Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 55860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 279(@200wpm)___ 223(@250wpm)___ 186(@300wpm)
It's beautiful, and I know with certainty that it’s the most romantic thing either of us has ever done. I’m absurdly pleased to have brought her here, to do this with her. If she didn’t already know how I feel about her, this would have told the tale. There’s no way I could hold her this way and keep it a secret.
She smiles at me, and I feel like a conquering hero.
“This is amazing,” she breathes. “I feel so light, and it’s like being in a movie. And you—I didn’t think you could be sexier. But here you are. Like you’re the duke in Bridgerton or something and I want to—”
“Be ravished in the garden? Want me to ruin you?” I whisper, than lean in and brush my mouth against her cheekbone.
Madame claps her hands and we spring apart like guilty teenagers. Then Serena starts to laugh. A quelling look from our teacher silences her, and we’re forced to dance separately again for a while. By the time we’re through, we can waltz and fox trot. She says the rumba was ‘too sexy’ for us since we had been reprimanded for stealing kisses more than once.
“Animals,” she derides us, “do not be in a rush like this. Take your time, let the distance and slowness of the dance seduce, give it space.”
We leave the studio holding hands, back in street clothes and exhausted. I pull her close to me and whisper, “Dance with me?” She looks at me in disbelief and then nods, delight playing on her smiling face. I hold out my hand for hers.
We dance on the sidewalk when it begins to rain, a slow, warm rain that tracks down my collar and slides along her throat as I spin her in my arms. I’ll bury myself deep inside her tonight, and we’ll fall asleep still joined. Our eyes will lock as I bottom out in the wet sheath of her. She’ll moan my name and say please while I hold her right on the edge until I force the climax from her and she convulses, sobbing and bucking while I empty into her.
I’ll wake her in the night, my hips rocking into her, her hand clenching in my hair. The promise of this makes me want every night for the rest of my life to be the same. It would be stupid and dangerous to consider it. To love a woman that I can’t let go. I saw my dad’s mistresses either run from the violent lifestyle or die trying to stay. I don’t want that for Serena. She deserves better, deserves to be free of my demons the same way she should be free of her father’s debts.
The thing is, I’m not noble enough to be a hero, even the morally gray kind. There’s no way I’d give her up for her own good. I figure she can make her own decisions, and she keeps saying yes to me. I’ll take it, that’s for damn sure. I’ll take this woman any way I can get her.
15
SERENA
I’m not the only one who’s late I quip to myself. Jack Marino is always on time. Right now, he’s keeping me waiting. I sit at the diner, drinking decaf coffee which feels pointless. I look at my phone, scroll aimlessly to keep from watching the clock. I breathe through my mouth to try and ignore the fried food and maple syrup smell of the place. I wish I knew where he is, why he’s running late. I have to stop watching the door. It’s pathetic.
When ten minutes pass, I check my texts again, make sure this is the right place, the right time. He hadn’t meant six AM instead of six PM, for example. There is no mistake. I’m here. He isn’t. I message him, my exasperation bleeding into some worry. His job, after all, goes beyond meetings in a board room. There are certain risks involved.
My leg jiggles up and down, nervous, as I wait for a reply. I try to drink my decaf, grimace and push it away. The waitress knows I’m waiting for someone. When she comes by with the coffee pot to offer me a refill, I shake my head.
“He’ll be here any minute,” I say with forced cheeriness. She nods but I think she pities me; believes I’ve been stood up. He won’t do that to me, I want to protest, but that’s exactly what someone would say who’s being stood up. They’d make excuses about traffic or imagine a car crash. I don’t need to let my imagination run away with me here. Borrowing trouble, my dad has always called it, when I conjure up the worst possible outcome.
I’ve licked my lips too many times and dig in my purse for lip balm. While I’m fishing around for it, my phone dings and I grab it like it’s my life raft. Be right there, parking now, his text reads. Relief that he’s okay floods me, that no disaster has happened, but then comes frustration hot on its heels. No apology, no excuse. I frown at my phone and put it away.