Page 95 of Catch Me
“During that scene. I saw you out of the corner of my eyes and my thoughts switched. One of the first acting tricks I learned for a sad scene was to imagine losing someone I cared for deeply.
“For a while I didn’t need to imagine. When I was younger, my mom had cancer, so at first I would imagine losing her. Then I used Thiers.”
“Your twin,” she says.
I nod.
I don’t go into what happened to my brother, the incident that changed him. But I know the emotion shows up in my eyes.
“Today it wasn’t either one of those scenarios.” The truth is I haven’t had to use that trick in a while. I’ve become better at stepping into my imaginary character’s shoes.
“I’ve worked with Victor Rivez on my method acting for the past half a decade. Today, though, I didn’t need that technique either. I just thought of you,” I admit. “I thought what if this were real and I were losing everything. Then I saw your face, and the idea of losing you sent me into a spiral. That was the emotion I used to act out that scene.”
Ivy blinks, her lips parting but no words come out.
“I love you, Ivy,” I admit. “You’re probably thinking it’s way too soon for me to have these feelings and say all of this to you, but … well, the men in my family fall fast and we fall hard, Ivy.”
It’s so damn true that words are a poor substitute for emotions because what I’ve just told Ivy doesn’t express half of what I’m feeling.
“Are you sure?” she asks, her words barely audible.
“As sure as you’re sitting on my lap right now,” I declare.
Her lips slowly part. “I think I love you, too,” she says, this time it is a whisper.
But it’s enough for me.
She pushes out a heavy breath. “But it scares the hell out of me,” she admits.
“What are you afraid of?”
“That I’ll fail yet again,” she answers. “That somehow I’ll stumble and fall, and this time I won’t be able to get up.”
I cup her face.
“That’s easy, baby,” I tell her. “If you fall, I’ll catch you.”
With that, I cover her lips with mine again.
CHAPTER 27
Ivy
“I’ll catch you.”
I wrap my legs around Andreas the moment he lifts us from the couch.
The bulge poking at my ass tells me he wants it bad, and I want him as much as he wants me.
His words continue to whisper through my mind, as he carries me. They trample over my doubts and confront my fears. The fear of becoming so serious with someone so quickly. The extreme terror of what being in a relationship with someone who has such a high-profile career entails.
And then there’s the incredible, nearly paralyzing doubt of me being too overwhelmed by it all.
But Andreas’ three-word declaration wipes those fears away. For the time being, they do, anyway. I know they’ll all resurface again in the morning.
Right now, in the cloak of night, in Andreas’ arms, I believe him. I trust that my darkness won’t overshadow this, us.
“Stop thinking, baby.” His deep voice penetrates my thoughts as he lays me on his bed. “It’s just me and you here. Just us.”
