Текст книги "In Your Heart "
Автор книги: Micalea Smeltzer
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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 20 страниц)
If this wedding hadn’t been planned for months in advance, I’d be convinced Emma was doing everything she could to torture me.
While we were taking an endless amount of photos the wedding organizers were busy setting up tables and chairs in the backyard.
I found my name written elegantly on a piece of parchment and looked beside my plate to see Ezra’s name written down.
Fuck my life.
I sat down just as Ezra appeared. He’d ditched his tux jacket and if anything he looked even more lickable. The sleeves of his white dress shirt were rolled up to his elbows and his slick black tie lay flat.
I quickly turned my head away when he saw me looking.
The chair to my left slid out and he sat down.
“You keep running from me,” he drawled, “and yet we keep ending up together. Think there’s something to that?” He propped his elbows on the table and tipped his head in my direction, a dark curl tumbled forward across his forehead refusing to be tamed.
“Yes,” I agreed and he smirked, “the world hates me.”
His smile fell. He leaned forward, his eyes flicking all across my body before he ever so slightly drew his bottom lip in between his teeth. Fuck me. He wasn’t playing fair.
His lashes lowered, fanning across his cheekbones, and his breath tickled the skin of my neck. “I’ll leave you alone…tonight. But soon I’m going to talk and you will listen.”
I swallowed thickly, hoping he couldn’t see the way my pulse fluttered in my throat.
“Is that a threat?”
His lips quirked up into a crooked smile and he leaned impossibly closer. “No, sweetheart, that’s a promise.”
I suddenly felt light-headed. Even when he sat back, out of my personal space, I still couldn’t seem to get enough oxygen into my lungs.
Our food was served to us, but I merely picked at mine. My appetite was completely gone. I wished I could bow out, but since I was the Maid of Honor I was stuck here.
The tables were cleared away to make room for a stage and room to dance.
Emma and Maddox had their customary dance together before Hayes and Maddox took the stage.
“Emma,” Maddox spoke into the microphone, “you haven’t heard this song yet and I’ve been hiding it for a while. This is for you. Only you.”
She smiled up at him from the edge of the stage.
He sat down on a stool beside Hayes. He tipped his head in Hayes’ direction and the soft sounds of the acoustic guitar filled the air.
With a small smile Maddox began to sing. His voice was similar to Mathias’, but softer.
Emma swayed to the song, looking up at her new husband with love shining in her eyes.
I was so happy for her, but that happiness didn’t fill the ache in my heart.
“Dance with me.”
I turned and looked up at Ezra. I said nothing as I quickly looked away.
He moved to stand in front of me and held out his hand. Other couples were already filling the dance floor.
I saw Hayes dragging a giggling Arden out onto the dance floor.
“Take my hand, Sadie.” His eyes pleaded with me. “If you don’t you’ll regret it.”
I wanted to be mean and tell him that I already regretted everything between us and that I could handle one more, but the words would be a lie, and I was done with all of the lying. It was exhausting.
He crooked his fingers, beckoning me to trust him for the moment and to put my hand in his.
Exhaling a deep breath, I somehow found the courage to give him my hand.
He smiled triumphantly and pulled me onto the dance floor.
I couldn’t help the blush that colored my cheeks when I thought about what happened the last time we danced together.
He held my one hand and his other settled on my waist, above the curve of my butt, and I stiffened. “Relax,” he coaxed. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
“You already have.” I whispered the words so softly that I thought he might not hear them, but he did.
He pressed a kiss to my forehead and I closed my eyes. “I’m going to make this up to you,” he vowed, “you’ll see.”
I wasn’t going to hold my breath.
I CLOSED THE door to my shop and locked it behind me.
The night sky glittered above me with a thousand shining stars and a brief smile touched my lips. It had been three days since the wedding, and I was feeling surprisingly good. It was one of the first days where I’d actually felt like my normal self.
I adjusted my purse strap on my shoulder and walked in the direction of my apartment. The weather had been perfect today, so I’d wanted to walk. Walking helped me to clear my head. It was helping me to gain a new perspective, and maybe the next time I saw Ezra I wouldn’t feel quite so angry. After all, none of this was his fault.
I crooked my head back, enjoying the evening breeze tickling the bare skin of my neck. Fall was in the air and I couldn’t wait to wear fuzzy pajamas, and drink pumpkin spice lattes every chance I got.
My building came into view, the old brick glowing with a golden hue from the old fashioned streetlights.
