Something shifts in her eyes then. Something warm. Dangerously so.
She tilts her head just a little, studying me like I’m the one being tested.
“My boyfriend,” she says. My chest tightens.
“Aryan Khanna.”
Relief crashes into me so hard it almost makes my vision blur.
“And,” she adds, a faint smirk tugging at her lips despite everything, “someone I’m occasionally rude to.”
A breathless laugh escapes me before I can stop it.
God.
Even now.
Even like this—
“You’re unbelievable,” I mutter, my hand sliding to the back of her neck, pulling her gently closer without thinking. She leans into it.
Like it’s instinct.
Like it’s where she wants to be.
And then she kisses me. It’s not careful. Not hesitant.
It’s messy and a little off-angle because of how she’s sitting and how I’m half-collapsed in front of her, but it’s real and warm and alive and—
It knocks the breath out of me all over again.
When she pulls back, her eyes are glassy. Tearful. “I’m okay,” she whispers again.
I nod.
But my hand tightens against her neck anyway.
Like I need the contact to believe it.
“I know,” I murmur. “I know.”
“You don’t look like you believe it.”
“I will,” I say quietly. “In about…ten minutes.”
She huffs out a soft, shaky laugh.
“I think I’m supposed to reassure you right now.”
“You are doing a terrible job,” She replies, her voice rough. “I really, really like you,” she says, her voice quieter now, more vulnerable than I’ve ever heard it.
My breath catches.
I shake my head lightly, a helpless smile pulling at my mouth.
“Do you remember me confessing my love,” I murmur, brushing my thumb just under the edge of her jaw, “or did the head injury do me a favor?”
She lets out a broken laugh.
