Page 197 of Charming Deception

Maybe it’s all the beer.

Maybe it’s the singular, unsettling fear that I’m losing her and there’s nothing I can do about it.

That she’ll choose another life over me and the one I can give her.

That at the end of our fake engagement, one year from when we started, she’ll set off on that new life she wanted when she left this place. I’ve given her the means to do it. She won’t need me anymore.

The panic of it pounds into my brain with every beat of blood through my veins now, the truth purified by alcohol.

Daisy’s head rests on her paws, and she’s still watching me, those pale-blue eyes assessing sleepily. Still deciding if I’m a good idea or not.

“What would make your life complete?” I ask Megan in the silence.

Next to me, she shifts, drawing a blanket up over our cooling bodies.

“I don’t know. I wish I could figure that out, but I just haven’t been able to do that yet.”

We lie in the near-dark, her breathing gradually settling back to normal. I’m still breathing like I’m floating on some raft in a swamp and a creature from the depths is lurking, bumping at my boat. I’m afraid I’m about to capsize, and I don’t know how to find the shore.

Without her, I don’t know what the shore even looks like anymore or why I’d want to get there.

I feel adrift. Poised to drown.

“Sometimes, it takes a while,” she adds with a sigh.

Like when you weren’t born into the life of a billionaire, with everything laid out for you so nicely, she doesn’t say. But I know what she means.

I wasn’t just given everything in life, like some people probably think. But at the end of the day… I kind of was. Even so, I’ve always wanted more. I’ve always been driven.

But right now… I have no motivation. For once in my life, I don’t want anything but the woman lying next to me.

I lie here, half panting and really absorbing that truth into the marrow of my bones, even as the room vaguely spins.

So this is love.

“I thought my life was complete before I met you,” I muse out loud.

It’s the wrong thing to say. I know that when Megan sucks in a breath.

I turn my head to find her staring at me.

“I meant—Shit. I’m drunk. My life was complete except in the relationship department.” I drag my hand down my face. “Obviously. Remember what I said about my fear of no happily ever after?”

Her eyebrows pull together. “So you don’t think there’s any way you could have one with me?”

“No, I fear I won’t have one with you. But that’s up to you.”

“It’s up to you, too.”

“No. It’s really up to you.”

She stares at me for an infinite minute. “This is a dumb drunk argument that’s going nowhere.”

“No. It’s going somewhere.”

She frowns.

The woman is so fucking adorable when she’s annoyed with me. Like a kitten in a bad mood.

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