Chapter 22

PRESENT DAY

My arm flops to the side against a cold, empty part of the mattress. The morning after euphoric bliss turns into deep heated dread as I pry open my eyes to a familiar scene.

I’m alone.

Again.

I grimace at the pillow still imprinted with Alec’s head shape, swing my arm up, and give it a good solid punch. If he expects me to call or text after this, he’s got another thing coming. His ass better be getting me breakfast or leaving me a cute note that starts a scavenger hunt that ends with roses or something equally romantic and thoughtful.

I huff at the ceiling, refusing to look at my phone as it buzzes on the nightstand. He’s getting the silent treatment until we’re face-to-face. After the epic lovemaking that topped our first night together, I deserve an in-person explanation.

A frustrated growl rips through my throat, and I slam both of my fists into the mattress and shout, “Damn him!” It’s then that I feel the bed shake, and it’s not me causing it.

I sit up, glancing over the side of the bed. Alec’s lips turn up in an adorable sleepy smile, and he stretches his very naked body.

“Good morning, grumpy.”

My eyebrows pull together. “What the hell are you doing on the floor? If you’re pulling a joke, it’s not funny. Jackass.”

He laughs, his smile so big and wide that it sends waves of joy through my heart. “You were having a pretty wild dream last night. I needed space if I was ever going to get some sleep.”

“I didn’t have a nightmare,” I say, shaking my head. I don’t always remember my night terrors, but I almost never wake up in the same spot I fell asleep in. Since I’m still cozied up in the sheets we tangled ourselves into last night, I’m assuming I kept the thrashing and sleepwalking to a minimum.

“I didn’t say nightmare.” He grins. “I said a wild dream. I had flashbacks to when the neighbor’s dog had a thing for my leg.”

I let out a faux gasp, flopping across the mattress to hover over him. “And you ran away? Didn’t want to take advantage of it?”

“Needed energy.”

“For what?” I lilt. He reaches up and slides me off the bed, strong arms keeping me from crashing too hard on top of him. His hand pushes into my hair, gripping tight and sending wave after wave of goose bumps up and down my neck.

“I want a redo,” he says against my mouth. “I want to show you what I’ve always pictured our morning after would be like.”

“Mm,” I moan, halfway between teasing him and just letting him have his way with me. “Does it include breakfast?”

“It does.”

“Then take your redo.”

He presses a quick kiss to my waiting lips, then rolls me around as I squeal with glee.

“God, I love being under you,” I say, grasping his yummy arms. This is my haven.

“Really?” he teases. “I couldn’t tell.”

He playfully bites my bottom lip, then nuzzles my nose. His hair tickles my forehead, and I erupt in uncontrollable giggles. I’d thought that last night, or even the time before that, was everything. But this…our friendship blossoming into more…this is everything.

He plants silly kisses across my forehead, over my cheeks, down my neck and chest. I arch into him, primed for more loving and warmth and bliss, but his arm wraps around my waist and pulls me up against him as he rests back on his knees.

My phone’s going off, and we both ignore it, ignore our morning breath and the sun hitting us in the eyes and the tangles in my very sex-crazed hair. I love being imperfect with him.

His phone starts ringing, and we both laugh between our kisses.

“It’s Liz,” I tell him, our lips touching.

“You sure it’s not Liz on Landon’s phone?” he teases. Last night, as we lay together after another ride to heaven and back and I traced patterns across his chest while he teased me for crying again—I’m going to have to Google that strange phenomenon—I confessed all my shenanigans of that night to him, from the coughing bush to the basketball-induced nosebleed. I think I embarrassed him a little, but he was mighty forgiving.

Our phones are so relentless in their buzzing I can practically hear Liz yelling at me to answer. I’m hoping to high heaven there’s a pregnancy announcement on the line.

“Two…seconds…,” I say between kisses, reaching back and fumbling around for my cell. Alec’s hand slides down my ribs and I stretch across the bed, his fingers dropping to my hip.

Four missed calls and three texts, all saying, ANSWER YOUR PHONE DAMN IT! I laugh and shake my head as I dial Liz’s number.

“Is this the necklace?” Alec asks, the pad of his thumb tickling my skin. I look over my shoulder and give him a nod and a playful grin, and his eyes drop to the tattoo. “I noticed the new ink, but it was too dark to tell what it was.”

I put the phone to my ear and twist around on the bed as he crawls over me. “I won’t lose this one,” I tell him before he drops a kiss to my lips, then works his way across my neck. I don’t even register the ringing in my ear until Liz answers.

“We have pink!” she screams, and I pull the phone away so I don’t damage my eardrum. Alec is now making a downward path with his lips, the weight of his naked body warming me from the inside out. I tap him gently on the head and mouth, “Liz is pregnant.” His mouth turns up in a dimpled smile and he kisses my stomach one more time before reaching for his own phone. I see Landon’s face on the screen before I settle my cell back up to my ear.