My strides quickened and I hurried up the steps, passing one of my neighbors. “Hey, Frankie.” I waved at him before grabbing my key and unlocking the door to my place.
I stepped inside and immediately knew something wasn’t right.
The floor lamp beside the couch was turned on and I knew it had been off when I left.
I turned slowly, circling the room with my eyes, and stopped when I reached my bed.
My breath was sucked out of me and my whole body shook at the sight of the boy perched on the end of my bed.
“What are you doing here?” I gasped, my purse and keys falling from my hands onto the floor. “How are you here?”
He shoved his dark unruly hair away from his eyes and stood with a gentle grace as he untangled his long legs.
He held up a key. “Maddox and Emma let me borrow this.”
“They’re on their honeymoon,” I said stupidly.
“I know.” He took a step forward, his boots crunching something. “I’ve been planning this for a little while.”
“Planning what?”
“This?” He spread his arms to encompass the space.
I finally allowed my eyes to leave his face and I looked around me in awe. Everywhere I looked pieces of paper littered the floor.
I bent down, picking up the piece of paper nearest my shoe.
I gasped, my hand flying up to cover my mouth. “Ezra.” It was only one word, but I knew he could hear the surprise and overwhelming love behind the word.
On the piece of paper was a drawing of the first time we met. He’d sketched every little detail, and while he wasn’t the best artist it was flawless in my eyes.
I clutched the piece of paper to my heart, hugging it against me, wishing that I could squeeze it tight enough to melt inside of me.
A tear brushed against my cheek and I reached up to wipe it away. In the process, my eyes met his.
“You wouldn’t let me explain.” His voice was soft, hesitant, almost scared. “So I thought I could show you.”
“Show me what?” My voice was thick with the threat of tears.
“That I’ve loved you from the beginning.” He pointed to the drawing I held so protectively against me. “There’s not been one single moment that I’ve known you where I haven’t loved you. And somewhere along the way, that love became something bigger, something so undeniable that the force of it scared me more than anything else ever has.” He took a measured step towards me. “Somewhere along the way I fell in love with you. I think I fell in love with you a long time ago and I was too fucking stupid to admit it, because the thought of loving you and losing you was too painful to contemplate. I would rather have you as a friend than not at all.” Another step. “But I realized something when you walked away from me in the hospital. No matter what, I was still going to lose you, because being your friend isn’t enough anymore, Sadie. I know now that falling in love with you isn’t wrong. It’s the best thing I’ve ever done. And I’m so, so sorry that it took me so long to see that.” He took yet another step towards me and now no more than three feet separated us. “I’ve made a mess of things. Please, tell me it’s not too late to fix this. I love you. I’m in love with you. And I will spend the rest of my life making this up to you if that’s what it takes. Forgive me, please.”
His Adam’s apple bobbed and he suddenly seemed unsure. He clasped his hands in front of his body and rocked back on his heels, waiting for my response.
“How long?” I questioned.
“How long what?”
“How long have you been planning this?” I waved my hand around to encompass all the drawings. There had to be at least a hundred of them, if not more. Some appeared to be larger and more detailed while some were smaller. From where I stood I could see one with Toby drawn on it in his goldfish bowl.
“Since the moment you walked away from me and I realized how in love I am with you. I would’ve told you then, but you were gone so fast, and I also knew that it was going to take a lot more than pretty words to make you believe me.” He shrugged, his hair tumbling forward across his forehead. I itched to run my fingers through its softness, but so much still needed to be said.
“You hurt me.” I whispered the words, handing them to him like they were a grenade. “I told you that I was in love with you and you just stood there.”
“I know,” he said sadly, nodding his head, “and I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry for a lot of things. But even if you tell me to walk out that door right now,” he pointed behind me, “and tell me you never want to see me again, I’ll never apologize for every moment I spent with you.” He motioned to the drawings around us. “Not just this summer, but every single time I smiled or laughed with you. I’ll cherish all of it forever.” He closed his hand into a fist and placed it over his heart.
“I don’t want you to walk out that door,” I confessed, wiping away more tears.
Damn that boy for making me cry.
A slow smile crept onto his face. “You don’t?”
I shook my head. “I want you to stay.” I pointed to my heart and I hoped he got my meaning.
“In your heart?”
I nodded. “I couldn’t get you out of there if I wanted to. You’re too much of a part of me.”
He crept closer to me and touched his heart. “You’re in mine too, sweetheart. You’re in me so deep that I don’t know what to do when you’re gone. I feel like half of a person.”
