moment.
Because the haze has been stripped away and the big raw thing sits fresh and bright in my chest. I know exactly what it is.
I'm up and out of my chair and across the room and cradling Ed's head between my palms and pulling him down towards me before the part of my brain that controls language has put a name to it.
Chapter forty-five
Ed
Bess'mouthissoftagainst mine and I gasp at the shock of her being pressed against me. It's happened so fast and it's so far out of any Bess-Ed reality I could ever have imagined eventuating, my brain is struggling to keep up with the sensory overload.
Her warm hands framing my face, her soft curves heating my skin, the honeyed scent of her hair, and her mouth...
Her lips taste of tonic. I fall into them.
Bess is kissing me. Bess is kissingme!
My body hums with a sudden accumulation of energy, and electricity crackles beneath my skin.
A new warmth steals between us, between our pressed mouths. It is wet and salty.
I pull my head away and wipe her tears with my thumbs.
She smiles up at me. "It's the most romantic thing anyone has ever done for me, by several thousand light years. It's the most romantic thing I could imagine someone ever doing for another person."
"Except I wasn't actually going to give them to you, so I'm not sure it counts."
"But you did. It just wasn't a straight romantic narrative. We had to clear the bumps and curves first."
I look in wonder at this woman with her extraordinary eyes with their dilated pupils and her kiss-plumped lips, and feel we are an Ed and Bess in another dimension living out the life I hoped for but knew wouldn't happen, and the Ed and Bess who've stumbled into something big and messy in this small, over-lit kitchen all at the same time.
It's unreal and so very much 'right now'.
"So I didn't imagine it."
"Imagine what?"
"You looking at me at the auction and liking what you saw."
Bess draws one side of her mouth up. "I liked what I saw a little too much. You looked exceptionally hot and I really didn't know what to do with thinking you looked exceptionally hot."
I hold that knowledge for a moment before chasing the next assurance. "And...my declaration...isn't freaking you out? It's a lot."
"Do I look freaked out?"
