Page 105 of Wild Abandon

“You’re right. It sounds awful.”

Awful he’d think this way. Awful he feels this way. Awful he lives this way.

“My friends haven’t been the same since it happened. Her friends are too afraid of reality. I lost the only family I ever knew. Eventually, I just stopped picking up the phone. I punished myself. I’ve been punishing myself. And then I met you.”

Nate’s head turns toward me, but I keep my eyes trained on the slowly changing numbers on the oven clock.

“Every time you walked through that door, a little piece of me came back. I tried to stay away. God knows I tried, but I couldn’t.”

I can’t deny that these words make my heart stop. I close my eyes and take a shivering breath.

“You had so many opportunities to tell me you were married, about Ellie, about Ed. I was lied to time and again. It’s embarrassing.”

“I wanted to tell you. I was going to tell you. I just wanted one more day, one more moment. I didn’t want you to look at me differently.”

What kind of person does he take me for? My head swerves to him. “How did you think I’d look at you?”

“Like this.” His voice is shaky, and the olive-green eyes I’ve come to love are looking at me with sorrow. They’re pleading with me for forgiveness. His face is cast in a halo of light, accentuating the curve of his mouth and the scruff that lines his sculpted jaw. He hasn’t shaved in a few days, and he certainly hasn’t had a haircut in weeks. His hair is messy and has a slight curl to it, dipping low on his forehead. He is a mess, and he is the most beautiful man I have ever seen.

Nate’s hand finds mine, gently lying on top of mine, the feeling so intimate. More so than any other act in the world.

When I weave my fingers through his, he lets out a breath and lowers his forehead, so ours are touching. His eyes close, as if he’s trying to memorize the moment, savor it for eternity to come. “Will I ever see you again?”

I close my eyes and answer honestly, “No.”

His breath hitches, and when I open my eyes, I see a tear fall down his cheek.

“Can I hold you? While you sleep? When you open your eyes, I’ll take you home, and I promise you’ll never see me again.”

It’s a bad idea. Being in his arms will absolutely ruin me.

“Okay.” I mentally berate myself for letting my heart answer before my brain had a chance to catch up.

My body must crave him just as much because I allow Nate to pull me down onto the couch. With his back to the cushions, lying on his side, he pulls me in against him, so we’re chest-to-chest. My knee folds and lies in between his legs, his right leg draped over mine. My head finds the crook of his neck as his arms hold me tight. My right hand is bent against my body, the palm flat against his heart. My left arm is around his waist, feeling the taut muscles beneath his shirt.

I lean down and inhale the smell of cotton, spice, and whiskey, making my own memory. I’m savoring every pixel of this mental image. The way his heart is beating rapidly beneath my hand. The way my leg feels surrounded by his strong thighs. The way his Adam’s apple bobs against my forehead. And how his back muscles flinch ever so lightly every time I slowly move my fingers.

He pulls me in tighter, and I mold myself further into him. When he inhales, I exhale, and when he lets out a low grown, I take it all in, like it’s my last breath.

“I love you, Crystal.” His arms hold on to me tighter, in fear that I’ll move away. “Don’t try to leave. Just listen to me. I can’t have you leave me tomorrow, thinking I used you or that what we had was a lie. I didn’t want to fall in love, but I couldn’t help it.”

My stomach drops. They’re the words every girl dreams of hearing. They’re so perfect yet so wrong. Even still, I can’t move. So, I don’t.

Nate lowers his mouth and places a soft kiss along my hairline. “You are funny and sexy and wild and sweet. The first time you came into the bar, I tried not to look at you because I just knew I was going to fall. I did. So hard. No one has ever made me laugh the way you do or understands me the way you do. The fact that you’re even here, tonight, is why I will never stop thinking about you for the rest of my life.”

Nate places a hand under my chin and raises it until I look up at him. His beautiful eyes are red-rimmed and filled with tears. “If I could, I’d take you to all the places you’ve never traveled, and when we came home, I’d re-create every meal you tasted there. I’d bring you to the symphony, and then we’d go dancing. I’d torture you with Giants games, but after the final pitch was called, I’d make it up to you by drawing you a bath and rubbing your feet while you told me about your day. I’d make love to you every day and not just with my body. I would make you feel loved in some way every chance I got. Because the best part of my day would be seeing you walk through the door. Crystal, I would never rewrite my past. But if I could change my future, it would be to have you in it.”

His voice is filled with more conviction than a man on death row. It’s wispy and breaking. The air in the room is no longer stuffy. It’s crackling and electric. The pure emotions we are sharing with the looks in our eyes and the way our fingers are holding on to each other are filling the city with an electricity greater than an earthquake.

I have waited my entire life to find my soul mate. To love and to be loved so deeply that it would never be replicated. I would take one night of this intensity than a lifetime of loneliness.

So, I am going to take it. At least until the sun comes up.

His heart is still racing, and my lips are quivering, only to be stilled when I lean forward and lay them over his. His body shakes when we connect, and his hands move down to my hips, pulling me in, as if they never want to let go.

When his mouth parts, our lips intertwine.

I kiss him for the first time. I kiss him for the last time. I kiss him forever.