Page 67 of Fall Into Me

If I could just make it around the block, that would be enough. If I could juststep outside, that would be enough.

My hand twitched for the doorknob three times but never made contact. On the fourth and final attempt, I heard him walk up behind me. Felt the way he stood just close enough for his chest to touch my back on his inhales.

“You have no concept of personal space.” My voice was rough, like all those screams hadn’t been just in my dreams. There was no bite to my words at all, but it was easier to be like this with him than to be any other way.

“I love to run.”

His statement caught me so off guard that I snorted so violently I started to cough. “I remember you lying on the floor of the gym crying ‘Take me now!’ after a five-mile jog on the treadmill.”

“I wasn’t crying, and thatwasn’tjogging. I’m good at jogging,thatwas attempting an olympic record.”

“You were definitely crying.”

“Hold on—”

I turned around, a big, bright grin on my face that Fane instantly narrowed his eyes at. “Like a big baby.”

“That’s—”

“A big, buff, gym baby.” My smile was so huge that my eyes were crinkling. The look on Fane’s face was so priceless that I couldn’t help but laugh. My head tipped back, and my arms wrapped tight around my stomach, unable to do anything but hold on.

“Okay, laughy pants, are we going for a run or not?”

“Laughy pants?”That just made me laugh even harder, especially with his dry delivery of the words. “Good one, Mr. Soft and Approachable.”

Fane reached around me and snapped the lock on the front door, pulling it open and grumbling about how he was going to toast Ashton’s balls. Despite the last twenty-four hours—despite the last two years—the smile on my face felt genuine for the first time in a long time.

“What the fu—” My arms fumbled for the doorframe, and it was only because of Fane’s arm miraculously appearing and banding around my waist that I didn’t trip over what had to be twenty pounds of lasagna.

He pulled me back into him, crushing me against his chest and what I was going to assume was just some morning wood that hadn’t gotten the hint or the benefit of being tucked away in something sturdier than running shorts.

The tips of Fane’s fingers flexed, and I felt the pad of each individual digit press against my skin. The way my back arched wasn’t on purpose. Both my hands moved to his arm before I did the exact opposite of what I commanded my brain to do. I moved my hips, grinding my ass on the growing thickness I felt behind me.

It was the single, gasping exhale that Fane released that made my eyes fly open. Eyes that I hadn’t even known were closed, and I used my hold on his arm to fling it off me like he had fucking cooties and hurdled over the stack of lasagnas on my doorstep.

“That was—Sorry, uh, your…your parts…are awake.”

Yourparts are awake?Sweet Lord, kill me now.

I was definitely aware of the silent, shaking laughter racking through Fane’s body. I decided to rise above it and focus instead on the pile of family dinners on my porch, like any very normal, verynothorny, morning runner would.

There was no mistaking the beautiful, precise, scrawling letters on the sticky note stuck to the top container.

For sweet Fane, I hope you feel better.

Love, Isla.

And then there was another note just under it in a scrawl that very much belonged to my father and done in something resembling a poorly sharpened pencil.

Fane, I had a bite. Sorry.

Fane’s pointer finger shot across the space I’d hurdled, pushing up on my chin to close my mouth. I swatted his hand away and glowered at him.

“You see that? Your mom thinks I’m sweet.”

I huffed, running my finger up the bridge of my nose. “Well, my mom clearly doesn’t know you that well.”

“Are you jealous, Rosie girl?”

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