Page 62 of Love at a Funeral and Other Awkward Conversations

My body responds before my mind can, and I relax my legs, sink into his sure and steady hold, and he presses the advantage, dipping his fingers inside me, twisting until he finds the spot that has me moaning and my fingernails digging into my palms.

“I would wait for you forever, but I’m glad you’re not making me,” he says, and I can’t register what he’s telling me. Not when his stubble is raking over my skin and his lips are turning me to mush. “You feel it? You feel how much you want me?”

I can. I can feel my inner muscles working, convulsing around his fingers. I can feel my heart racing, my chest heaving with each breath. I feel everything. I feel it all.

And it’s too much.

“It can be like this all the time,” he murmurs against the shell of my ear. “Let me in, and I’ll make sure it’s like this all the time.”

Then he bites the slope of my neck and shoulder, and he presses hard inside me at the same time he circles his thumb over my clit, and fireworks go off inside me too.

Above me, they pop and sizzle, like my heart when Vince smiles down at me as if everything is right in the world.

But it’s not.

He tenderly removes his hand from inside me, slipping out of my ruined panties, and gently brushes my hair back from my sweat-slicked temple. Then he sticks his wet fingers in his mouth, ruining me.

And I blink, trying not to cry.

He rolls on top of me. “Don’t, sweetheart. Please don’t overthink this.”

I shake my head and push against his chest, forcing him to give me room.

To breathe.

To think.

Because, yes, I am overthinking.

I sit up, mindlessly wiggling my fingers and arms, anxiety and alarm creeping into my bloodstream as his words finally hit me.

You’re the sweetest girl I’ve ever known, delicate and soft. I’ve always known, always saw it in you, no matter how you try to hide it.

Let me in, and I’ll make sure it’s like this all the time.

I’ll take care of you.

I would wait for you forever.

And it’s not fair. It’s not fair of me to make him wait and take care of me.

He shouldn’t have to.

He shouldn’t want to.

I’m broken beyond repair.

I fix the straps of my dress and settle the skirt over my thighs, telling him the first honest words that come to me. “I would drag you down.”

He leans into my space, laughing like I’m kidding. I’m not.

“You think you could actually drag me down,” he says, wrapping me up. “With these arms?”

Even now, I want to laugh. I want to cry. I want to stay in his perfect embrace, but I can’t, and I wiggle out of his arms, meeting his amused gaze until he sees the truth in mine.

He drops his chin toward his chest for a moment, his shoulders rising and falling on a breath I can’t hear over the fireworks. He nods a few times to himself before lifting his eyes to mine. The corner of his mouth hooks up sadly. “You won’t accept it, will you?”

You won’t accept me is what he’s really asking. And I can’t.

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