She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “I promise to tell you everything—every little detail—but not tonight, okay? I just … I need a break from all of that.” Her face looked drawn in exhaustion, and I wanted nothing more than to get her home.
So I scooped her back up. tori squealed as she wrapped her legs around my waist. We waved to our friends at the bar and I carried her right out into the street.
Speed walking to her apartment, she grinned in disbelief. “Are you seriously going to carry me like a Rheseus monkey for half a mile?”
“Yep,” I said, and her grin widened.
She grabbed my face to kiss me before whispering, “I love you, Cruz.”
Those words, in that voice, coming out of that mouth made me weak. But not weak enough to drop her.
“I love you, too,” I said with a peck on her mouth. “Now stop distracting me from taking you home, stripping you down and fucking you for two to twelve hours.”
Her head tilted back as she laughed fiendishly, her legs pulling tighter around me. And I was never, ever letting her go.
"Everywhere," Fleetwood Mac
Tori
Aprofoundsenseofrelief washed over me as we entered our building’s lobby, a balm to my frayed nerves. Cruz refused to put me down, his arms unyielding, his strides purposeful. I’d fallen in love with a man strong enough to carry me. How could I have thought I could walk away?
By the fifth floor, my hands trembled so badly I dropped my keys—cold, unfamiliar metal after a month of penthouse keycards. Before I could curse, Cruz had already scooped them off the floor, unlocked the door and hauled me inside.
The door slammed behind us, keys clattering to the floor as I shoved him against it desperate for his skin to prove the truth that we were here, that this was real. His breath was ragged against my lips, his grip bruising on my waist.
Our eyes met, our mouths inches apart, sharing the same breath, and I knew I never wanted to be apart from him again. All that mattered was this—him, us,now.
“Hey,” he murmured, tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear, his thumb lingering on my cheekbone.
“Hey,” I breathed, leaning into his touch as my throat tightened. “Missed you.”
Weeks of aching for him crashed into me. I surged onto my toes, crushing our mouths together in a kiss that burned through every lie I’d ever told myself about being better off without him.
My hands shamelessly explored the hard planes of his chest, his back, his hips, my body moving instinctively against the heat between us. His fingers tangled in my hair, tilting my head back as his lips trailed down my throat. When his teeth grazed my collarbone, my knees buckled. In an instant, his hands were under my thighs, lifting me, carrying me to the kitchen island where he settled between my legs like he belonged there.
His fingertips slid under my skirt, and when they reached my panties, I leaned back on my palms to lift my hips, wanting nothing between us ever again.
A crash shattered the moment.We both jolted, our heads snapping to the sound of crashing, coming out of the lusty fog to make sense of the plastic bottle clattering on the tile floor. Bubble bath.
I blinked twice, looking where my palm had landed beside boxes of tampons and chocolate-covered pretzels. Exactly where I’d left them that final morning, when I’d dropped to my knees to prevent myself from blurting out that I loved him.
Brushing the tampon box, a trail of dust came off on my index finger. I closed my eyes to brace myself as reality sank in.
I lifted the pretzels. “You don’t live here.” Shit, that sounded like an accusation.
“No,” he admitted, stepping back and raking a hand through his hair. The loss of his warmth was a cold slap on my thighs.
I curled my legs together, suddenly exposed as a real estate executive who couldn’t even give property to the man I love.
"You really thought I'd live here without you?" His raw voice cracked something open in my chest.
“But I, I thought I was ..” I rubbed my temples, unable to look at him. “I wanted you to have a place that was yours, not tied to your job, so you could focus on your training clients, or your music, or—”
“That’s why you gave it to me?” he asked.
My mind raced, trying to pull together the blurry whir of memories about that day: the deed transfer, packing my clothes, writing the letter … “I thought I told you that. In the letter. Didn’t I say—?”
“You called it a token of your appreciation, Victoria,” he said, his tone resigned. I hated the sound of my full name on his lips instead of being his Tori.
