Page 177 of Going Viral for Christmas
Soren doesn’t ask questions. Or make a joke. He obeys. Piece by piece, he undresses with my help, right there on the floor, until nothing remains but the man who’s seen me at my worst—and stayed.
I rise slowly, unhooking myself from the past that’s clawed at my ankles for too long. My dress slips off first. Then my bra. Then my panties. Layer by layer, I strip away more than fabric.
I strip away fear. Shame. Doubt.
I move to straddle him, and Soren’s hands settle lightly on my thighs, but he doesn’t grip. He doesn’t guide. He letsmecontrol the moment.
Cradling his face in my hands, I gaze down at him, finally seeing him for who he is—which isn’t the viral fantasy, or the book boyfriend brand—but the man who braved my family, created a night made special for me, watched the Twilight Saga…
Told me he loved me and meant it.
And got on the floor when I broke.
“I need to do this. My way.”
His voice is hoarse. “Anything you want, Bells.”
I kiss him. Sure. Deep, pouring everything into it—everything I’ve held back. The terror. The hope. The way he’s unraveled me with every single touch, all of his words, and each time he looked at me.
I sink down onto him, taking him inch by deliciously hard inch. There’s no rush. No urgency. I want to feeleverybit of his eager cock.
Soren groans beneath me, his hands tightening, but he doesn’t move. He lets me ride the rhythm, lets me lead us both deeper into this new thing we’re building.
My hands slide down his chest. My hips roll. His name leaves mymouth like a song he wrote, and when he answers with mine on lips, it’s tender and cherishing.
This man is not a risk.
He’s the reward.
I keep moving, grinding, learning the parts of him that tremble when I clench around him. I kiss his throat. I tell him I want all of him—every broken, beautiful piece. His eyes never leave mine. And when the climax hits—when I flutter around him and he pulses inside me—I don’t break.
Ibecome.
I’msomething new. Something more.
We collapse, breathless, sated, and I curl into his chest, no longer afraid.
Soren runs his fingers through my hair, whispering words I can’t quite catch.
“What did you just say?” I ask.
Soren presses a kiss to my temple, and the world tilts. The sound of it — so sure, ordinary — punches through my ribcage like sunlight through a shuttered window. “I said… You saved me, Bells. Forever, I am yours.”
The words land, and all the places I’ve kept locked up rattle. My lips part to tell him the truth back, that he saved me too, that he rewired something that had been snapped and rusted inside me, but the sentence dies behind my teeth. Fear crawls up my spine like cold ivy, and the reflex to brace, to fold the fragile parts of myself into a smaller shape where no one can reach them, takes over. I taste salt from a laugh I try to force out and feel ridiculous for wanting to cry and laugh and fling myself at him all at once.
So, I close my mouth and inhale the smell of him, pine and snow, and honesty, and press my hand to the place where his heart would be if I could map it. My fingers tremble. I can feel, in the unbridled ache beneath my ribs, how much he means it. He means so much to me. That should be enough. That should let me say the words, hand him back the gift he’s given.
But the memory of promises that turned to paper boats and drowned keeps its hold. Trust is not a light I can switch on. It’s a roadI’m too fearful to walk down. I want to offer him everything he’s handed to me—the safety, the staying, the reckless kindness. But the part of me that learned to survive by leaving a piece of myself at every exit still hesitates at the door.
Therefore, I say nothing. I curl into him in the only way I know how: with my trembling body, with a silence that means yes and maybe-not-yet all at once.
Soren doesn’t push. He holds me like I’m the most deadly and most beautiful thing he’s ever been trusted with, and that stability almost breaks me open. Because some wounds take longer than one night, one poem, one promise to trust again. I’m terrified of handing him my whole heart and watching him learn how to let go, and proving me right all over again. Proving that love isn’t forever, except in stories. That even the best of them leave, no matter how tightly you hold on.
Thirty-Two
SOREN
I’ve done a lot of humiliating things for the sake of marketing.
