Page 125 of You, As You Are

She wasn’t supposed to cry – these minutes were supposed to be the pleasure-drunk afterglow, but she’d waited for someone like Iain to come along and love her right for so, so long, and now he was here. It felt like someone had just handed her a golden ticket – or a puppy, puppies made her cry – and she couldn’t contain herself.

She visited the bathroom then splashed water on her face, but it didn’t work. She couldn’t help being watery at the emotion of everything that had happened today. There’d been a lot ofopening up and setting her heart out on the table – so much risk she’d taken, praying that things would be okay in the end.

Iain was a better man than he’d ever given himself credit for. Her gentle mountain man with a sense of humour, fantastic beard, caring hands, and a penis that made her tremble and shake without even entering her.

This didn’t happen to her.

She was the side plot – the best friend.

She didn’t get the perfect ending.

Well maybe that trope would change now …

Maisie lay back in bed and closed her eyes, letting the emotion sit within her, until she heard boots tread up the steps outside. Ted’s claws clicked their way straight to his bed, the zip of Iain’s coat drew down.

He crawled under the duvet and another shock of emotion made Maisie quietly catch her breath.

“Are you awake?” he whispered.

She sniffled. “Yes.”

Iain shifted behind her, his face appearing by her shoulder. He paused, frowned. “Why are there tears falling, Daffy?” he asked, folding his arm around her waist and hugging her tightly to his chest.

Maisie’s gooey, melting, physical response to his nickname for her which she still hadn’t figured the meaning of, was innate now. She wasn’tsad,and she didn’t know how to make that clear. Happiness had never manifested in her like this.

She couldn’t bring her voice any louder than a hushed – “I might be overwhelmed.”

“Was it too much?” The thread of worry in Iain’s voice as he stroked his thumb back and forth between her breasts was entirely her fault.

“No – no, you were amazing, and you did what I asked,” she said. “I’m just … you don’t know how long I’ve wanted to be held like this.”

Iain tucked his body up against hers, pressing a kiss to her naked shoulder. “So long as you want me to, I’ll hold you all night,” he said. “I promise.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

MAISIE

“I’d likethe balls to be a little bigger.”

Maisie scrubbed her palm across her forehead. “Having them larger can be overwhelming, visually. I would recommend having more of them sporadically and on the smaller side.”

“What about placing them with the bat?” her client asked.

She didn’t know how she was supposed to politely explain that having a repeating motif which looked too much like genitals on a website for a children’s multi-sport club was inappropriate.

“I’ll see what I can do,” she conceded with every intention of finding a way around making a cricket bat and red balls look like a?—

“Excellent. Now I’d like to talk about …”

Maisie listened as her client listed their other comments about the preliminary design and website layout she’d emailed yesterday, though her mind was anywhere but at this desk.

Despite how it’d come about, her weekend had been magical; her path had taken a turn she’d never been expecting, but if a time machine appeared in front of her she wouldn’t go back and change any of it. Not for anything. She wished so much to be back there again to where it felt like the world had evaporated,instead of here at her desk where reality seemed to crawl at a dreary pace whilst she waited out her workday to see Iain again.

She’d awoken that Sunday morning in his arms just like he’d promised. But after another wobbly moment of emotion before he’d woken up and kissed all her overwhelmed tears away, Maisie had watched an influx of jewellery orders roll in through her emails, and her stress had begun to climb. So, they skipped out early from the campsite and drove home at lunch.

They’d spent time together every day since. Which was only three days, but it was three days they’d chosen to be together without the pretence of interaction being fake or for show. Though since her period arrived unduly early and wreaked havoc as soon as she’d gotten home – not to mention her still very sore knee, which hadn’t been helped by their nightly activities that weekend – the nights Iain spent over had been of the purest kind. The kind that involved food and movies, the pair of them curled up on her sofa with a few tears at her endo pain, and a lot of his warm hands massaging her lower back. When the worst of her cramps had passed on Wednesday, Iain had brought Ted over for dinner and they’d strolled along the oceanfront. He’d made morerarebitand brought her traditionalbara brithto try from a town his job had sent him to. Her tastebuds hadn’t wrapped their heads around the tea-soaked fruit loaf, but she hadn’t said no to another buttered slice.

Maisie hadn’t wanted to ask that ‘what are we?’ question in case it broke the peacefulness of the moment. She wasn’t the casual kind of woman and Iain had already made it very clear he couldn’t do commitment, yet the things he’d said to her about waiting for however long it took her to open up contradicted that. She could float along for now and see where things took them, but sooner rather than later she would need an answer.

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