Page 36 of One Hot Summer
My mind blanked. My first impulse was to step aside, let him in, and offer him a seat like this was some normal visit and not the thing I’d been dying for since the second I watched him disappear into the crowd at LaGuardia. Instead, I just stood there, staring like an idiot, until he gave me a small, tentative smile. “Can I come in?”
“Oh, um, yeah. Of course.” I nodded, stepping back, and tried to remember how to use my words. I breathed him in as he moved past me into the apartment and my head spun with overpowering need. The need to be held, cared for, to be wanted by this man.
I held his scent in as long as I could, committing his smell to memory in case this was the last time I ever saw him. He turned and looked at me, and for the first time in days, I felt like I could exhale.
“I hope it’s okay that I just showed up,” he said, running a hand through his hair. He looked nervous, like he was worried I might kick him out.
I shook my head. “No, I mean—yeah. It’s fine.”
His eyes swept over the spotless living room, then back to me, and the corners of his mouth twitched. “I see you’ve been keeping busy.”
I laughed, but it came out brittle. “If by ‘busy’ you mean rearranging my entire existence every twenty minutes, then yeah. I’m a model of productivity.”
He nodded, hands in his pockets. “I know the feeling.”
I wanted to ask him why he was here, if he’d talked to Dalton, if maybe he’d just come to say goodbye for good, but I couldn’t seem to force the words out of my throat. We stood in the middle of my living room, two feet apart, neither of us moving. The silence built until it was unbearable.
He broke it first. “I missed you,” he said, voice low. “More than I thought was possible.”
I felt the words in my bones. I looked away, blinking hard. “You don’t have to say that.”
He stepped closer, and I felt his presence the way you feel the sun on your face after days of rain. “I’m not saying it because I have to. I’m saying it because it’s true.”
His words hung in the air between us. I finally forced myself to meet his gaze, and what I saw there almost knocked me over. He reached for my hand, threading his fingers through mine. His skin was warm, his grip firm and certain. For the first time in days, I felt something other than regret.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I pushed you away. I thought I was doing the right thing, protecting you and Dalton. But I was wrong. I was trying to protect you, but I was also protecting myself.”
“Protecting yourself from what?”
He shrugged, looking uneasy. “From rejection, from being hurt. I’ve never felt this way about anyone before. Not even my ex-wife.”
My heart pounded so hard I was sure he could hear it. “What are you saying?”
He reached out and gently cupped my face in his hands. “I’m saying that I love you, Adam. I’m in love with you. And if you’ll have me, I want to try to make this work. For real this time.”
My heart raced at his words. I wanted so badly to believe him, but fear and doubt still gnawed at me. “What about Dalton?” I asked. “He hates me now. I’ve ruined everything.”
Griffin shook his head. “He doesn’t hate you. In fact, he’s the one who convinced me to come here tonight. He came to see me earlier. We talked—really talked—and he gave us his blessing.”
I stared at him, not quite believing. “How did you convince him?”
Griffin smiled, the first real smile I’d seen from him in forever. “Easy. I just told him how happy I am when I’m with you, how you’re the best thing to ever happen to me, and how badly I want to keep you in my life, to make you mine.”
The air left my lungs in a rush, overwhelmed. “You do?” I asked, the words barely more than a whisper.
He stepped forward until there was no space left between us. “I do,” he said. “I want you, Adam. All of you. I think we have something worth fighting for, and I’m done running from it. But I need to know how you feel. Is there any chance for us or did I ruin it all?”
My knees almost gave out. Before I could embarrass myself by actually sinking to the floor, I pulled him into my arms and kissed him, slowly and carefully. “I feel the same way. Every single bit of it. I love you and I want to be with you for as long as you’ll have me.”
He pressed his forehead to mine. “I feel I should warn you. There will never be a day when I won’t want you or need you in my life. I’m in this for the long haul,” he whispered.
I nodded, grinning like an idiot. “Me too.”
He let out a shaky breath and hugged me so tightly I thought he might never let go. I didn’t want him to. We stood there, wrapped up in each other, the city noise fading into a dull, distant thrum. With Griffin back in my arms, I was finally home.
The sight of Griffin in my living room—looking somehow both completely out of place and more at home than anyone else had ever been—sent my heart ricocheting up into my throat. We just stood there, each of us looking at the other like we were waiting for the world to pull the rug out from under our feet.
He broke first, his eyes darting around the apartment before settling on mine again. “Do you want to sit down?” he offered, voice tentative.
