Page 88 of Lost Touch
I went into his arms, and he bent and kissed me, long and deep.
When he lifted his head, he looked as dazed with joy as I felt, my whole body buzzing like the bees.
“I love you,” I said, because I honestly couldn’t wait until he fucked me.
“I’m never going to get tired of hearing that. I love you too. And you were fucking awesome in there.”
“I couldn’t have done it without you.” My eyes stung. Oh, God, I was going to cry. So freaking pathetic. “I wouldn’t be alive without you. And I want—Drew, I really want to introduce you to my parents. I want to introducemeto my parents. Can we? I know you wanted to spend the day in bed with me, but—”
“No,” he said firmly. “I wanted to spend the day with you. In a police station, here, in the car, wherever you want. I want to be with you. Every fucking day of my life. Not that I’m not going to get a much nicer hotel room than the last one and fuck you all night later on, so don’t think you’re getting out of it.”
There was nothing I could say to that except, “I’m yours.”
And when Drew leaned down, whispered, “Right back at you,” and kissed me again—I didn’t need to say anything at all.
Epilogue
Home at Last
Drew turned to me where I sat in the passenger seat, my stomach churning and my head so light I thought it might float away.
“You ready, baby?” he asked me again.
I swallowed down bile and stared at the little house across the street, with its weathered blue paint and a lawn surrounded by dwarf citrus trees, lemon and orange, and a lavender hedge along the sidewalk. Concrete walkway to the front door. A bird bath next to an old wooden lounge chair.
Home.
I pushed my door open and got out, knowing that if I didn’t do it right that second, I never would.
This time, Drew followed me up the path instead of leading the way like he had at Clayton’s apartment building. The very last rays of sunset gilded the porch and glittered off the front windows, blinding me for a second.
Long enough that when the front door opened before I could even set foot on the doorstep, it took me a second to see who stood there.
Another step forward.
A woman, maybe in her fifties, with curly blond hair all shot with gray down to her shoulders, and blue eyes.
She had my nose and my lips.
“Oh, God,” she whispered. And then, “Paul!” she shouted. “Paul!” Her voice broke, and she staggered against the door frame, bracing herself with one hand while the other flew up to her face.
“I don’t remember you,” I blurted out frantically. “I have amnesia. But I’m your—you’re my mom, right? Please don’t be angry with me. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to stay away—”
A man about her age, fuck, myfather, appeared in the doorway behind her. Dark hair, but his eyes were the same light brown as mine. And the way he looked at me…
“Asher,” he said, his voice cracking.
I stepped forward.
And they both grabbed me in unison, laughing and crying and saying my name over and over, arms around me, petting my hair and holding on to me like they’d never let me go again.
A scent caught at me, a little thread of memory unwinding from a spool. Perfume, or maybe just shampoo or lotion, but I was a toddler lying in my mom’s lap. She was reading me a book about a rabbit, her voice low and sweet. I giggled when the rabbit stole a carrot and ran away from the farmer…
And then I was there in the doorway again, caught tight in their embrace, reeling from the shock of the transition back to the present.
“Come in, come inside, I can’t believe it,” my dad was saying, and they started to pull me in.
“Wait, Drew!” I called. Because I’d looked back to see him taking a step away, off the porch and into the yard again, uncertain in a way he shouldn’t ever be with me.