We celebrate with our best friends about the news, Liz crying and Landon apparently so ecstatic that he’s already bought a crib and sent it to their place in L.A. Alec’s fingers trail over my legs as we lie in bed next to each other, his head resting at the bottom of the bed while mine is pressed into the fluffy pillows, and we listen to our separate conversations about the same thing. Liz keeps prodding me about what happened after she left me last night, but pretty soon they both figure out that Alec and I are in the same room at seven in the morning, and once they put it all together, they are quick to end the phone call, but not before Liz sets up a date for me and her and Shay so that I can deliver details. I wonder if they’ll know why I cry after orgasm with him.

“So…” Alec says, sliding his thumb across the red hang-up button while I do the same. “Did they kill the mood?”

I set my phone on his nightstand, knocking over an empty water bottle. “Completely,” I lie.

“Yeah, for me too,” he jokes back. I throw a pointed look at his tent pole. He twists to try to hide it, but it only ends up poking me in the ribs. It hurts a little; I think I may have bruised myself on that fire escape.

“Do you think they worked it out?” I ask him, interrupting the seductive plan I could see forming behind his eyes. “Rian and Jackson, I mean.”

He lifts a shoulder and presses a kiss to my ankle. “If they didn’t last night, I imagine they will in the future.”

“You think?” I ask, my voice coming out a little raspy and distant now that his hands are starting to roam over my skin. My attention is definitely moving away from the topic of Rian and Jackson.

“After last night, I think I’m willing to bet on anyone who loves someone that much.”

I let out a small laugh. “You mean so much that they try to sabotage any chance either of them has with someone else?”

His lips turn up as he rises and sits me up with him. The hand on my hip squeezes with gentle pressure, sending a flock of Cupid’s arrows through my stomach. “I actually meant Rian’s part of things. When you love someone so much that being with anyone else feels forced, unnatural, no matter how much time has passed.”

I rest my head against his. “No offense, but I think I did the more unbelievable things last night in the name of love.”

“This isn’t a competition.” He grins.

“But if it was, I’d win.”

He shakes his head against mine, and we bask in the sweet afterglow of finally coming together and still being us. I’ve never had pillow talk before. At least not like this. I don’t want to leave this apartment, leave this room, leave this bed.

Alec starts humming “Love Changes Everything.”

His voice is so gorgeous I bring my fingers to his mouth, tracing his lips and the smile lines, and pressing into the dimple that creases his cheek. He pauses his song to give me a kiss that is too quick for my taste.

“I want to see you wet,” he says, and I raise a playful eyebrow, which he laughs at. “I mean wet as in shower wet. That night I told you I loved you? It was raining. I…liked the view.”

“Is that what you had in mind for our redo this morning?”

He nods. “Shower, breakfast, making you play the piano for me…”

“Hmm,” I murmur, taking his earlobe between my teeth. His hot, ragged breath hits my collarbone. “That sounds like a much better morning after than waking up alone.”

I meant to keep our foreplay playful, but Alec’s lips are making it hard to be anything but passionate as he roams my shoulders. He’s holding me as if he’s terrified I’ll disappear into a wisp of fog, as if I may not be entirely real. Kissing me as if he’s trying to memorize my taste, inhaling my scent and reveling in my body so much so that I lose whatever sense I may have had and start holding and kissing and smelling him in the same way.

“I may have said this already,” he growls into my neck, “but I just don’t believe it.”

“Hmm?”

His hands cup my face and bring it down so our foreheads touch.

“Do you have any idea how many times I thought of you when I was in here? How many times I pretended I wasn’t alone, but holding you like this? Laughing with you, kissing your smile, touching every inch of your body as if I was worthy of doing so. You’ve just…I mean, hell, you’ve made my dream come true. And I just don’t believe it.”

My hands find his sides and slip up his warm back. “You keep talking like that and kissing me like this, there is no way we’re going to make it to the shower.”

His lips turn up into a seductive, playful, gorgeous Alec smile, and his hand finds the crook of my knee as he coaxes me onto my back.

“I can see you wet later.”

I release a very girly giggle, trailing my fingers down his chest and his abdomen, smiling like a damn fool at the perfection of his body. Morning is a good time for Alec’s nakedness. The sun sheds a flattering light on the veins and taut muscles that cover every inch, and I revel in the fact that he’s mine. That he kept his heart safe for me. Me. He said he couldn’t believe it; well, I’m the one who is dipped in unbelief.

His lips drop to mine, kissing me slowly at first, then faster as he quickens his pace. I find myself falling away from my surroundings, and I’m taking Alec with me. I don’t think I’ll ever have to call for another redo as long as I live.