Total pages in book: 76
Estimated words: 73174 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73174 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 366(@200wpm)___ 293(@250wpm)___ 244(@300wpm)
It’s what Emmett and I had been doing without knowing it. We’d started out with our egos butting heads, always thinking about ourselves.
And then even through each other’s scars, we’d started to fall for one another. Not despite the scars, but including them.
“I always liked that one, even though I never quite had it hit close to home for me, back in the day.”
“I like it, too,” I said. “Thank you for sharing it. And for everything you share with me.”
He hummed, leaning in to kiss below my ear. “Like my cock?”
I laughed. “Fuck yes, like your cock.”
His smile had my whole heart.
“Let’s head back in,” he said.
And we did. Together. Because for the first time in my life, I’d found someone who could truly love me, scars and all.
EPILOGUE
EMMETT, 3 MONTHS LATER
“I can do it,” Storm said, walking around his gleaming new kitchen and twirling with his arms outstretched. “I can make a cup of coffee in the morning, sit down at the bay window, and look out at the hot tub.”
I grinned at him. “Is that your ideal morning? Gazing out at your hot tub?”
“Gazing at you, honestly,” he said, kissing me. “I love you.”
“I love you,” I replied. “I love you so much.”
It was wild how easy it was to say now. How eternal my love for him felt, just a few months after we’d finally fallen for each other.
When you know, you know.
It wasn’t even a quote that my dad ever said—it was just something I’d come to think a lot about Storm, now that we were a bona fide couple, so head over heels in love that it ached sometimes.
With him, I knew. Knew that he was my person, even when he drove me crazy. Knew that he deserved all the love in the world, and that I wanted to give it to him daily.
Knew that he was well worth the recent media storm that had been following us, too.
It wasn’t that they ever wrote bad things about me, like Storm was worried about.
It was the opposite.
“Did anyone send you the article in the New Times from this morning?” I asked Storm now as he brewed himself a cup of coffee in his new kitchen.
“Nah, what are they saying now?” he asked.
“They said that we are the hottest power couple for the new year,” I said. “They even called Waycott Marketing a promising new business venture.”
Storm smiled and whistled. “Look at that,” he said. “Told you it was going to be a success.”
“It’s still insanely young,” I said. “But I have high hopes. I really think Dad would have been proud.”
“He would have been. I know it.”
Winter was in full swing now. Storm’s house was perfect—not too fancy, just like him, but modernized and beautiful, like a forest hideaway. Along the walls of his living room, he’d bought and hung up five Cartier-Bresson black and white photograph prints, just because he knew he was my favorite photographer.
Storm did a lot of little things like that, thinking of me. And it made me feel like a king, every day.
Outside the big, beautiful bay window in the kitchen nook, there was snow piled up around every corner of Storm’s yard. We’d just let Oreo and Pepper out to play in it, and I watched them bound around in the snow now, hopping like bunnies. The fence between our yards was brand-new, a beautiful wooden fence that Oreo couldn’t get through anymore.
And of course, the moment she stopped popping up in my yard unannounced, she ended up over there all of the time anyway.
Because Storm was at my house as much as I was at his—and we fucking loved it.
“You know what we could do with the fence?” I said, musing out loud.
“Oh no,” Storm said. “I’m not ready for more home renovation projects. Not yet.”
I laughed. “It wouldn’t be anything big. But we could put some sort of little doggie door in it, so Oreo and Pepper can go between our yards whenever they want.”
“Way too much power for my little maniac fluffball,” Storm said. “But that is a really cute idea.”
“I’m going to go put on my outfit, and then we should head out in the next ten minutes, okay?” I asked Storm, sliding my arms around him.
“Mmm,” he hummed. “Or we can stay here and fuck.”
“You sucked me off this morning. And we fucked last night.”
“Just the way I like it,” he murmured.
I felt so good being this close to him, feeling slightly small as he wrapped his arms around me, too.
Storm really did take care of me in a way I’d never let anyone do before. It was a new feeling, and one I hadn’t realized I’d been desperately in need of.
“Love you. So fucking much.”
He kissed the top of my head. “I love you, too. I know we need to leave. I don’t want to be late for Chase’s bash.”