Page 110 of Only Ever You

Nothing made any sense. Faye had so many questions. “But you said you want more? You want a family, and those women were just—Why would you do that if it’s not what you want?”

Why did that fucking matter right now?

The look in Bash’s eye as a shallow laugh cracked from his lips was like she’d missed a giant neon sign right in front of her face.

“I went after those women because they were all the exact opposite ofyou!” He looked like he wanted to shake her. Faye wanted him to as well if it’d help her swallow down what he’d just told her. “Theyweren’t your infectious smiles or your talent or your warmth. They weren’t women who I’d run across freezing cold London at midnight for. They were distractions from how you, Faye, are in my thoughts.Every.Single.Day.”

Something like bubbles of champagne filled Faye up inside. Her mind operated on a time delay as she caught up to what he’d confessed.

“I knew that none of those relationships could ever be serious,” Bash continued, “because the only woman I want to be serious with … is you.”

His breathy voice slowly lost its strength, but not his words, not his meaning. Not the heat in his eyes as he looked down at her. Close enough to touch, feel his warmth sparking against the fire swimming through her skin.

“Why did you never say anything?” Faye’s voice still shook with disbelief.

“Because … ” As Bash found the right words, a soft smile like coming home to a warm apple and cinnamon muffin on a winter night settled on his lips, his cheeks a brighter pink than before. All masks removed.

“Because the way we are has always been both enough and not enough,” he confessed. “It’s taken me years to realise that I want more. You’ve never given me much indication that you did too, so I backed off. I was scared you wouldn’t want me too and that I’d not take the rejection well, which I know sounds so fragile of me.”

Faye’s eyes were wet.

Years … My god,how long had they been fighting this? Pushed back against their hearts? She’d backed off first because he’d been in a relationship when they’d met, and then they’d become friends and she’d never thought in any way that he’d want to be with her the way she wanted him.

What were they waiting for?

She didn’t have any words. If she could take out everything that she felt inside of her and show it to him in her hands, then she would.

Bash began to shake his head. “There’s only one thing I’ve ever wished I could wake up and find under my Christmas tree. You are a gift,” he said, emotion thick in his voice. “All of your quirks, your random ideas … they’re beautiful. And I am left completely unable to function when I think about how much you are the single moon in my sky.”

Faye hadn’t given permission for her chin to tremble like it did.

Warm fingers wrapped around her cold, trembling ones. Like a smooth brush of velvet on her skin, Bash continued to say, “Stare at the sun for too long, and all that you get is burned. Look at the moon … and you can watch her forever, seeing more and more of her you’ve never realised before each day.”

He stared at her lips, then tilted closer, their toes touching. Like she’d tied a rope around his waist and pulled him in.

Faye might never recover from this shock she was in. How could she have never seen this at all? She’d chalked everything Bash had ever said or done for her up to friendship. But now it all made sense; his hugs, the way he touched her. The way he would stare down any guy that she dated. How he was always the first one to come running whenever she needed help.

How he’d kissed her under the mistletoe.

How she was the only one who he ever asked to dance.

Bash cupped her cheek with a careful hand like he was afraid that if he said the wrong thing, she’d shatter, his thumb pressing and brushing across her lips. Faye’s breath caught in her lungs, her legs ready to give way.

“I’ve spent years trying to push away how badly I want to kiss you,” he said with a devastating smile. “And even longer falling gently, madly, wholly in love with you, Faye.”

In love.

Those tears welling in Faye’s eyes, slipped. Their warmth tickled down her cheeks. Because to be loved by someone was nice. To love someone else was nice too. But to be loved by the person who you were in love with, what was more peaceful than that?

Bash’s eyes bounced between hers, his voice uneven. “Say something … ”

Her tongue finally untied. “Bash … I’ve belonged to you since the day that we met.”

Just like that, Faye ripped a massive, vulnerable, honest tear in time and space, admitting aloud what she should’ve said a decade ago. Any other man might have made her doubt, but Bash was the only one who she would never be unsure of - the one who she would take the risk for and go all of the way.

His glistening eyes snapped to hers. “You have?”

A timid chuckle worked its way out of her, because she couldn’t believe what she finally got to freely say.

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