Page 23 of Awaited Love with You
And I mean it.
All of it.
He stayswith me at my house for a few days, creating a bubble that I know will eventually have to burst. He makes love to me in the mornings, I lay against his chest and ask questions in theafternoons, and in the evenings, he threads his fingers through my hair and listens to my worries about going back with him to Seattle.
He only picks up his phone to speak to Adele.
He doesn’t look at it for anything else.
When our time is over—when the fourth day hits—he brushes my cheek and says, “There are some things I need to finish back in Seattle… I’d like you to come with me, but I understand if you’d rather stay.”
“Do you really understand?”
“I’ll pretend to.”
I smile. “I would like to go.”
“How long would it take you to get everything you need?”
“Not long.” I hesitate. Then I blurt, “I need to get Kylie back for fucking me over.”
“Why?” He studies me. “She was doing her job.”
“No. She was playing mind games once she knew who I was dating.”
He tilts his head to the side, looking slightly unconvinced.
“Her rush to meet me all of a sudden—from one phone call—didn’t make sense.”
“Even if she was your best friend?”
“Estranged best friend… And no. It didn’t make sense, and all her warnings might have been warranted, but the manner in which she went out of her way to deliver them wasn’t.”
“Trust me.” My chest aches. “The overdrawn stories, the way she mentioned things, the binder she gave me?—”
“What binder?”
I hold back a sigh and unzip my suitcase, freeing it from a stack of jeans before handing it to him.
He flips it open, slowly scanning through the pages, stopping when he reaches the ones that feature the photos of his family.
He clenches his jaw, his fingers tightening around its edge.
“I was feet away when they were murdered. At our dinner table,” he says, his voice a shadow of itself. “By my biggest enemy. The same man who tried to kill you.”
His eyes are suddenly distant, and for a moment, it’s like something has shifted.
Briefly shutting his eyes, he sighs and tells me the story like a novelist. The parmesan shells. The kitchen. The hiding. The four days he listened to their killers joke about what they’d done.
“That’s why I have to leave for Seattle now, Autumn,” he says, pulling me into his arms. “I have to get him back, and I won’t rest until I do. Are you coming with me or do I have to come back to get you later?”
I answer his question with a kiss.
End of Episode 10
Temporary Delay
EPISODE 10.1
