How to End a Love Story(57)

Expiration date. Like they’re bread, or the watery Greek yogurt she has in the back of her fridge. Helen taps an index finger against his lips, shushing the thought.

He presses a slow kiss to her finger, and there’s something warm in his gaze she can’t quite bear.

“I can’t think when you’re touching me like this,” she murmurs, her eyes closing.

“Hm,” he says. “I know what you mean.”

She leans down and kisses him again, this time with an urgency that he matches, his grip going from featherlight to viselike in an instant. It’s a searching chase of a kiss, it’s a kiss that knows they don’t have world enough, or time, for all the ways they want to lay claim to each other, at least not tonight. Somewhere, in the darkened corridors of her mind, she thinks it might be fun to play this kissing game with Grant forever, changing tempos and rules until they’ve circled back to that first, perfect kiss. When he pulls away, she’s the one who falls forward slightly, and she’s annoyed by how quickly she’s learned to chase after the feeling of his lips on hers. He laughs gently.

“Let me know if you figure it out,” he exhales. “I’d like a fighting chance of survival.”



Helen is staring at a spot in the hollow of his clavicle, stroking the inch of skin there with a single-minded frown of concentration on her face. He swallows, and her eyes flicker at the movement it causes.

“Helen,” Grant says, trying to get her attention again.

“Hm,” she answers, her hand coming up to examine his stubble.

“Why did you leave, after you asked to sleep over that night in New Jersey?”

She stops stroking his skin and her frown is now directed at him. Well, he’s used to that. He feels a sincere need to reach up to smooth out the crease of her brow.

“I thought if I stayed, I’d do something very . . . foolish.”

He laughs at that. Foolish. She’s so proper, even at a time like this. He tightens his grip on her waist, and in one smooth motion, he flips them over horizontally onto the couch. She’s flush under him now, and her mouth is a perfect, surprised O. Some primal part of him is briefly satisfied. So this is what it’s like to have her body under him.

“Helen . . .” he says, pressing his unmistakable erection against her thigh. “We aren’t going to have sex tonight. I’m not in the mood.”

She laughs as he drops his face to her neck, so she doesn’t see just how badly he wants to fuck her into the next weekend.

“Can you sleep over now?” he asks her neck.

“Hm,” she says. Half an eternity seems to pass before she says, “I have nothing to wear, though.”

He lifts his head. “You’re a fucking evil woman, you know that?”

She cackles, and he rolls off the couch before he does something . . . foolish.

“I’ll give you a shirt,” he manages as he walks off into his bedroom.



He gives her a soft, heather-gray T-shirt that she’s pretty sure she’s seen him wear before while sitting across the table from her, and a pair of boxer shorts she’s grateful for because her lace panties have been soaked through to an embarrassing extent. He leaves her the privacy of his bedroom to change, which she thinks is a polite and wise gesture until she realizes she’s been left alone in his bedroom.

His bedroom that he sleeps in. Probably has had sex in. Probably, if she’s honest, will have sex with her in, because they’ve driven so far past the city limits of a matter of time that it’s laughable. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she reminds herself that this morning, she was determined to let that ball in her court bounce until it was lost and forgotten. And then . . .

He knocks on the door before he enters and she feels like a mirrored reflection of their past selves in his office. His eyes sweep over her, from the loose fit of his shirt on her to the barest sliver of his boxers peeking out beneath the gray fabric. He swallows hard, and she realizes her nipples have turned to pinpricks under his shirt.

“Grant?”

“Hm?”

“You knocked.”

“Jesus Christ,” he says, and laughs at himself. “Yeah. I have a spare toothbrush for you. If you want it.”

There’s a strange sort of intimacy she feels brushing her teeth side by side with Grant, though he’s still fully clothed and she’s wearing his clothes. It feels like they’re laughing at some private joke as they stare at each other in the bathroom mirror and brush.

“What?” she asks, when her mouth is clear.

“Nothing,” he says. “You look good in my clothes.”

She goes back to the bedroom first, tucking her knees up as she waits for him. When he returns, he has a spare pillow and throw blanket under his arm.

“You’ll be fine on the couch, right? There’s only one bed and it is mine, so . . .”

She chucks a pillow at his head.

He ducks it and laughs. “Sorry. Couldn’t resist,” he says.

The laughter in his eyes diminishes with each step he takes toward the bed, and by the time he reaches the edge of the bed, she’s kneeling up and waiting for him to get close enough to drop her arms around his neck.

“You’re staying here, then,” he says, when they finally reach each other, and it feels like a question.