Page 47 of Finding Haven
The man staring back at me is ready to open his heart and demolish the walls surrounding it. This man is ready to love and be loved in return. A slow, vibrant smile stretches across my face.
Brushing my teeth, throwing on deodorant, and a few sprays of cologne only takes a few minutes, and it still feels too long. I’m desperate to get back to Quinn. Imagining her curled up in my bed, getting her sweet scent all over my sheets, makes me feel feral.
For her.
For what we could be.
36
Quinn
“Igetitnow.”Zack’s chest rumbles with a deep chuckle, lightly shaking my head where it rests against his warm skin. “You just like this show for the sex.”
Playfully smacking his chest, I laugh. “Shut up, I do not. The story is amazing. Each season is somehow better than the next, and I like watching how the couples come together and overcome all the obstacles standing in their way. Plus, the outfits and music? It’s perfect.” Lifting my head from his bare chest, I meet his gaze to find a smirk tugging at his lips. “What?”
“You’re cute when you ramble,” he says, his fingers grazing over my lower back as he keeps my body pressed to his. I have one leg thrown over his hip, resting between his legs like I’m desperate to be closer to him. He doesn’t seem to mind.
A comfortable silence stretches between us as a new episode of the regency era TV show begins. His steady heart beats beneath the palm of my hand where it rests on his chest, my own beating in sync as my mind slowly begins to wander.
I still have so many unanswered questions—things I want to ask—but I don’t know how. I’ve never been the type to have trouble talking to someone. But I also don’t think I’ve ever felt this ache to knowall that I can about another person. I want to peel back the layers of his soul and know who he truly is at his core.
Zack had a life before he moved here. What was so bad that he felt the need to run away and start over? Was it just the job that made him move, or was it something else?
As much as I love meeting new people and visiting new places, I couldn’t imagine ever packing up my life and starting over somewhere. Moving out of my parents’ house and in with Becca was a huge change on its own, but I needed to know that I could be independent. I was barely getting by for months before turning to making adult content online. Now that things are financially getting better, my dream of opening a boudoir studio has started to shift back to the forefront of my mind.
“I can feel you thinking.” His low, deep voice breaks the silence.
My thumb taps against his chest. “My mind never really shuts off.”
“What are you thinking about?” he asks.
I give myself another moment to revel in his comforting warmth before I say, “I was thinking about what kind of life you had before Haven Beach. . . before me.”
He lets out a deep hum. “Is that all?”
I hesitate. My mind is a carousel of thoughts, endlessly spinning around and around. “I was also thinking now that I’m not struggling as much with money, I should try and focus more on building my boudoir photography business. Seeing myself in the photos and videos I’ve taken makes me feel confident and powerful. Sexy. I want to help others see themselves the same way.”
A heavy breath releases from his lungs as his fingers comb strands of my hair in a calming, repetitive motion. “Do you want to talk about it, or do you want to keep watching your show?”
He’s giving me the freedom to voice my thoughts without the pressure of having to talk about them. The way he so easily sees me has butterflies taking flight in my stomach.
“I know you lost someone you cared about. Is that why you moved?”
The silence that builds is thick and heavy, settling over us like a weighted haze. I have to remind myself to keep breathing and not let my mind concoct ridiculous scenarios as I wait for him to respond.
A deep sigh escapes his lungs. “For the most part, yes. Ryan was my best friend. We went through the academy together and were partners until the accident. My life back then was… complicated. I wasn’t happy, but I didn’t realize how unhappy I was until he died. Losing him ripped away what little shred of happiness I was hanging on to.” His heart rate has slowly increased with each word spoken and is an erratic thrum beneath my palm. I lift my head from his chest, propping myself up on one arm and meeting his gaze.
The pain shining behind his warm brown irises steals the breath from my lungs. It stirs an ache deep inside of me, sick and slithering with no escape. There’s nothing I can do to take away the pain he feels. No visible entity that I can fight or rescue him from. It’s a pain that only the passing of time will heal, and even then, it’ll likely never fully disappear.
“Why weren’t you happy?” The night we met, he told me life is too short to waste time doing something you don’t love. Waiting for him to speak, I graze my fingernails over his scalp, sliding my fingers through the soft, black curls I’ve come to love.
“I was engaged,” he rasps, his voice laced with ice. There’s no remorse in his words. No hint of a love lost.
Engaged.
I’ve never even felt true desire until I met Zack, and he’s been so in love with someone that he planned on spending his life with them.
“What happened?” The question is a whisper that somehow feels louder than anything else I’ve ever asked him. I don’t think I want to hear his answer. But I need to. I need to know why the relationship ended. Was he the one to break things off? Or was she? Maybe it was the final straw that sent him packing up his life and moving states away to start over. I have no right to be jealous of a woman from his past. I would’ve only been eighteen at that point in his life. Even if we had known each other back then, we wouldn’t have had the relationship that we do now.
