Page 77 of Under The Twilight Rainfall
“Hey, baby.” His voice is gruff, laced with something that sounds like amazement, and when he looks around I can understand why.
He’s seeing our home for the first time.
I flick on the kitchen light, not entirely illuminating us, but letting Dex take in more than just vague shapes and darkness.
It’s minimal. There’s a couch and a coffee table, pictures hanging on the wall, a bookshelf full of photo albums (of Dex’s photos). The walls are cream with splatters and spots of pink and yellow. The floor is hardwood but there’s mats in the kitchen and bathroom with a rug in the living room. We’ve jokingly talked about decorating a couple of times in the last few years, but I always paid close attention to Dex’s little tells that it was something he wanted to be a part of.
There’s not a lot because I wanted him to finish it with me—build this home with me.
“Val.” My name falls from his lips in a shaky exhale, and in the next second my back hits the wall and Dex’s mouth is moving against mine. He has a hand on my nape, holding me to him, and the other explores around my waist, slipping under the material of my scrubs to press into my skin. “Valentine.”
Hearing my full name shouldn’t spark a white-hot heat to simmer in my gut, but it brings up memories of our last night together. Of Dex—for the first time—sinking into my body as he held my face and whispered kisses along every inch of skin he could reach. As he’d moved inside, those kisses became my name—my whole name—over and over until he’d filled me with his release and I’d slipped into him to give him mine.
“What are you doing here?” Not that I can be bothered to pull my lips away from his, wrapping my arms around his neck to crush us closer together.
He feels so solid and real against me.
Mine.
Dex has to be the one to pull away, cupping my jaw in his palm to hold me still. He lifts his phone, wiggling it from side to side, but I barely glance at it because I’m so distracted by the soft, reverent look in his eyes as he stares down at me.
“You asked me to come home.” His mouth curves into a smile, and he pockets the phone to grip my waist. “We have ahome, Valen.”
He kisses me again, but not as urgently this time.
“We have a home, and I have an incredibly handsome, unbelievably attractive in scrubs husband who thought I’d leave him alone and hurting after those voicemails? Baby, as soon as I heard your voice start to tremble, I started booking flights. I’m sorry I didn’t call. It was a mess of packing and calling Spinny and getting on planes and layovers—but I’m here now.”
“For how long?” I can’t help but ask, my throat dry. Selfishly, I want him to say ‘forever.’ But that isn’t fair. I’d promised that I’d be happy as long as I got this: the moments when he comes back.
He brushes back my hair with a smile and a twitch of laughter that I know is because of the color change. For the longest time I kept the black and pink mix, letting the pink fade but never dyeing over it, but a few weeks ago I made the last-minute decision to dye the entire thing pastel pink.
“For as long as I want,” he says, nudging his nose into the hairline behind my ear and kissing the spot just below. “For as long as you’ll have me.”
“You can’t give me that power,” I whisper, head falling back against the wall as his lips make a soft path down my neck.
They quirk into a smile at the base of my throat, and I grip Dex’s shoulders like I need the reminder that this is real. That he’s here.
“Say it, Val. How long will you keep me? If there’s no limit?”
He’s not looking at me, his forehead resting on my shoulder, and I’ve never been more grateful that he doesn’t see the tears that spring in my eyes.
“Say it.”
“Forever, you ass.” I nudge his thigh with my knee, but all that does is open more space for him to fit our bodies together. My voice shakes and cracks, but he doesn’t say anything about it.
“Okay then. I will be here. With you. In this house.” He brings his mouth back up to mine but doesn’t quite apply enough pressure to call it a kiss. His eyes dance and sing with pride and love and happiness, and I need him to finish this godforsaken sentence. “Forever.”
It feels like my heart falls into place. Like a generator has been turned on and kick starts every nerve in my body. Like I’ve been operating half alive for the last four and a half months.
“Don’t make me promises like that,” I say, tucking my chin to my chest to break the excruciatingly gentle look in his eyes.
“Why not?”
Because it’ll break my heart if you don’t keep them.
“I already swore myself to you, babe. Under that waterfall. Five years ago. Again a few months ago. Don’t you get it?”
Dex slips his thumb under my jaw and tilts my head up, forcing my eyes to his as he scrapes his fingers soothingly through my hair.
