Page 37

stassi

I shouldn’t have shown up. Or maybe I should have.

It’s complicated. Dirks’ confession was unexpected, a relief to my wounds I didn’t realize still stung.

Yet, being here, facing Alex, dredged up a whirlwind of emotions.

We were playing this absurd game, pretending he didn’t know where I lived or that he wasn’t the one who sent me those boxes of fabric.

“Fuck,” I muttered as I reached the hallway, relief washing over me that it was empty. Leaning against the wall, I pressed my hands to my face, willing the tears not to come.

“Your secret admirer hasn’t forgotten you.” His voice, that smooth velvet, echoed down the dim corridor.

I turned to him, rooted to my spot. “I miss my friend,” I confessed quietly. “I tried so hard to avoid you, to shut out everything that reminded me of the past, but here you are.”

He approached slowly, each step deliberate, drawing out the tension between us. “Here I am.”

“All those memories of waiting outside your apartment, hoping for just a few moments of peace while my husband paraded out with God knows who,” I continued, my voice wavering with emotion.

Another step closer.

“The kiss in the hospital... It was the first time I felt desired for who I am, not out of obligation or as part of some marital ritual.”

“I wanted to kiss you because I ache to know every part of you, to shield you from pain because...” His gaze was intense as he stopped short of me.

“Are you seeing anyone else?” His question hung in the air as he closed the distance between us, our breaths mingling, chests rising and falling in perfect synchrony.

I found myself gazing up into his captivating green eyes. “No,” I admitted softly, my heart racing. “Not since...”

“No one since him?”

I shook my head. “No one since you.” There had been no one else who had kissed me since the last time his lips pressed against mine.

His mouth dropped down so it hovered over mine. “I don’t think I can be your friend again...”

My eyes fluttered between his lips and his eyes, pausing on his deep green orbs. “There’s still so much we have to talk about,” I whispered.

“Not everything has to be decided in one night,” he said. “I found you, Anastasia. I’m not letting you go again.”

“I don’t know if I can let you in though. I need to do this my way. I still haven’t... processed everything that has happened to me. There was so much...”

He pressed his finger to my lips. “I want to be here with you. This time without a label though. I don’t care what you need to tell yourself.

I want to support you in all the ways you need.

But I swear to God, I will never let you go again.

..” He leaned in. “I walked away once because you asked me to. You said if I truly loved you, I’d do it for you. ”

His words hung heavy in the air, sinking into my mind like lead. He... admitted it. He silently confessed his love for me.

He walked away because he loved me.

Alex’s touch sent shockwaves through me, his hand grazing my hip with deliberate slowness.

Every nerve in my body tingled with anticipation, goosebumps prickling along my skin.

My heart threatened to burst from my chest with its rapid, intense rhythm as I struggled to process the enormity of his revelation.

“I left because I thought it was best for you, but I tried to find you so many times. I tried, but you never let me in.”

I swallowed hard. “I changed my number after the press...” The words were heavy on my tongue.

“I went into hiding because I couldn’t stand the thought of you having to carry the weight of the mess my life had become.

I felt like if I kept you away, I could somehow protect you from all of it.

But deep down, I knew I was still trying to prove to myself that I could do it on my own.

.. because a part of me kept blaming myself. ”

My voice wavered, and I took a shaky breath.

“If I had never tried to leave him, I wouldn’t have ended up there.

I wouldn’t have gone through that assault.

It felt like everything that happened was because of that one decision, and I couldn’t face you knowing I was the one who set it all in motion. ”

He shook his head as he gripped my waist. “And I blamed myself for feeling like I forced you to. I didn’t want you to break up with him because of me, and when I saw you, that’s what went through my mind.

” He paused. “I miss having you in my life. We live in the same city. I don’t think I can stay here knowing that you’re a few blocks away from me. ”

“Because you know where I live.” I stuck out my bottom lip, and one corner of his lips lifted into a smirk.

“I looked it up. Please don’t blame me for making sure you were real.”

“I don’t,” I said softly as his lips dipped down to mine.

My pulse quickened as he drew nearer, the air thick with a potent mix of longing and trepidation.

