Page 45 of Holly's Grizzly

I can’t ask for more than she wants to give.

Making her feel guilty or burdening her with my own heartache won’t help anything. Not when she’s always been used to putting others’ wants and needs over her own, not when I know she’s got a full, wonderful life waiting for her, and not when this thing between us was always meant to be a beautiful, temporary impossibility.

So I do the only other thing I can think of.

I walk over and pull her into my arms, savoring the warmth of her, the scent of her, the last few minutes we have together.

17

Holly

I was right.

Irving’s hugs are the softest, warmest, best hugs in the world.

Not that it changes a damn thing as he holds me in the cabin's silence and doesn’t say anything, doesn’t ask anything, just runs his hands up and down my arms, my back, my hair. Soft, gentle touches that feel like goodbye.

When he finally speaks, it’s in his oh-so-Irving way of making sure I’m taken care of.

“Do you… do you need to clean up before you leave? Take a shower, or—”

“No,” I interrupt, shaking my head. “No. I’m fine.”

It’s a long drive back to Seattle, but I can’t bear the idea of washing away his scent on my skin before I go.

“Are you hungry? I could—”

“No,” I say again, softer this time. “I’m… I’m alright.”

A long moment of silence passes between us. Another moment where I could say something, where he could say something.

But whether because we’re both too afraid to find the words, or because we’re both well-aware of what those words would be, we don’t.

“Sit with me?” Irving asks, a murmur against the top of my head.

I nod, and he takes me by the hand and leads me over to the couch. He sits first and then pulls me into his lap, settling me against him with a low, contented rumble that draws a sharp sting of tears to the backs of my eyes.

“Can I see your phone?”

I pull it from my pocket to hand it over, then watch as he enters his own name and number into my contacts before giving it back to me.

“If you run into any trouble on the road, you can call me and I’ll find some way to get to you and help.”

I nod, and he lets out another low rumble of approval.

Irving presses a kiss to my forehead before tucking me into his chest, one big hand cradled around the back of my head and the other moving in soothing strokes up and down my back.

“Vic will get you back safely to your car,” he says, voice low and gruff. “I trust him completely, and I know he’ll be careful with you.”

“Okay.” I try to ignore the waver in my voice, the way it cracks slightly on the second syllable.

I nestle into him, and we stay just like that for a few long minutes, or maybe hours, with the way time warps and compresses. I breathe in his scent and bask in the warmth of him, desperate to make each second last a lifetime.

A few of those lifetimes later, the crunch of gravel under tires snaps us both to attention, and the unmistakable flash of headlights through the windows sends my stomach plummeting to my feet.

Vic is back, and time is up.

Rising slowly from Irving’s lap, I find myself frozen as soon as I get on my feet. Irving is, too, and the only part of him that doesn’t seem to be made of stone is the burning intensity of his gaze as he peers down at me.

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