I took a deep breath and finally I made that final step, the one that closed the distance between us. I leaned my head back to look up at him.
“So what does this mean for us?”
He tilted his head to the side. “I hope it means that you’re my girlfriend…” He paused. “Although, I really hate that word, because I feel like it diminishes how much you mean to me.”
I reached up and wrapped my arms around his neck and we both sighed at the contact. “No more hiding?” I questioned. “This is real?”
“It was always real, sweetheart.” He cupped my cheek. “We were only trying to pretend that it wasn’t.”
A question glimmered in his eyes and he must have found the answer in mine, because he lowered his head, slanting his lips over mine.
I moaned into his mouth, my body relaxing at the contact. I stood on my tiptoes and my fingers tangled in the curls of his hair as I tried to get closer.
His hands pressed into my waist, moving lower, and I startled when he grabbed my legs to lift me up.
He carried me over to my bed and laid me down. Paper crinkled beneath my back and I pulled away enough to breathe, “Don’t mess up the drawings. I want to look at all of them later.”
“Later?” He chuckled, brushing his lips so lightly against mine it couldn’t even be called a kiss. “How about now?”
I leaned up, finding his ear. “I was kind of hoping my boyfriend would fuck me first.”
He framed my face with his hands and shook his head. Before I had a chance to be upset he said, “I’m not going to fuck you, Sadie. Not right now, at least.” His voice lowered to a husky whisper and his lips ghosted against my neck over the spot where my pulse raced. “I’m going to make love to you the way I’ve always wanted to.”
I shivered at his words. “I like the sound of that.”
He grinned and kissed me again, deeply, with a hunger that could never be filled. I kissed him back just as urgently and with no less passion. As hot as all our other encounters had been we’d both been holding back on the emotion part, and now it was here in full force and couldn’t be denied anymore.
He slanted my head back with one hand and his tongue pressed against mine. I gasped into his mouth and the sound was drowned out by his groan. His other hand slid down the side of my waist and over my thigh. He grabbed my knee, lifting my leg so that he could fit himself more firmly against my center. His hips ground into mine and I gasped again, my hands sliding down his chest until I found the bottom of his shirt.
I tore it off of him and he chuckled at my enthusiasm. His shirt fell to the floor somewhere and I relished in the feel of his smooth, tanned skin beneath the palms of my hands.
“I love you.” The words came out as a breathless gasp and I reveled in the feel of being able to say them with no restraints.
“Fuck, I love you too.” He ran his thumb over my bottom lip. “So much. Don’t ever doubt that.”
With all the drawings of our best moments lying around us, there was only one answer. “I won’t.” I couldn’t doubt his love for me anymore, not when he’d gone to this much trouble to literally illustrate how much I meant to him.
He kissed me again. The kind of kiss that stole your breath and maybe your soul too.
He took his time peeling off of my clothes, like he was unwrapping the most precious gift he’d ever received.
He kissed every inch of my skin that he uncovered and my heart raced impossibly faster. Surely, eventually, it would stop beating all together. At least I would die happy and knowing what it felt like to have Ezra love me.
His lips skimmed between my breasts, over my stomach, and stopped when he reached my underwear. His hands slid up my thighs and hooked into the sides. All the while his eyes stayed on mine. He pulled them down and tossed them behind him and he finally let his eyes drop to feast on my bare skin.
“You’re so beautiful.” The words were a whispered rasp that covered my body in Goosebumps. He said the words with such conviction that I could never doubt them. Even as his eyes fluttered over my body I didn’t feel a desire to cover myself. I wanted him to see me, all of me, and the love I had to give.
He sucked his bottom lip between his teeth and his eyes finally met mine once more. “I love you,” he said, ducking his head to kiss the space where my neck met my shoulder. “I love you.” A kiss to my collarbone. “I love you.” He kissed my chest, over my heart. “I love everything about you.”
“Everything?” I questioned with a giggle when he kissed my side, his stubble brushing against a ticklish spot.
“Everything,” he repeated.
He removed the rest of his clothes and grabbed my hips, easing inside of me. We both sighed in relief at the feeling.
My hands roamed down his back, grabbing his ass. “Harder,” I pleaded desperately.
He grabbed my hands, entwining our fingers together. We fit together seamlessly, another reminder of why we were so perfect for each other.
“I never want you to walk away from me ever again,” he confessed.
“Then don’t give me a reason.” I breathed against his lips.
