I don’t pretend to still be asleep. And I don’t move my hand on her belly, either. “It’s early,” I murmur, my voice rough with sleep. “Seems we fell asleep. Nobody else is up yet.”
“I didn’t mean to…” She sighs and relaxes into my arms. “This is nice, though.”
I nuzzle the side of her head.
She giggles softly. “Your moustache does tickle early in the morning, it turns out.”
“Really?” With my free hand, I brush her hair off the back of her neck so I can test that theory in more detail.
She squirms and laughs in my arms as I kiss down to her shoulder.
“Good to know,” I murmur. “I like making you laugh.”
She huffs, and my chest shakes silently against her back. And I thinkthis. This is everything.
I know I should move.
I don’t.
“Hope.”
“Mm.”
“Bellamy’s going to wake up soon.”
“I know.”
Neither of us moves.
Her thumb strokes the side of my hand. A tiny, deliberate, decisive movement.
“Five more minutes,” she whispers.
And I was wrong, becausethatis actually everything.
Chapter 20
Hope
I’m so glad I took those extra five minutes with Zane in the early morning, because we don’t see each other again before Bellamy’s nap in the afternoon—and then, when we meet in the kitchen, he barely has time to catch me by the hips and pull me in for a hungry, deep kiss before a car rolls up the drive.
My pulse spikes. It always does, and maybe it always will. But in the safe circle of Zane’s arms, I catch myself and look out the window instead of panicking.
I’m glad I do, because it’s a familiar car, Mercy's blue SUV, that I climbed out of a few days ago with my life in a grocery bag.
“I guess she’s here to check up on you,” Zane whispers into my hair.
I give him a secret smile. “I’ll see you later, then?”
“Definitely.”
He heads to the library, and I step out onto the porch.
“Hope!” She waves happily.
"Come in," I say. “Do you want coffee? Tea?”
"I have an hour before I need to be back for the dinner prep. Coffee would be perfect." She steps inside and toes off her shoes, heading for the kitchen like she's been here many times, which, I realize, she probably has. "How are you doing?”
