Page 94 of No Place Like Home

She turned around, and that smile that had been on her face got a bit wider, and that right there meant more than any championship ever did. I wasn’t scared anymore. The question that had been weighing on my mind had suddenly lost its weight.

Walking behind her, I wrapped my arms around her waist and rested my chin on her head. She felt good in my arms. She felt like she belonged there.

“What did you make me?” My tone sounded deeper than I had intended.

“Protein pancakes,” she breathed.

I raised a brow because my healthy eating was just a me thing. Jess still ate some greasy as fuck shit.

She cleared her throat. “I found the recipe online.”

“You wanted to impress me?”

Her mouth parted, and she glared at me. I couldn’t resist, and I bent down until I was close enough to kiss her. I could feel her gaze boring into my skin. I had barely grazed my lips against hers when she was pulling back.

I raised a brow and was about to ask her about it, but she gave me half a smile.

“Foods going to get cold.”

Something in her tone begged me to drop it, so I did. I sat at the table and watched as she fixed my plate.

We ate mostly in silence. I knew I needed to approach this conversation with her, but I didn’t know how. Being with me came with added pressure, and it wasn’t fair to ask it of her. But like hell if I wasn’t imagining her with me on my new journey now.

“What are your plans for the rest of the summer?” I asked after a few minutes.

She seemed to think about the question.

“I don’t know,” she said after a while.

“Come on. There’s nothing you wanna do?”

She looked at me weirdly, probably wondering why I was prodding. “I don’t really care.”

That pissed me off for some reason.

“There’s nothing that gets you excited?”

For some reason, I wanted her to say me. What we had.

“No.”

I hesitated before asking, but I did it anyway, wanting to know more. It was starting to feel fucked up that I knew her body, but not her past.

“You never talk about your parents.”

The moment I said that, her body stiffened. There was no answer.

“You can talk to me, you know. I’m more than just your human dildo.” My tone came out harsher than I thought it would.

I was ready to drop it, but she suddenly began to speak.

“What’s there to talk about?” she whispered. “Hewas always yelling and belittling my mother. Can’t remember him ever telling her he loved her, but I remember a thousand ways he drunkenly told her she never did anything right. Or do you want me to talk about how I had to watch my mother stay with a man who abused her all because she had no family?”

She was angry, and hearing her voice break was gutting me.

“Or how I had to take care of my little sister because our parents were self-destructing themselves at every turn. My personal favorite—”

“That’s enough,” I told her.

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