His chest rumbled with laughter. He brushed my hair aside and placed a soft kiss on my neck. “As much as I enjoyed that, it wouldn’t have been right before, for either of us. We needed to get here in our own time.”
He pulled out and nudged me onto my back. I wiggled around to face him, and his beautiful blue eyes were filled with adoration. He brushed his thumb across my cheek and gently kissed my forehead, then the tip of my nose, then each corner of my mouth.
“We needed to come to terms with our pasts so we could see a future. Our future.”
Tears welled, my emotions threatening to overwhelm me—happiness, trust, pleasure, connection. My feelings for Elias ran deep, but they didn’t scare me. Instead, they felt... right.
I pushed my fingers into his hair and ran my nails over his scalp. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For giving me my life back. For showing me I can trust. For taking a chance with your future.”
He leaned forward and kissed my lips, lingering there for a precious moment, then pulled back to meet my eyes. “Our future. And the adventure is just beginning.”
Epilogue
LENA
SIX MONTHS LATER
“E!”
“Yeah?” Elias stuck his head through the half-open door and craned his neck until he found me. “What’s up?”
“It’s almost eight. Is everything ready out there?”
He stepped up and leaned easy, resting his forearm on the door frame. His t-shirt crept up, and my eyes locked on the ridge of his abs. I opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out.
“Lena.”
I tore my eyes away from my boyfriend’s sexy midriff and found a wicked grin on his face. He winked, and I rolled my eyes.
“Sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize to me, gorgeous.”
He crossed the foyer and joined me behind the counter. He slid his hands around my waist and rested his forehead against mine. Coconut and sandalwood assaulted my senses, and an ache of need rushed through me. I placed my hands on his chest, stared into his ocean eyes, and shoved down my desire.
“We could call off the whole thing, you know,” he said with his siren’s allure. He pressed his hips into mine, and I felt his hardness. “Lock the doors and do some... partner yoga.” He waggled his eyebrows.
A bark of laughter escaped me, and I swatted him on the chest. “Stop it! I’m serious.”
He ground his hips against me. “So am I.”
“Elias!’ I wiggled my way out of his arms, took his hands in mine, and stepped back. “Are we ready?”
He leaned forward and kissed my forehead. “We’re ready.”
“Good.”
We’d been preparing for the grand opening of Yoga Star Hilton Head for weeks, and I wanted everything perfect for the big event. We had a small setup in the parking lot of the strip mall including a bar with beer and wine. Elias and Niko rented mics and hired a bongo drummer to accompany Elias’s guitar. Island music for the win.
Candace and a few of my teachers from the Charleston studio drove down earlier in the week to double check the office organization and help prepare for the free classes we planned on offering to incentivize new clientele. But tonight, Candy was bartending, and my teachers would perform acrobatic partner yoga to demonstrate some of the new formats we’d bring to the island. Hopefully, the event would draw attention to the studio’s rebranding and help establish my presence in the Hilton Head yoga community.
I patted his chest. “Everything in here is ready, too.”
I stepped back and surveyed the inside of the empty studio—my studio—and nodded. Yeah, I was definitely ready.
