Page 153 of The Perfect Mistake

His thumb strokes up my cheek, and his smile turns rueful. “I’m glad, sweetheart. But you can. Maybe that’s love, when it’s true and deep. It’s the ability to give someone absolute joy… and absolute misery. And that’s what I’d feel if I lost you.”

“Alec,” I murmur. “You won’t lose me.”

His smile stays in place, and a new warmth enters his eyes. “I might. But it would be a far worse fate to lose you before I could tell you that I love you. To lose this, right here…

“You’ve brought magic back into my life. I’ve thought about it, this past weekend. The things that lead us both here. There were so many obstacles in the way of you and me ending up together. So many mistakes, and twists in our paths. What are the odds of you moving in next door to Connie, and the two of you bumping into one another… Victoria passing away, and your hip injury extinguishing a dream. And if the kids’ previous nanny hadn’t quit when she did…”

His thumb moves in slow circles along my jawline, and his voice grows hoarse. “You and I never would have met if not for all those things,” he says. “Maybe we are an accident, or a cosmic mistake. Unplanned and unexpected. But it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

I swallow hard. Tears are welling up, and it’s only a matter of time before they spill. “Does this mean you’re willing to try?”

His smile widens into the most glorious expression, the one I’ve seen more of lately. “Try? I want to do it all. I want you with me every day. I want to spoil you. I want to take you out. And I want you in my bed every night. There’s no end of wants I crave with you. And I can’t remember ever wanting this much, this fiercely, but now that is all that I feel.” His hand cups my cheek, and his warm breath ghosts over my mouth. “I want to make you as happy as you’ve made me.”

“You do,” I say. My voice comes out a bit wobbly, and I grab the lapels of his suit jacket with both hands. “I want all of that, too, and I want it with you. But I don’t want you to change your mind again. To get into your head, and start thinking about what people will say or the age difference or all the things you mentioned the other day.”

He kisses me instead, his lips brushing over mine once, twice, and then a third firm time. “Does this mean I’ll ever stop wanting to wring the necks of people who look at you sideways for being with me? Or that I won’t be afraid you’ll come to resent the age gap someday and leave me? No, of course not.”

I slide my hands up and lock them behind his neck. “I guess I’ll just have to stick around forever to prove you wrong.”

His fingers move down the sides of my body. “Good,” he murmurs and settles them at the small of my back. “I’ve never felt this way with anyone before. It’s like you’ve embedded yourself inside of me, under my skin, and diffused in my blood. You’re essential.”

Warmth races through my body, spreads into my limbs like molten honey. It fills up the hollows I didn’t know I had.

Outside the window, the rain shifts into a heavy downpour that beats against the glass.

Alec’s lips brush mine. “I want to give you everything.”

“I don’t need everything. I just need you.”

He smiles. “You have me. But I’ll give you all the rest, anyway.”

I lean against him, our bodies touching at every point, and whisper the words against his lips. “I love you, too.”

Alec kisses me deeply, taking my breath away, before lifting his lips an inch. “Say it again.”

“I love you,” I breathe.

He grips me steadily, but we fall anyway, sinking to the uneven wooden floor. He hits his knees and tugs me against him. “Sweetheart,” he murmurs. He runs a hand down my back and kisses me with a fierceness that has none of his usual slow finesse. He trails his lips across my cheek, my neck, the scruff on his chin making me shiver. “I love you,” he murmurs into my skin. “I didn’t know how good it could feel to say that to someone again. To mean it with every cell in my body.”

I run my fingers through his hair, the emotions are making it hard to speak. My eyes are blurry. “I love you, too. I have loved you for so long…”

His mouth traces the edge of my camisole, lips over the skin of my chest. “I want you in my life forever,” he mutters. His voice is hoarse, his hands on my waist are tightly wrapped. “I want… I want all of it. I didn’t know I’d missed that, too. The wanting. It makes me feel alive. You make me feel alive.”

I tug his face up and we kiss again. It’s an all-consuming kiss. Every nerve ending of my body is firing. I’m feeling too much, and all of it is concentrated right here, in the tight space between our bodies. Nothing else exists.

Alec stretches out on the floorboards and pulls me on top of him. His hands trace my back, up and down, and he doesn’t stop kissing me.

I hope he never stops.

“I love you,” I whisper again. His hazel eyes are dark and smoldering, and locked on mine, but warmer than I’ve ever seen them. “I’ve never said that to a man before.”

He brushes my cheek with the back of his hand. “I’m honored,” he says.

I feel light, like I could float away at any moment, and also wonderfully anchored to the man beneath me. I trace the faint lines at the corners of his eyes, his high cheekbones, and the thick hair that has the slightest hint of gray. I caress his cheeks down to his lips, and wonder at him being here with me. Lying in his suit on an old floor and looking up at me as if I’m his entire world.

Maybe we’ll float away together.

I flatten myself firmer to him and kiss his neck. He shudders beneath me, and that’s when I feel his hardness, pressing against my stomach. His hands dip lower and slide over the thin fabric of my leggings.

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