Page 111 of His To Unravel
My hand lifts, cupping his cheek, guiding his gaze back to mine. “Nathaniel,” I whisper, willing him to hear me, tobelieveme. “You’re wrong.”
He says nothing, but I see the war in his expression, the way his body has gone so still.
“I don’t need to know Alexander to know that I would chooseyou,” I tell him. “Because Iseeyou. The way you think. The way you feel things so intensely but try to hide it. The way youlove.” I brush my thumb over his cheekbone, and his breath hitches under my touch.
“I love you for who you are, Nathaniel.”
He lets out a shuddering breath, like the words have stripped away some invisible weight from his shoulders. His forehead dips against mine, his hands rising to my face, his grip almost too tight. I let him hold me like that, let him breathe me in.
Then, barely above a whisper, he rasps, “Say it again.”
My chest aches with everything I feel for him.
I thread my fingers through his hair and brush my lips against his cheek, his temple. “I love you.”
He jolts. His fingers curl against my skin, his breathing ragged as he squeezes his eyes shut, like he can’t bear the intensity of it.
For a long moment, he doesn’t speak. Then, his voice comes, hoarse and desperate.
“Again.”
“I love you,” I whisper. “I love you, Nathaniel.” I will tell him as many times as he needs to hear it.
A tremor runs through him.
Then, he’s kissing me as if he can press my words into himself, as if he needs to feel them in every fiber of his being.
I let him. I kiss him back, pouring every ounce of what I feel for him into it.
Because he deserves this. He deserves to be chosen, and I want there to be no doubt. I willalwayschoose him.
His hands grip my waist, pressing me so close that I can feel the rapid, uneven rise and fall of his chest against mine. I cling to him just as tightly, as if I can hold him together through sheer force of will.
Then, suddenly, he tears himself away.
His forehead drops against mine, his breathing ragged, like the act of pulling back physically hurts.
“We need to leave,” he rasps. “Now.”
He grabs my hand, his grip tight as he leads me from the room. The hallways are silent as we pass through them, the dim lighting stretching our shadows against the walls. I barely register the path we take to the front entrance, where his driver is already waiting.
When the door to the Rolls-Royce opens, Nathaniel hauls me inside, slamming the door shut behind us with a force that sends a sharp reverberation throughout the car’s interior. I have no time to settle into my seat before his hands are on me, dragging me onto his lap with a desperation that sends my pulse into a frenzy.
“Nathaniel—”
His arms lock around me as he buries his face in the crook ofmy neck. “Just let me hold you, please.” He breathes against my skin. “Ineedto hold you.”
So, I hold him back.My poor, beautiful boy.
I curl into him while his hands roam, restless, smoothing over my back and sliding down to grip my thighs. I shift to straddle him, so that he can hold me closer, mold my body to his. I soothe him the only way I know how, with soft touches and quiet reassurances while his lips press reverent, open-mouthed kisses to my skin.
The lights of Manhattan flicker past the tinted windows, but the world outside doesn’t exist. There’s only him.
Although the drive back to Central Park Tower is short, it feels endless. By the time the car rolls to a stop in the private garage, I can feel the tremors in his hands, the tension thrumming through his entire body.
Inside, the concierge barely spares us a glance as Nathaniel leads me straight to the elevator.
Once the doors slide shut, he descends.
