Total pages in book: 173
Estimated words: 169266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 846(@200wpm)___ 677(@250wpm)___ 564(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 169266 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 846(@200wpm)___ 677(@250wpm)___ 564(@300wpm)
She nods once with a sly smile. She remembered what I said about my kinks.
Guess she’s okay with it.
Satisfied for now, I roll onto my back and pull her against my chest.
“Don’t go anywhere,” I murmur into her hair. “Stay with me. Just a little longer.”
“I really do have to go eventually.”
“I know.” I tighten my arms around her. “But that’s eventually, not yet. Give me the morning. Breakfast. Maybe a shower.” I pause. “Definitely a shower. You’re filthy.”
She laughs, swatting at my chest. “And whose fault is that?”
“Mine. But just so you know, I’m not sorry.”
We lie there for a while, tangled together, her heartbeat slowing against my ribs. I stroke her hair, her back, her hip—touching her just because I can, because she’s here and she’s letting me and I’m fucking addicted to her.
“When you came back last night,” I say eventually, “I was surprised.”
“That I came back?”
“That you came back so quickly.” I hesitate. “But yeah, that you came back at all. I half-expected you to disappear. Check out of your hotel. Leave without saying goodbye.”
“Why did you think that?”
I rub my lips together while I think it over. “I was afraid.”
She flinches and adjusts herself on her elbow to look at me. “Of what?”
I shrug. “I dunno. That maybe you got what you wanted from me. I am your target, aren’t I?”
Her eyes widen. “Target?”
“You know. The subject. You’re writing about me as a journalist and maybe this signified that you got all you needed from me. It wouldn’t be the first time, you know, that someone got close and then backed off once they could brag to their friends about it.”
She stares at me for a moment, her expression troubled, then gives her head a shake. “You think I’m doing this to brag to my friends? Nate, I don’t have friends.”
Now I’m giving her the same look. “No friends? How is that possible?”
She looks away. “It’s just hard in this line of work. And I guess I’m a workaholic. It’s mostly my fault.” She glances back at me. “I’m not going to just up and leave. I still have an article to write.”
“And then you’ll leave when you’re done.”
She blinks and gives me a soft smile. “Not if I don’t want to. Not if I can find a reason to stay.”
I swallow thickly. Her words give me some assurance, enough to keep the demons at bay. The feeling of being used is a hard one to get over, and the idea that none of this means anything would kill me.
“You know, you make it very hard to be smart about this,” she whispers.
“Good.” I kiss her softly. “Smart is overrated.”
We stay like that, breathing each other’s air, until her stomach growls loudly enough to break the moment.
I laugh. “Hungry?”
“Starving,” she says, cradling her belly.
I sit up, pulling her with me. “Come on. I’m making you breakfast.”
“You mean you can make more than grilled cheese?”
“I can manage eggs. Toast. And don’t forget the coffee.”
“A man of many talents.”
I find my sweatpants, and she pulls on my shirt from yesterday—the sight of her in my clothes does things to my brain—and we make our way to the kitchen.
She perches on a barstool while I gather ingredients, and I’m struck again by how natural and right this feels, like we’ve been doing this for years instead of hours.
Keep her, the darkness whispers. Whatever it takes.
For once, I don’t argue.
“Scrambled or fried?” I ask, cracking eggs into a bowl.
“Scrambled.”
“Good choice.”
I cook while she watches, occasionally stealing sips of her coffee or reaching over to touch my arm, small intimacies that might not seem like much but somehow mean everything.
When the food is ready, we eat at the kitchen island, our knees bumping under the counter. She tells me about her parents cooking growing up, about Sunday roasts and Yorkshire puddings. I tell her about the terrible MREs I survived on during deployment, about dreaming of real food in the Afghan mountains.
We’re halfway through our eggs when her phone buzzes.
She glances at it, and a conflicted look comes across her face. “I really do have to go this time,” she says, giving me an apologetic smile. “My editor wants to see my draft notes. Make sure the profile is on track.”
“When?”
“This afternoon.”
“That gives us the morning.” I set down my fork and go to her, pulling her against my chest. “Plenty of time.”
“Nate…”
I dismiss her protest by kissing her, slow and deep. When I pull back, her eyes are glazed.
“Shower first,” I murmur against her lips. “Then we’ll see where the morning takes us.”
“That sounds dangerous.”
“The best things usually are.”
She laughs and lets me lead her toward the bathroom, and I think—not for the first time—that I would burn down the entire world if it meant keeping her here.
Obsession, Julia’s voice echoes.