“I won’t,” he vowed.
With the amount of love and truth swimming in his gaze I had to believe him.
His thrusts sped up and my fingernails dug into his back.
My body tightened all over and I gasped, “I’m close.”
“Me too.” His hold on my hips tightened and his forehead creased.
We came together, both confessing our love for the entire world to hear.
When he fell asleep I crept out of the bed, wrapping my robe around me, as I padded around the apartment, collecting every single drawing. I sat down on the bed once more, beside his sleeping body. He was lying on his stomach, with his arms hugging the pillow. His dark hair was wild and unruly and perfectly him.
I giggled at the first drawing.
Paint twister. That had been fun.
Next was a drawing of the two of us getting milkshakes at this cute little diner in town. I remember the day well. It was before we really knew each other that well, and my crush had been raging in full force that day. I’d spent a good two hours picking out my outfit, only to spill milkshake on myself. I’d been upset at first, but then Ezra took his glass, spilled his own milkshake on his jeans, and shrugged, saying, “Now we match.” Laughing, I’d scolded him for wasting a perfectly good milkshake. He told me it was worth it to see me laugh and ordered two more.
I set that drawing aside as well and looked down at the next one. I couldn’t figure out what it was at first, but then realized it was a picture of me sleeping peacefully in his bed. Scrawled in the corner he’d written, You belong here.
I laughed at that, but my laugh didn’t sound right. It was more like a choked sob and I realized I’d started crying again. But these were happy tears and I was thankful for them. Just like I was thankful for the drawings and the boy sleeping in my bed.
I thought I’d never have this.
This soul-stirring, intense, all-consuming, once in a lifetime kind of love.
But I got it.
With my best friend.
And you didn’t get any luckier than that.
“I CAN’T BELIEVE I LET YOU TALK ME INTO THIS,” I mumbled, carrying the second to last box inside the house. Ezra was behind me, carrying the final box—the one that marked the fact that this was my home now too, not just his. I was here to stay. “You know my lease wasn’t up yet.”
He set the final box down on the floor along with the others.
He cracked a smile and leaned his hip against the kitchen counter. “This is your home. This is where you belong.”
“With you?” I smiled widely.
“Yes.” He framed my face, kissing me deeply. “And Toby of course.” He nodded towards the fishbowl. “Toby has really missed you. He cries every night. I have to rock him to sleep.”
I busted out in laughter. “Oh I’m sure, seeing as how rocking a fish would kill him.”
He mock winced. “Yeah, that’s why that’s Toby 2.0.”
I gasped. “What? You killed our baby!”
He laughed so hard that he was bent over at the stomach. “You should’ve seen your face!” Straightening, he sobered. “That’s the original Toby, I assure you.”
“It better be,” I muttered, fighting a smile.
I stepped forward, wrapping my arms around him. His lips brushed against the top of my head.
“So, what do you say Westbrook, are you ready to try out this love thing with me forever?”
“I don’t know,” I hedged, clucking my tongue, “forever is an awfully long time.”
“I’m good company, I promise.” He grinned down at me. The kind of smile that made him seem boyish and young.
“Hmm, sounds tempting.”
“Do I need to do more convincing?” He asked, his fingers gliding beneath my sweater.
“A lot more.” I whispered breathily in his ear. “Preferably naked.”
“I can do that.” A mischievous glint sparkled in his eyes.
I squealed when he grabbed me, tossing me over his shoulder as he ran up the steps.
Instead of stripping me naked and making love to me for the rest of the day and night we ended up jumping on the bed like two little kids.
Because that was us.
Our relationship was intense, passionate, and full of fun.
And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Interviewer: Good afternoon, Ezra. Sadie. Thanks for sitting down with us.
Ezra: Thanks for having us.
Interviewer: Of course I have to ask you if Willow Creek is working on any new music? Can we expect a new release any time soon?
Ezra: I’m not really allowed to say, but we’re working on it.
Interviewer: Good, good. So it’s recently come out that you two are indeed a couple now.
Ezra:
Interviewer: Mhmm. Sadie, do you have anything to say? You’re awfully quiet.
Sadie: I read magazines. I know how you guys twist things, so no I’m not talking to you.
Ezra:
Interviewer:
Ezra:
Interviewer: Ah, yes. We all know how you and your band members feel about your privacy.
Ezra:
Interviewer: Yes, well, I suppose…
Ezra: Do you have any more questions?
Interviewer:
Ezra:
Interviewer:
