He stares down at me—his unruly lock of hair falling over his brow and his dark tattoos competing with the perfect, dangerous rim around his irises. And then like a riptide swallowing me whole, his mouth slants over mine and demands as much as it gives. I make a sound and he makes a sound, and I think I might die from how wonderful this is—from how much more I need. I don’t care about anything besides taking everything that Will wants to give me. And that’s when I realize that never again will I be able to settle with simply nice and soft and stable. I mean, yes, I want those things still. But I also want this. Dangerous, untethered, and demanding. How did I ever think I didn’t need this?
I grasp at his shoulder blades and then pull away with surprise. “Your tattoos do extend over your back!” I peek up and over and am delighted to see that these beautiful flowers completely wrap his shoulder.
Will’s eyes are unfocused when he looks at me, resting on his forearm and pushing my hair back from my face with his other hand. “You’ve been wondering?”
“Every night since I met you,” I say, solemnly. “Sometimes I can’t sleep because I lie here imagining where they end.”
He stares at me, barely breathing. “I wasn’t expecting that.”
And then his head lowers and swiftly takes my mouth for a kiss so intimate, so demanding, so fevered that my toes curl and my legs lock around his. His tongue parts my lips and glides over mine until I’m consumed by him, and everything I knew about myself vanishes and begins redrawing new lines. I want more. Everything.
While we kiss, Will’s hands fumble with the buttons of my shirt, starting at the bottom and working their way up. There’s only one left when I grab his hand. “Wait. Time out.”
He pauses immediately and pulls back.
“I’m not ready yet,” I say in a nervous rush. “I’m sorry…I thought I would be, but then as things started progressing—”
Will immediately cups my face, cutting me off. “Don’t apologize. No explanation needed.”
“I feel bad.”
“Don’t.” He adjusts to his side, resting on his forearm and then using his free hand to pull my hand to his mouth. He kisses my inner wrist with a tenderness that surges to my soul. “You don’t owe me—or anyone else—anything, Annie. Just kissing you is a gift. One that…” His brows pinch together and he pauses, idly playing with my fingers. When he looks at me again, I see something so raw in his eyes I never expected to see: fear.
I never do learn what he was going to say. I expect Will to leave, but he sighs and pulls me over to rest my head on his chest, holding me so tight it feels like he’s afraid I’m going to fly away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Will
Sunlight hits the back of my eyelids, and I drag in a quick inhale. I’ve been sleeping like a rock. Like the dead. Like…I’m not alone.
Shit, shit, shit.
I open my eyes to the sight of bananas and blonde hair. Annie is tucked up close to me, leg draped over mine, head in the crook of my bare shoulder and hand splayed out on my chest. She’s breathing deeply—sound asleep. We must have fallen asleep together after…Damn, I don’t even know what to call last night. It definitely wasn’t just a kiss. It was devastating.
This is not good.
And by not good, I mean the Entire Situation is not good. I’m overwhelmed. There’s a lot happening inside me that I don’t know what to do with. I’m feeling things for Annie that I didn’t know I was capable of feeling. Normally, by now, I’m bored in a relationship. This isn’t even a relationship with Annie, and I’m clawing out of my skin with a need to be more for her. To always be around when she needs me. To be the kind of man I never saw modeled growing up.
And yet—can I trust it? Can I trust myself with her? Would she even want a man like me with so much baggage and heartbreak to share a life inside her white picket fence? I feel like the biggest hypocrite alive to be desiring more with Annie when I just told my brother to pump the breaks with the woman he loves. But I didn’t realize…
Maybe there is hope for us.
Or maybe I should take a step back and think about it without this lushly curved woman pressed up beside me.
It was a bad idea to ever come back to Rome. To let Annie touch me. Kiss me. Turn me inside out. It was so much easier when I thought I wouldn’t like a relationship and that I didn’t want to run the risk of ending up in a position similar to my parents’。 Because what other option is there for someone who endured eighteen years of a hate-filled marriage between his parents? When infidelity and emotional abuse were all I saw? There was no tenderness. No patience. There were insults and harsh reprimands and me wondering if that night was going to be the one when all their yelling was going to end with my dad hitting my mom or her leaving us for good to sleep with some other guy.