Page 84 of As the World Falls

“Sounds easy enough.” I was more than happy to stay inside her apartment the rest of the day doing absolutely nothing except being near her. I also couldn’t remember the last time I simply watched a movie and relaxed. Being with her was causing me to have way too many revelations about how I’d spent my time in my adult years, and I wasn’t happy with any of it.

“Do you have a favorite movie?” she asks, sitting back beside me.

I tilted my head, trying to think about it. “I don’t think so.” I was slightly embarrassed about it because I was still human. I should have enjoyed movies and even had some favorites, but I didn’t. Not one. But where I thought I’d find more of her judgment, she just casually nodded along.

“I don’t have a favorite movie either. There are too many. We can pick something together, I guess.”

I turn my head to the side toward her. “You’re being awfully kind.”

She rolls her eyes. “If I’m stuck with you, I might as well make the best of it.”

“So enthusiastic,” I murmur.

“Whatever. I’m going to prep for dinner, so?—”

“Do you care if I use your shower while you do?”

“Oh,” she says as if I startled her. “Yeah, sure.”

I nod in thanks as I go to her bathroom and shut myself inside. I slide open her shower curtain and take in the obscene amount of shower products sitting on hanging shelves in her shower. It was like a rainbow of products, plus some men’s ones, to my surprise.

I stare at them; the thought of her having these, because she has men over and in her shower, makes me want to put a fist straight through the bathroom wall.

I shower quickly, begrudgingly using the men’s shower soaps, but when I step out of the shower, my clothes on the counter are gone, and a clean folded towel is there instead. It’s light pink with little pom-pom balls on each hem. I sigh as I wrap the towel around my waist and walk out of the bathroom, a cloud of steam rolling out as I do.

I walk toward the kitchen where I thought Cecilia would be, but she’s not there or in the living room when I turn around to look. I turn back around and see her bedroom door open, so I go there now and stop inside when I see her on her knees inside her closet, tossing several handfuls of clothes to the side.

“Anything in there for me?” I call out, making her jump and a small scream rip from her. I smirk as she slowly turns around to face me, and her eyes instantly focus on the towel I’m holding closed at my waist and then slowly roam up my wet chest. I pop a brow, watching her watch me. “Or would you rather me stay like this?”

“I…I was trying to find you something before you were done,” she managed to say, although her voice sounded weak and dry.

“So, you’re the clothes thief?”

She hesitantly smiles. “I have to do a load of laundry, so I thought I’d throw your clothes in with mine.” She stands now with a pair of sweatpants in her hand and starts flipping through her hangers before pulling a shirt down off one. “Here,” she says, handing them to me. “It's not quite your style, but it’s not women's clothes.”

I take them from her, noting the dark grey sweatpants I set on the bed. Then, I hold out the shirt for me to see. It was a dull blue T-shirt with a faded white print of the Colorado mountains on it—somewhere I’d never been and something I’d never wear.

“Old boyfriends?” I asked because I had to know, and he better be old, as in the past. “You even had men’s shower products,” I point out.

She blushes, making my chest squeeze. “I just bought the shower stuff for Tobias because he’s been hanging around a lot lately, and the sweatpants are also an old pair of his.”

She doesn’t finish, and I fist the shirt in my hands. “And the shirt?”

“It’s not that big of a deal, James. Just wear it.”

I step closer, making her step back toward her closet door. I continue until she can’t back away any further, and I’m completely in her space. “Who’s is it?”

She huffs incredulously, trying to avoid eye contact with me. “It's just an old boyfriend from college. I never gave it back because I liked how big and soft it was. I’ve washed it a hundred times, so it’s fine.”

“Hmm,” I murmur. What feels like hard clay twists in my stomach as I step away from her. I grab the sweatpants off the bed, walk back to where she hasn’t moved, and trap her with my presence again.

Then I drop my towel.

She lets out a gasping noise but keeps her eyes locked on mine. I grin down at her as I stand completely naked in front of her. I couldn’t help myself. I was so fucking hard already. She was trying too hard to keep her eyes on mine, and her skin was turning a gorgeous color of pink like it was this morning. The idea of someone catching me here like this, in her bedroom, was so forbidden but so damn right.

Maybe her little friend could walk in and see how she can’t resist me. She wasn’t even trying to move away from me. God, I wanted her. It was becoming agonizing having her this close and not being able to do a damn thing about it.

I keep my eyes on hers as I slip into the sweatpants and tie them around my waist. I then take the shirt in my hand, hold it between our barely touching chests, and brace it in my fists as I rip it straight down the middle.

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