Page 180 of Under the Lies

“I’m surprised you just didn’t track me down.”

My words send a ripple of disgust through him. He pulls away from me and stalks farther into the room. “You really think I’d do that?”

He doesn’t yell but might as well have in the way the words hit me.

“I don’t know,” I admit, looking down at my hands before forcing my gaze to meet his. “I haven’t seen you in days, Noah. And it’s not like you’re an open book when it comes to sharing your feelings! I don’t know where we go from here, what we’re doing! Or” —now I’m shouting— “how you feel about me.”

Noah doesn’t say anything, but he motions for me to come closer, to follow him.

I do, with a stampede racing in my chest. I follow him into the living room. And when I do, the first thing I notice is the chessboard with our unfinished game. That’s not new. What catches my eye is that there are more pieces missing than when I left this morning.

Only two remain on the board.

A red king and a white queen.

The king lays on his side in front of the queen as if bowing at her feet.

What…

The stampede gets wilder.

I try not to get my hopes up as I turn around to find Noah on his knees watching me.

The sight of him down there constricts my lungs.

“What is that, Noah?” I ask around the tightness in my chest.

“You’re not going back to that apartment, Sayer. Not unless you really want to, but I’m fucking hoping you don’t. I want you here. With me. For good. I want your crap all over the place, your hair in the damn shower drain. I want you, Sayer. I’ve waited around for you since prep school.”

“What?” I breathe, the word barely reaches my ears.

He says so much that makes my knees feel weak, my palms shake with nervous energy. But the words that wreck me the most?

I’ve waited for you since prep school.

“You don’t know the power you’ve held over me. Have always held over me. You make my life have more meaning than vendettas. More than revenge and anger and all the ways I’ve lived for all these years.” His deep blue eyes are brimming with emotion, alight with emotions he’s never dared said. “You make me feel grounded. You make me have another purpose.” He crawls to me on his knees and that sight alone as tears prick my eyes. He looks so vulnerable. So open and raw. “I don’t want to go another day without you.”

He grabs my hands.

They’re shaking.

My chest tightens at the sight.

He puts my hands over my heart. It beats strong against my palms. “Every beat I have is for you.”

A choked noise escapes me as he keeps talking. “Everything that I am is yours. Everything I have I’ll give you. This heart? It’s yours. Don’t break it. It’s a fragile beast.”

“I promise,” I vow around tears. Happy tears. Healing tears. “Now, stand up. Kings and devils don’t kneel.”

He doesn’t budge. “They do when it’s to their queen.”

I fall to my knees, then. Pulling his face to mine. Our kiss is slow at first, familiarizing each other and steadily building to ravenous where clothes are peeled off one layer at a time.

And as Noah’s unhooking my bra and sliding it off my shoulders, down my arms, he utters a set of words I never thought I’d hear him say. Three little words that destroy me from the inside out.

“I love you,” he rasps from the place his lips tease the hollow of my neck. “I never thought I would love anything, but I love you.” He cups my face, my shocked, tear-streaked, awed face. “I more than love you, Sayer Brooks. I worship you.”

Words I never thought I’d hear, words I never thought I’d get to say back to him. “I love you too,” I mostly mouth, my words inaudible with all the elation building inside me.

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