Page 56 of Drum Me Away
She lifted a finger. “Okay, I like your emphasis on us. It gives me hope. Also, I’m glad you believe that was all real, because I do too. I want to be like that, Lucas. With you. For the rest of my life.”
I stood where I was, absorbing her words. I’d wanted to hear them for so long.
“Will you tell me one thing?” she asked.
“Sure.”
“Why did you ask for the fake breakup instead of telling me how you felt?”
I paused, considered my words, but if I expected her to be all in, I needed to be too.
“I was afraid I’d lose myself in my feelings for you. My dad told me this story about how, before he met my mom, he’d been obsessed with this girl who didn’t even know he existed, and he thought he would lose sight of the person he was if he didn’t get away from her. I didn’t want that to happen to me either.”
“I am fully aware that you exist, Lucas.”
I chuckled. “I know you are.” And then I moved to the top of the stairs. “Say it again.”
“What? That I know you exist?”
I shook my head and took a step down. “I want to hear you tell me you love me.”
She smiled. “I love you, Lucas Lloyd. Forever and always. With all my heart.”
I don’t know how I made it down those steps without tumbling ass over teakettle, but I did, and then I had Faith wrapped in my arms and her mouth was on mine, and she probably didn’t hear me mumble “I love you” with my lips pressed to hers. But that was okay, because I had every intention of saying those words to her at least once every single day for the rest of my damn life.
When the groping was in danger of becoming enough to get us arrested here in public, I leaned away and cupped her face.
“For the record,” I said, “I think our relationship is more like my parents’ than whatever was going on with my dad and that other woman.”
“Or better yet, we get to create our own story that’s uniquely us.”
I laughed. “I like that idea. Speaking of unique, what’s with the pearls mixed with sweatpants and the new makeup job?”
She spread her arms. “It’s me. I finally realized it was pointless to run away from my past. I’m both of these people—a Hearsy and a Devempor. I might as well own it. Because it’s me. All of me.”
I pulled her tightly to me again, burying my face so I could breathe in the scent of her rainbow-colored hair.
“I love you, Faith. All of you. And I always will.”
She clung to me, her arms twined around my neck, her fingers curled into my hair.
“I cannot wait to spend the rest of my life giving all of me to all of you.”
“I think you just came up with the final verse of our next number one hit.”
She laughed. God, I loved her laugh. And her.
All of her.
Epilogue
Later that evening, at a nearby resort
Faith
“The videoof you two kissing and making up has officially surpassed the number of views for Faith’s true confessions live feed,” Dahlia announced as she plopped onto a sofa, her gaze glued to her phone.
No, she hadn’t been secretly filming us from inside Lacey’s house; we’d staged that makeup scene so our fans wouldn’t lose their damn minds wondering what was going on.
