The way she clung to me in her sleep.
The way her whole face lit the moment she saw me across the hotel lobby.
The way she never let a second pass when she wasn’t touching me in one way or another.
I’d never doubted that she loved me. That might have been the part of letting her go that hurt the most. This journey of self-discovery she was on was all for her benefit though. I didn’t need to know who she was in order to know she’d been born to be mine. In my eyes, Remi was perfect. She always had been. If she had given me the first indication that she was ready to come back to me, I would have been on one knee in the very next heartbeat. Ready, willing, and eager to welcome her home again.
She wasn’t there yet though. And for once in my life, I wasn’t devastated by it. We belonged together, and I finally got the sense from her that she knew it too.
When was an easier issue for me to swallow than if when it came to my forever with Remi Grey. I wasn’t a particularly patient man by nature, but for her, I could wait. Again. Preferably not four more months, but I’d figure it out.
I had no idea what going home would mean for us. Would Raven text Harley when she was lonely late at night? Would Remi text me to see how I was doing? Now that we’d broken this barrier of seeing each other again, would there be phone calls? Visits? More stolen weekends where we satisfied each other’s every sexual desire?
I would take any and all of the above, but the ball was in her court. It had to be because my court was at a church with an altar and we were still a long way off from her flipping out about that.
So, yeah. It was our last night together, and rather than allowing myself to drown in the impending misery of losing her again, I was living in the minute, waiting in the lobby across the street for her to finish up the day, and choosing to focus on all I’d gained instead.
“Well, hello, my beautiful Raven,” I crooned, sauntering over to her as she appeared in a short, black dress that had probably driven every man she’d crossed paths with crazy all day. Smirking, I tapped the sticker name tag on her chest. “Who’s Remi Grey?”
She sighed dramatically. “Some completely boring woman they forced me to be for the day. I left my lanyard in your room this morning.” Circling her arms around my neck, she pressed up onto her toes and placed a long, lingering kiss to my mouth.
Oh, yeah. Remi had been thinking about our last night together too. Not that I was complaining.
I nipped at her bottom lip. “So, what are we doing this fine evening?”
“I want to go dancing,” she murmured against my mouth.
“Dancing?” I laughed.
“Yep, there’s a dreadful real estate party to celebrate the end of the conference. I just happen to have scored four free drink tickets. So, what do you say we go get sauced, embarrass everyone on the dance floor, and then you carry me back to your room and do that one thing with your tongue that I love so much?”
Slanting my head, I squinted one eye. “One thing? I thought you liked everything I do with my tongue.”
“Oh, I do, Mr. Steele. But I have a feeling I’m going to enjoy it that much more when you’re faced with performing all of them to figure out which one I like best.” She gripped the lapels on my suit coat and pulled me down to her for another sweltering kiss, her tongue boldly gliding with mine. Public display of affection be damned.
Knowing we were about to have a replay of me standing in the corner, prattling off ’90s Braves stats to hide my hard-on, I removed her arms from around my neck and stepped out of her reach. “Okay, okay. I should warn you that the only person on the dance floor who is going to be embarrassed is me and therefore potentially you. But I’m game if you are.”
She plucked the sticker name tag that had transferred from her dress to my jacket and stuck it back on her chest. “It’s not that hard. I can lead. I took two semesters of ballroom dance in PE back in high school.”
I blinked at her. Remi and I were far from perfect with our role-playing game. I couldn’t count the times I’d screwed it up, and she was just as bad. But when she committed, the whole Raven gimmick was always followed by a grand, off-the-wall story of absurdity. From what I knew of the faux woman, I didn’t suppose Raven had gone to high school at all. She’d probably been hatched from an ostrich egg and spent her formative years learning from the secret society of haberdasheries in the Swiss Alps. Not hot-stepping her way through her physical education requirements.
