Total pages in book: 235
Estimated words: 224334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1122(@200wpm)___ 897(@250wpm)___ 748(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 224334 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1122(@200wpm)___ 897(@250wpm)___ 748(@300wpm)
“Can you make me remember the conventional way?” she asks, totally serious. It brings the first smile to my face in too long. There’s nothing conventional about us. Never will be. I had my way, she had hers. And together, it worked. It’ll work again.
“I’m making it my mission objective,” I say with grit. “I’ll do anything.” My words seem to reach something inside of her, and her lips part as she scans my face. I hope she sees determination in my eyes, and I know she has when she falls into my chest and clings on like she needs me. As much as I need her. Even just a glimmer of hope would have charged me with resolve. This? How hard she’s holding me, how deep she’s snuggling? It’s more than a glimmer. It’s a lightning bolt. She’s healing me. Healing us.
I exhale, sinking my face into her hair, my arse beginning to go numb, but my heart feeling everything there is to feel. So much fucking love.
“Your bath will get cold,” she whispers.
“I’m comfy.” It’s a lie. My achy muscles are screaming.
“You need to eat as well. And that hand needs seeing to. Does it hurt?”
“Like hell.” And eat? My stomach turns at the mere thought.
“Come on.” She peels our skin apart as I moan my dismay. Yet I’m drained of the physical strength I need to keep her here. I should also be amenable to her clear desire to take care of me. It’s backward, not us, and I hate it. But . . . I’ll take anything I can get.
She offers her hand, looking down at me. It’s admirable, but we both know she couldn’t move me an inch, even when I’m useless. But I still accept, wincing my way up to standing, and let her unhurriedly lead the way to the bathroom, my eyes unmoving from our joined hands between us.
We enter, and I take it all in, wishing I could erase the horrid memories of this space, leaving only the amazing.
“In you get.”
I find her pointing at the tub—the giant tub that’s way too big for one person. The potential of soaking in it alone isn’t the only strange notion I’m dealing with. “Are you making demands?” I ask, unsure whether I quite like it or hate it. The dynamics of our relationship are shifting too fast for me to get used to.
“Sounds like it.” She’s indifferent, in a smug kind of way.
Would it be too much to expect her to join me? It would be a major step in the right direction, a leap closer to our normal. “Will you get in with me?” I ask, sounding very unlike the Jesse Ward who met this young beauty only a few short weeks ago.
Her indifference turns on its head, and she moves away, now unsure. “I can’t.”
Bullshit. She can and she should. She simply won’t. Injured, I try to explain, rather than enforce it, which is exactly how things would happen if I wasn’t standing here with my tail between my legs feeling half dead. “Ava.” I breathe out her name like a plea. “You’re asking me not to touch you. That goes against all my instincts.” She knows that. Is she punishing me? Every second without her attached to me in one way or another feels like the worst kind of torture.
“Jesse, please.” She looks away, clearly unable to face the hurt in my eyes. “I need time.”
Time for what? To decide whether she’s staying in my life or not? Time to decide if she’s going to forgive me? Then why the hell is she here? “It’s not natural, Ava. For me not to touch you, it’s not right.”
Her eyes dart to her feet, and she’s silent. God, what’s going through that head of yours, lady? If she’d tell me what to do, I’ll do it. No questions asked. Anything.
Then do this, Jesse. Give her the time she’s asking for and just be grateful she’s even here.
Fuck. Can I do that? Abstaining is hard enough when she’s not around, but when I can smell her? Smell the relief and the cure so close?
Ava finds it in herself to look at me, and it’s a blatant effort to show me her stance. Adamant. It’s ridiculous. We both know what will erase this pain. Me. Her. Together. She’s hurting too, and the remedy—me—is standing here before her begging her to let me repair what I’ve broken.
It goes against the grain for us but, reluctantly, I do as she’s asked, dropping my blanket and stepping into the tub. Alone. “It’s not the same without you in here with me.” I rest back and close my eyes, hoping my lack of vision will take the edge off how odd it feels to bathe alone. How much I hate it. Listening to her moving around. Knowing she’s here.