Total pages in book: 210
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 203847 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1019(@200wpm)___ 815(@250wpm)___ 679(@300wpm)
Nothing is rushed about these simple, easy kisses. It’s the purest connection we’ve ever had, and I’m thrilled and I’m scared at the same time. As he holds me tighter, I realize that I’m more thrilled than I am scared.
“Mmm,” I hum when he kisses the corner of my mouth.
“When do you go?”
“Hm? Go where?”
Tyler laughs, bringing me out of my slightly dizzy haze. “To California.”
“Oh. I fly at, like, ten tomorrow morning.”
He runs his hands down my back to my butt and taps it lightly. “Come on. I’ll help you pack.”
“You’re not going to drag me into your room and strip me naked?”
“Liv, if I wanted to strip you naked, I wouldn’t have to do it in my bedroom.” He sits us up with a grin. “And as much as I’d love to, you need to pack.”
“I’ll be fine. It won’t take long for a few days.”
He clasps my hands with his and pulls me off the sofa, leading me to the door. “I’m going to make sure you have everything you need. I know you’ll forget something important.”
I step into the elevator after him. “No, I won’t. I need makeup, clothes, a phone charger, shoes, a hairbrush, and a toothbrush.”
He smirks, wrapping his arms around my waist from behind me. His hands trail lazily across my stomach, and he presses a firm kiss to my skin where my neck meets my shoulder.
“And your vibrator.”
My skin hums after his words. “Why do I need my vibrator?”
“So you can use it and think of me.”
“And if I get searched at security?”
“Then we’re all gonna have a bloody good giggle at your expense. It’s going in the suitcase, and you’re going to use it, and you’re going to think of me.” He nips my neck. “Got it?”
“Got it.”
California is hot. Really, really hot. Compared to Seattle, it’s another world.
And standing here below the burning sun, pretending I’m not covered in sweat so thick it could be another layer of skin, is next to impossible. Thankfully, the photographer calls a break and one of the girls runs over and hands me a water bottle. No one else is suffering the way I am.
But hey. That’s what you get when you put a northern girl in a southern climate when the North is pretty much still in winter.
After ten minutes, a wipe-down, and a reapplication of my makeup, I head out to the waterline. The photographer is a nice, friendly, thirty-something woman who’s famed for her beach shots. It’s evident to see—the positions she asks me to contort my body into is practically fucking yoga. I’m half tempted to ask if she’d like to shoot me in the downward dog position.
Of course, she’ll likely give the other girls, who are holed up in different hotels, the same instructions. I just have to hope none of them can do yoga, because then I’ll be pissed off. Right now, my fitness regimen is all that’s keeping me balanced. If I hadn’t been doing basic to medium yoga for three years, I’d be flat on my ass.
After an hour, we call time on the shoot and I head back to the hotel. I wrap a towel around my shoulders, more to keep the sun off me than anything, and head up to my room. It’s not the best hotel in the state, but it has amazing views of Santa Barbara and its pier. Heading down there is on my plan for tonight.
Go to the pier, grab a glass of wine somewhere, then back to my room. Maybe for my vibrator.
Knowing I’m hours away from my family, my friends, Tyler—it’s surreal. This is only the second location shoot I’ve been on that’s taken me this far away from my home.
Before, it didn’t matter. Before, there was nothing tying me down to my home city. Now, though, it’s different. So different.
Now, there’s something—somebody—anchoring me to Seattle. He makes me want to go home right now. To go to the airport and hop on the next flight out of California. Two nights without him seems crazy although it’s nothing new.
Perhaps the difference is in knowing that, back in Seattle, he’s within walking distance. I can walk, run, or drive for only a few minutes and I’ll be at his door.
Here, though… Here, we’re nowhere near each other.
Two days ago, faced with the prospect of walking away from him, I thought I missed him.
I was wrong.
Missing someone isn’t the idea of leaving them. Missing them is knowing you’re so close yet so far away.
Seattle to Santa Barbara isn’t the hugest distance in history. For example: he could be back in London. That would be a distance—a whole country and an ocean would separate us.
I guess… I guess I’m in a constant state of missing Tyler. We’re so close physically. I know what makes him tick. I know he likes it when I suck lightly on the pulse point at his neck, how I run my nails down his back…. He knows where and how I like to be kissed, how to restrain me, what to say to me to get me wet…