Page 43 of The One I Love
Except that now that I’m looking, there is a new picture. I take a few steps toward it and smile as soon as I see what it is—a picture of the two of us.
“Is this?”
I look back at Shane, who’s walking toward me with two bottles of beer in his hands. He sets them down on the coffee table before he comes up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist as he brings me closer to him. “Jake and Whitley’s wedding.”
In all the craziness of that day, and night, I completely forgot that we had taken a picture before the ceremony. “Right before the ceremony.”
I feel him nod against me. “I might have asked Mariah to send it to me.”
I feel myself smiling, because how can I not? “And you framed it?”
“The next day.”
“And you put it on your mantle?”
“Of course. Where else would I put it?”
This man…
The more and more I see him outside the light of just my best friend, the more and more I fall for him. How can I not?Every day he does something else that takes my breath away. And it’s never anything big. It’s putting a picture on a mantle, or remembering how I take my coffee. I need to quit fighting this. And I need to get out of my head, because right now, that’s the scariest place to be.
I turn to face him and wrap my arms around his neck. His hands tighten around my waist so there isn’t an inch between us. His thumbs start gently stroking at the small of my back, which somehow is chasing away the jitters I had just a few minutes ago. They aren’t all gone. I don’t know if that will happen anytime soon. But somehow being in Shane’s arms is calming me in just the way I need.
“Hey,” he says as he places a kiss on my forehead. “You know nothing happens tonight that you don’t want. Right?”
I chuckle. “Am I that transparent?”
Shane leads me to his couch, where he brings me so close that I’m practically sitting on his lap. “You are. But I also like to think it’s because I know you so well.”
When you’re friends with the guys, there is one topic that’s off limits—sex. It’s the unspoken rule we’ve carried since Simon lost his virginity our freshman year. And while I wish I could avoid saying the words that are about to come out of my mouth, I also know that if Shane and I are going to have a chance, I need to be up front with him. Even if it’s absolutely mortifying.
“I want this Shane. I want you in every way. The more and more I think about it, the more and more I know I want it.”
“I feel like there’s a ‘but’ coming up.”
“You do know me well.” I look down and start playing with the fabric of his jeans as I try and find my words.
“I…It’s been a very—and I mean very—long time since I’ve been with anyone. I don’t want to say the name of that person because I’d rather not talk about him, but yeah, it’s been a minute, and there’s only been him. And, well, I’ve never been good at it. And I don’t think I was ever doing it right, so I know I’m not going to do it right after a very long, emphasis on very long, hiatus. And I don’t want?—”
Shane cuts me off by scooping me into his arms and placing me across his lap. His lips find mine—this kiss hard and purposeful—and I’m pretty sure he’s doing it to shut me up.
I’m okay with that.
“You’re right,” he begins. “I don’t want to hear about him. As far as I’m concerned, that man has no place when it comes to us.”
“I agree.”
“However, I know what he did to you. I know what he said to you. How he made you feel. I saw it. It killed me. I wanted to kill him. But now I get to do something better.”
I tilt my head, not sure where he’s going with this. “What’s that?”
“I’m the one who gets to replace those memories. Because Amelia? There isn’t a memory I don’t want to make with you.”
It takes every part of me not to start crying. Because I want that. I want Shane to be the one to make me forget. To make me feel. To help discover this new version of me. To allow me to experience things I’ve thought were maybe just a fairy tale.
“Shane?”
“Yeah?”
