Page 185 of Between the Lines

He strokes up my back in slow, reassuring sweeps. “You were hurt. And you were healing.”

“I thought I was over it,” I whisper. “But I didn’t realize I’d just closed myself off entirely to the possibility of…this.It’s scary.”

Aiden chuckles a little. “It’s fucking terrifying, Chaos. You could ruin me with a single sentence.”

We breathe in silence for a few moments. Happiness is a slow syrup through my veins, heady and thick, until his words settle trigger a niggling thought in the back of my mind.

“Aiden,” I blurt. “The thing I said, when we argued earlier in the week? About how you shouldn’t believe your own… God, I can’t even repeat it.”

“My own puff piece?” His voice is easy, and his hands never stop stroking up my back.

I close my eyes in shame. “Yes. I’m so sorry, I was hurt, and I didn’t mean it.”

“I read the book,” he says gently. “I know you didn’t mean it.”

I lean forward again, our foreheads touching. “Whatdidyou think about it?”

He smiles. I can almost feel the movement, we’re so close. “I think,” he says, “that you’re the most talented writer I know. You made me sound infinitely better than I truly am. You also made observations that… I’m going to have to think about some more.” He strokes his thumb along my cheek. “No one has ever known me quite like you, Chaos.”

“I feel the same way,” I whisper. “You figured me out so fast.”

“I’d say that you read me like a book, if that wasn’t terribly cheesy,” he says. “And wrong. Because you’ve written the book.”

“Mmm. I just had to learn to read between the lines.”

He kisses my temple again, and I close my eyes, feeling his steady heartbeat against mine.

“Aiden,” I say.

“Mmmhm?”

“I want to try living in Los Angeles for a bit.”

He’s quiet for a long beat. “Really?”

“Yeah. If that’s okay.”

“Okay?It’s fucking perfect.” His hands come to cup the sides of my face. “But are you sure? You’re not going to give up anything because of me. I want to give you things. Not take things away.”

That makes me laugh. “Aiden, in what world would me living with you betaking things away?I want to try staying in one city for a bit. I want to write my new book. And maybe… I want to try being a girlfriend.”

A slow, wide smile spreads across his face. “My girlfriend.”

“Yes.Yourgirlfriend.”

He kisses me again, and then pulls me tight against him. I feel his heart beating. “I am very happy right now,” he says.

I close my eyes against the welling of sudden tears. “So am I.”

We sit like that for a long few minutes. There’s only the sound of the creek behind us and birds in the distance, settling down for the night. Somewhere, a car engine starts.

“Do your parents like wine?” Aiden asks.

I laugh. “What?”

He leans back to meet my gaze. “I’ve brought a case ofLangleywine for them. I know I’ll have to fight an uphill battle to try to win them over.”

I laugh again. It slips out of me, warming the little glade. He looks at me with a widening smile. “Wrong choice?”

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