Page 69 of Tell Me You Love Me

She snickers. “No. Though I’m beginning to wish I had. Just a little to help me be less afraid.”

“Afraid of what?” I rest my forehead on hers. Too close. Way too fucking close. “Me?”

Her single, fast nod shatters my heart.She’s afraid of me?When, in my soul and with my actions, I thought I’d proven I would trade my life for hers.

I would’ve taken a bullet for her when I was seventeen. I would have stopped a speeding car. Derailed a fucking train. I would destroy any man with no hesitation, spending the rest of my life behind bars, if that’s what I needed to do to keep her safe. And even now, though I’m not sure it’s healthy for me to admit, I would do the same.

There is no point in my existence if she’s not safe and happy.

That’s why all this hurts so fucking bad.

“I’m afraid of making things worse,” she whispers, stepping just a little closer soIknow it was no accident. “Afraid of hurting you more. It breaks my heart that ten years have passed, and you’restillso angry, because it terrifies me to consider a world where you haven’t found love again. A world where the greatest soul, the greatest man who ever existed, escaped the parents he was burdened with and the life he was tossed into, only to be broken by a silly girl not nearly worthy enough to have hoarded the best years of love he would give.”

Fresh tears settle on her lashes while her eyes glitter in the shadows.

“It’s not fair that you fought through so much pain and such cruel beginnings, and now, because ofmyhorrible choices, you can’t feel the happiness you deserve.”

“You seem to think you get to dictate who I deserve.” I slide the pad of my thumb over her plump bottom lip, stroking until I’m rewarded with a brush of her tongue. “You’re trying to jam a square peg through a round hole, Lana. Constantly fighting against what’s right, what fits?—”

“We don’t?—”

“When all along, I’ve only ever wantedyou.” I pull her to the tips of her toes and gently press my lips to hers.

She sighs, her breath sprinting to the base of my lungs, and then she kisses me back, ensuring I’ll never again retrieve my soul, suckling on my tongue and wrapping her arms over my shoulders to keep me close.

It’s not like last time when tequila, loud music, and the safety found within the shadows ruled our hormones. This is sweeter. Softer. Her tears mingle on our tongues, and her breath is choppy because of how she cries.

I slide my hands around her thighs, tugging her closer in my quest to eliminate even a sliver of space between our bodies. But she wants more, jumping into my arms instead and trusting me to hold all of her.

I would normally turn and slam her to the door. It’s as natural to us as breathing. As arguing. Living. But I bend my knees instead and earn her whimper of approval as I lower to the floor.

The rough wood catches on my shirt, tugging threads and crackling in the evening silence, but the fabric saves me from splinters, and her lips on mine make me not give a shit anyway. I wouldn’t care if the skin was torn from my bones. If my bones were fed to a fucking wood-chipper. I wouldn’t care if the entire world was burning. Not when I place her over my lap and her fingers go to the snap of my jeans.

Alana Page and I are good at fucking.

We might have been young ten years ago—probably too young to have practiced as much as we did—but fuck, we know exactly how to make the other fall apart.

But this isn’t fucking. This will be lovemaking.

And hell, I like that, too.

“Say the words.” I drag the strap of her tank off her shoulder, trailing my fingers over her delicate skin until she breaks out in goosebumps.

She draws my cock out of my jeans, humming with pleasure and carefully lining it up at her fiery opening. Then she slides down, swallowing me up and dropping her head back with a whimper.

Her breath turns choppy.

Desperate.

But fuck, she’s so beautiful sitting atop her throne.

“Hey?” I wrap my palm around her throat and force her eyes back to mine. So blue, even in the waning light. So bright despite the hurt circling between us. “Lie to me, Lana. Say the words.”

“I love you.” She rides my cock with slow, languid strokes that stoke an inferno in my blood, and when I free her tits from her top and take her pebbled nipple between my lips, she mewls. “God, Tommy. I love you.”

ROUND TWENTY-ONE

ALANA

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