Page 157 of The Lies We Play

I move closer.

Slowly.

I brush my mouth over hers.

She tastes herself there and makes a tiny sound against me, half embarrassment, half hunger. Her hands come up to my face. At first, her touch is careful, almost testing, as if she wants to make sure I am real before she decides what to do with me.

Then her fingers curl against my jaw.

She kisses me harder.

The room narrows to that. Her mouth. Her hands. The heat of her body is still open beneath mine. The stunned silence after my confession pressing between us, asking for an answer she doesn't owe me, and I have no right to demand.

I pull back first.

It costs me.

“You don’t have to say anything,” I tell her.

Her eyes search mine like she is looking for the trap. The fine print. The clause that lets love become another thing someone can revoke.

“I don’t know how to do this,” she whispers.

I press my mouth to her palm. “Neither do I.” I shrug. “And it’s three of us. Will we fuck this? I hope not because I love the two of you too fucking much to lose you.”

I lower myself over her until our bodies touch from thigh to chest, careful not to trap her. She lets me come close. More than lets me. Her knees part around my hips, and the movement is so trusting, so instinctive, it knocks the air from my lungs.

“I love you,” she says.

The words leave her in a rush, almost like she tried to catch them and failed. Her eyes widen the second they are out. Panic flashes across her face, immediate and naked.

Then she says it again, quieter, “I love you.”

Fuck.

My forehead drops to hers.

Her hands tighten in my hair. “Creed.”

“I’m here.”

“I need you inside me.”

My body answers before my mind can pretend to be civilized.

Still, I make myself lift my head. Make myself look at her. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” she says. No joke this time. “I’m sure. I want you. I want this. I want you close enough that I can’t talk myself out of believing you.”

My hand comes to her face, and I kiss her once, hard enough to make a promise, soft enough not to bruise. Then I force myself to leave her for the few seconds it takes to reach the drawer.

Her eyes track me.

That should not undo me, but it does. The way she watches. As if she is afraid I might come back different. As if tenderness has a time limit.

I shove my pants and boxers down with less grace than I’d prefer, kick them aside, and reach for the drawer.

I grab the condom, tear it open with hands that are no longer as controlled as I would like, and roll it on. She watches that too, breath uneven, lips parted. When I move back over her, she reaches for me.