When he rinses it, his hands are so careful not to let soap sting my eyes. Then he turns me so my back is to his chest and soaps my shoulders, my arms, my waist—every touch tender,almost worshipful. I feel small and safe and seen in a way that makes my throat tight.
I turn in his arms and take the bar from him. My hands shake a little as I run it over his chest, tracing those same muscles I just explored in the tub, down his arms, feeling the way his skin pebbles under my fingertips. He watches me with quiet intensity, like he understands exactly how new this feels—how every touch is a first, how the years of distance make even soap and water feel sacred.
When we’re both clean, he just holds me under the water. Chin on my head. Arms secure around my back. The steam is thick, the sound of the shower steady, and for once I don’t feel the need to say anything.
Everything is so new.
The way he takes care of me without making it feel like a performance.
The way being held can feel more intimate than sex.
The way love can be this quiet, this gentle, this safe—after waiting so long it almost broke us.
I press my lips to the center of his chest.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
He kisses the top of my head.
“For what?”
“For all of it.”
He doesn’t answer with words.
He just holds me tighter.
And by the time brunch rolls around, I already know I’m going to need the rest of my life to recover from him.
By the time we’re dressed for brunch, I feel ruined in the most expensive possible way.
Not tired.
Glowing.
There should be a word for the exact state a girl enters after waking up loved, making out in a private hot tub over the Atlantic, and then standing in a hotel bathroom trying to do skincare while the same man who wrecked her gently steals her hair tie and acts like that is somehow flirting.
If there is, I don’t know it.
All I know is that I’m wearing cream wide-leg trousers, a fitted black sweater, gold hoops, and the kind of barely-there makeup women apply when they know they are already being looked at like a favorite prayer.
Tristan is in dark slacks and a charcoal sweater with the sleeves pushed up, hair still a little damp from the shower, looking like money and trouble and every adult version of the boy I first fell for.
He catches me staring as we wait for the elevator.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
His mouth curves.
“That’s never true.”
I step closer and smooth imaginary lint from his sweater just because I can.
“You clean up well.”
His hand settles lightly at my waist, thumb brushing once against the small of my back.
