Page 67 of Surrender

"Yet," Harrison replies. I don't like this conversation. Harrison touches my arm, a request to look at him. When I turn to fully face him, he's looking down at me with pity and sadness.

"I've known Declan for decades. He's got his walls up high.ButI see the way he looks at you. Like you're the sun he orbits around. He may be coming around slowly to the idea of letting you in. But you need to make sure that's what you want. Don't let him fall for you and then decide he's not it for you. Because if he lets himself fall in love with you, it’ll be it for him."

I frown, but before I can reply, he continues. "Just make sure there's more there than his body and his bank account. I know both are appealing, but you have to love his heart, too. And you have to be in it for the long haul."

He squeezes my shoulder. "Just think about it," he says before walking away.

And I do. I think about it the entire drive home. I think about it in the shower, and I think about it as I pretend to sleep, wrapped in the strong arms of the man I've fallen in love with.

Who doesn't love me back.

Chapter thirty-eight

Declan

"Hey babe? Did you want to go to a Caps game this weekend? I think they're playing the North Carolina Titans," I call out as I walk into the house. I'm kicking off my shoes, thumbing through a stack of mail when I hear a throat clearing.

I look up to see my beautiful Serenity, but the atmosphere in the front entryway is off. She's nervous. Biting her lip and picking at her cuticle again. It's then that I notice the luggage at her feet.

My heart sinks into my chest at the same time that it trips over itself.

"No," I say, deathly serious as I lay the mail and keys down on the table. I step towards her, hands itching to hold her.

She holds up a hand to stop me.

"You're not leaving me," I growl.

"Hear me out, please?"

"You're not leaving me!" I shout this time, wincing at the sheer terror lacing my voice. My brave girl doesn't even flinch.

Her lower lip quivers. "I'm not breaking up with you. If you don't want. I just... I want to do this right, Dec. I never learned how to live on my own. I went straight from my parents' house to yours. We never dated. We never got to know each other before we jumped into bed together. And I don't know where you're at, but," she squares her shoulders before clearing her throat, "I want this to be forever. And I feel like you deserve that, if it's what you want, too."

I can't stop myself this time. I wrap my arms around her and bring her against my body, as if I can physically keep her from leaving me.

"Don't do this. Please. I'll do whatever you want. I'll take you on dates. We can take sex off the table. We can have long chats about anything you want. Just please, don't leave me."

She kisses my chest before she says, "You taught me about boundaries. This is one that I'm asking you for."

God, that guts me. But she's right. If we don't have boundaries, we have nothing.

She pulls back and places her hands on my cheeks, but the look I see in her eyes devastates me. She's leaving, and there's nothing I can do about it.

"I lo..." but she cuts me off with a hand over my mouth.

"If you love me, you'll give me six months. I want to keep seeing you, but if you can't wait for me, I understand." She swallows and I know this is hard for her too.

But I do love her. I love her with everything I have, and if tearing my heart out and letting her walk away is what she wants, it's what I'll do.

So, with a sad smile, I help her load her suitcases into an uber. She tells me how her and Ella got an apartment together closer to campus. And that she hopes I'll visit her there. But she sounds far away and I'm blinking back hot tears that threaten to fall.

She tips up on her toes and presses a kiss against my lips, but I'm numb. I swallow thickly as I watch her uber drive away. When I turn around to drag myself back into my house, I watch as the very last of the rose petals drifts to the ground on a cold breeze.

The finality of it shatters me. It's the end of the roses. Is it the end of our relationship?

Will she find someone her own age at college and realize how much better she could do? She should be off at frat parties, not hanging out with an old fucker like me and a sex club. Will she decide the lifestyle's not for her? Or will she find someone younger to dom her?

The uncertainty of it all eats away at me.

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