I hadn’t been this close to a man in so long.

And, oh, how badly I wanted to succumb to the urge, to lose myself in the intensity of our shared desire.

But beneath that longing lurked a deep-seated fear, a fear of surrendering the carefully crafted semblance of control I had built.

His lips parted as they grazed along the side of mine.

God, I wanted to kiss him. I wanted to feel his lips on mine, to taste what it felt like after all these years.

Because I still felt his kiss on my lips from that day in the hospital room.

How could I tell him I couldn’t kiss anyone else because it had always been him?

“Alex,” I whispered, far more breathless and raspy than I intended.

He was the man, not my ex, who had cradled me while I leaked milk from my boobs, the man who had been my unwavering support when everything else seemed to crumble around me. The ache to be close to him, to feel his warmth, was almost unbearable.

I struggled to articulate the emotions raging within me. I could walk away. He would let me. His grasp on my body wasn’t tight enough to keep me here, but just enough to make sure I knew he wanted to be here. Yet, I wasn’t sure I even wanted to go anywhere.

Desire burned through me. I thought about what Alina had told me. The emotions that surged every time he appeared were overwhelming, impossible to ignore. His handsome face was all I could focus on, especially the familiar tension in the corner of his cheeks as he clenched his jaw.

The air crackled with tension as I struggled to contain the whirlwind of my emotions.

Every fiber of my being yearned for his touch.

I glanced at him, searching for answers in the depths of his gaze, but all I found was a reflection of my own turmoil.

But, despite the uncertainty, an undeniable pull drew me closer to him, urging me to take a leap of faith.

Plus, I was so fucking horny. It was a rare occurrence when I was out without Damien at night and even rarer that I was at a bar with an incredibly attractive guy, tucked into a dark hallway as his hands gently caressed my hips.

His chest heaved up and down, mirroring mine. His mouth begging to touch my lips.

After my accident, one of the lessons I learned was that life was so short and rarely would you wind up on the path you expected. Life was messy, and finding someone to give you that safety and comfort was rare.

I drew in a steadying breath and trailed my fingers along the expanse of his broad arms, tracing the contours of his muscles with a deliberate slowness. As I reached up to loop my arms around his thick neck, a surge of heat coursed through me, igniting every nerve ending in my body.

“Fuck it,” I murmured, the words barely more than a breathless whisper as I surrendered to the irresistible pull drawing us together.

With a boldness born of desire, I closed the remaining distance between us, pressing my lips to his in a kiss that was electrifying.

His response was immediate as he let out a pleasured moan and tightened his hands around my hips.

I gasped into the kiss, a mix of pleasure and surprise as his touch ignited a firestorm of sensations within me.

With every movement, every caress, he seemed to stoke the flames of carnal need, drawing me deeper into him.

Meanwhile, I clung to him desperately, anchoring him to me as if afraid he might slip away. I threaded my fingers through his hair, reveling in the silkiness of the strands as I pulled him closer, unwilling to let him go. In that moment, nothing else mattered but the heady rush coursing through us.

His tongue danced against mine, darting in and out in a sensual exploration that left me breathless. Each brush of his lips, each flicker of his tongue made me crave him more. We were lost to our lust for each other. The one thing that was always missing between us.

I thought that by kissing him, maybe it would help remind me that we were just friends. We had no passion. But this was doing the opposite because I wasn’t able to let him go.

He trailed his hands up my sides as our mouths devoured each other, the dance we were playing turning into something more animalistic.

“Alex,” I moaned into his mouth as the pads of his fingers trailed along the sides of my dress. The linen button-down I wore fell past my shoulders, covering his hands as they traced the side of my breasts.

He brought his other hand to my thigh, lifting my dress as he trailed along the side of my now-bare leg.

Everything inside me shivered when he touched my skin.

I concentrated on the way his tongue was now fucking my mouth, aggressively moving in and out like he was lapping every single morsel of my taste.

“I will drop to my knees to worship you, malyshka. Is that what you want?” He moved his fingers toward my inner thigh, spreading me out slightly.