Page 88 of Crazy About Love (All About Love)

He lets out an equally frustrated sigh. “Well, then, what did this sign say?”

I grab his twitching hands, holding them tight in my grasp. I’d ask him to look at me, but I never have to do that with him.

“I’m ready. I’m not just ready—I’m ready foryou. I asked you to be in the damn auction so I could bid on you. I had three grand in my pocket tonight to tell you with some grand gesture what I’ve been holding back.”

“You want me for another night?”

“I want youeverynight.”

The confusion drowns the amusement in his eyes, and worry lines form on his face. Without thinking, I reach up and smooth his brow, then trace his jawline with my pinky. His mouth opens a smidge, as though breathing through his nose is just not going to cut it right now. This may not be the grand gesture I was hoping for, but I can’t keep it in any longer.

“I want to redo everything. Every moment I’ve had with you. I want to rewrite my dialogue, give you everything I should’ve given you in the first place instead of handing it over to that prick I was dating, or any of the pricks in between. I want to go back to that first night you said you loved me. I want you to say it again so I can say it back. And don’t think this is because I saw you strip on that stage tonight, because I can tell from that look on your face you’re thinking that. And don’t laugh right now—I’m being serious!”

He hides the smile with his hand as he rubs his chin, but his shoulders are shaking with silent laughter. He brings our hands up to his mouth and presses a kiss to my knuckles.

“I don’t want to go back that far,” he says. “I don’t want to redo any of it. Everything I’ve done for you and with you? You couldn’t pay me to change that.”

“Butyoucalled a redo. You said I could have one redo for anything I wanted, and I want one for each event since I met you. That’s not too much to ask, I don’t think.”

He chuckles, his fingers turning in my hand to link together with mine. He’s not shaking anymore. He’s not nervously clenching his fists or bouncing his legs, and I can see a warm light brightening the green of his eyes. It’s like a weight has toppled off our shoulders, for both of us.

“I just want to redo something I said to you,” he says. “I’ve wanted to take it back for three weeks.”

My heart stops. It would be just my luck that he’s asking to redo that night—the only one I’d rathernotredo.

“You were right,” he says, and I wildly shake my head back and forth, whipping my already messy hair into an even more tangled state.

“No…I was wrong,” I tell him. “So very wrong. Right now I’m right. I need to redo everythi—”

He puts his fingers up against my lips with a stern look, and my shoulders drop in surrender.

“There was a night when I helped wash your dishes. You remember?”

“There were a lot of those, Alec.”

That makes him break, a half grin cracking his face. “Well…I asked you if you were sleeping with Jace.”

“Oh yeah, the night you had a giant brain paranoia fart.”

“You said you wouldn’t sleep with me because it’d mean something.” His breath catches a little and I watch his ears redden. “You were right. For three weeks I’ve been trying not to let you see just how much that night meant, because, hell, it was thebestnight of my life. And I’m the schmuck who just left you. I left you alone, and damn it, I’m sorry. You’re right—I shouldn’t have left at all, even if I thought I had a good reason for it. Even though you werecrying.”

“It was happy crying!” I say, gripping his shoulders and shaking them in mock anger. He laughs and takes my hands in his again.

“Look…the real reason I left…well, I’ve never been able to forget why I love you, and I was in danger of saying it out loud again. Over and over again, and I didn’t want to deal with the pain that you wouldn’t say it ba—”

I slam a hand over his mouth so that hisI love youdoesn’t get lost in the rest of his sentence. Those were the words I was afraid I’d never hear from him again.

“You still love me?” I ask, my voice a breathless, blissful whisper amid the noise of the train station.

He nods, and I let my hand drop slowly from his mouth to the collar of his jacket. He still loves me, even after all this time, all these years, even this disaster of an evening, and I start to wonder if fate really is on my side after all.

He takes hold of the hand I have on his collar and locks his eyes with mine. “If I’d have told you that night, would it have changed anything?”

If he’d said it, it just would’ve made that night more perfect than it already was.

“We probably would’ve gone for round two.”

His smile is something that should be on aGQcover, melting my insides and filling them up all at once. I can hear the train pulling into the station, and he presses his forehead against mine quickly before helping me to my feet.

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