Page 115 of Finding Our Reality

I spin in a circle, looking at the living room. “This isn’t you, Lulu. Can’t you see that? You don’t belong here. You belong with me. Atourhouse. The house you designed and I built. It’s ours.”

She walks over into the kitchen and grabs a diet soda from the fridge. “What are you saying? You want me to move in? You wanna live together?”

I grab the soda from her hand and put it down on the counter. Scooping her into my arms, I hug her, holding her body tightly against mine, forcing her to her tiptoes. She loves it when I do that. Bending my head, I slowly lick the shell of her ear and whisper, “Hell yeah, I do.”

She loves it when I do that too.

And having her in our house, I’ll be able to do all the things she loves whenever I want.

Chapter 37

ELLA

Fourteen days.

Twenty-three times.

I’ve had sex with Ryland Joseph Crutchfield twenty-three times over the past fourteen days, and I’m ready for a million more. I never wanna stop making love to him.

Never. Ever. Ever.

And that’s what I’m thinking about when Marcum tosses a box of tissues in my face. The box bounces off my chest and lands on the edge of his desk.

“Ow. What was that for?”

“A Kleenex, for you to wipe that smile off your face.”

I lean forward, splaying my hand across the form he’s been trying to read for the past twenty minutes, the twenty minutes I’ve been sitting here pestering him. “You like it when I smile.”

He tries to camouflage his chuckle with a cough. Leaning back in his chair, he gives me the evil eye. “So, living together now, are we?”

I’m not a rocket scientist, but Iama pretty good detective, and I know the ‘we’ he is referring to is not me and him.

“Well, not technically speaking. I still have my parents’ house. And I still have my house in Mobile. I mean, I’m still making a mortgage payment on that one for goodness’ sake.”

The air around me sparks to life. I feel the connection of his presence even before he rounds the corner and walks into the office. Standing behind me, his fingertips trail underneath myhair, searching for my scar. His calloused thumb gently strokes the raised skin.

The timbre of his voice sends chills up my spine. “Technically, the answer is yes. And I told her to put the Mobile house on the market.”

Marcum pokes out his bottom lip, glancing between me and Ry. I can’t decide if he’s happy or angry. I fully expect him to say that we’re moving too fast; instead, he folds his hands behind his head and says, “I hear the market is really hot down there right now. Might not be a bad time to sell.”

Well, that was unexpected.

Shifting in my seat, I look up at Ry. “Did you come in here just to make Marcum worry about my finances?”

He looks to Marcum and back at me. “Nope. I’ve got the DNA results.” He doesn’t wait for us to respond; he simply walks out of the office and heads into the conference room.

I jump out my chair so fast, I nearly knock the thing over. Marcum flings his ink pen across the desk. We race into the conference room, trailing behind Ry.

Waiting on him to pull out his laptop and sign into the secure portal for the private lab is agony. Pure slow death. I tap my foot impatiently on the floor. When I hear the ding, telling me he’s entered an incorrect password, I reach for the computer. “Here, let me do it.”

He cocks his head and twists out of my grasp.

“Ella, settle down. You’re gonna give yourself a heart attack.” Marcum pulls a protein bar out of his interior jacket pocket. “Here, have a protein bar.”

I pick it up off the table and study the mangled bar. “How long has this been in your jacket?”

“I’m not exactly sure. But it’s a protein bar. It doesn’t expire.”

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