Page 28 of Harboring Secrets
Liam tasted like peppermint with a hint of coffee underneath. The combination was sweet and a little bitter. Perfect, like the way I fit against him. It had always been easy for me to get lost in Liam, in his kisses and in his arms. I swear we lost entire days of our lives just kissing.
After we met abroad, there had been no separating us. I followed him on the next leg of his journey, both tired of the place I’d been and unwilling to say goodbye to him so soon. He changed his bookings and we shared a room. Meals. Music. Night swims in the ocean and sometimes the hotel pools. Magic surrounded us.
A glimmer of it flickered in me and I found myself smiling against Liam’s mouth.
“Hi,” I said, breathless and a little lightheaded.
“Hi,” Liam repeated back to me. I’d always loved looking him in the eyes. They were a dark shade of blue, the kind that looked like an endless hole in a tropical ocean. The kind of blue that went for miles down deep, leagues under the surface. The kind that held worlds inside them.
Another kiss ghosted against my lips, but Liam made no move to deepen it. We were both affected by it. I could feel his rigid cock pressed against me, matching mine. A large part of me wanted to beg him to lay me down on the floor and fuck me through it. To christen every room in my tiny house and make it all smell like us.
The more sensible part of me knew we’d done plenty of that already. What we hadn’t done was live in the real world together. We’d met in a bubble and while it was wonderful while it lasted, it had been agony when that bubble burst.
My doorbell rang again and Liam looked at me with a furrowed brow. “Expecting someone?”
“Just my dinner.” I untangled myself from him and pulled my shirt down over my crotch to hide the bulge in my pants. I opened the door and thanked the driver for my delivery. I’d tipped well on the app so I didn’t feel bad that I didn’t have any cash on me.
I carried my dinner inside and set it on the island next to the sunset bouquet Liam brought. I traced my fingers over the petals of a pink daisy. The bloom heads were huge, easily the size of my palm.
“The florist must love you by now. These are beautiful.” I turned to him. “But you don’t need to shower me with gifts to make an excuse to come see me.”
“Then how about I shower you with gifts because you deserve them? Because they make you smile, and I like making you smile.”
Heat crept up my cheeks. Why? I had no idea. Sometimes I couldn’t help the giddy schoolkid-with-a-crush feeling that swelled up in me.
“I should go.” Liam pulled his keys from his pocket. “I don’t want to wait to see you again. Can I take you to breakfast in the morning?”
No one had ever taken me on a breakfast date before. Not on purpose. I’d been to breakfast with men I’d spent the night with, but that wasn’t the same as sleeping apart and someone deciding that they couldn’t wait a full twenty-four hours before they saw you again.
“I’d like that.”
Liam gave me a soft, satisfied smile. He stepped into my space again, this time catching me under the chin with a couple fingers and tilting my head up so it was the perfect kissing angle.
The kiss was soft and quick, far too quick for my body’s liking. It screamed at me to go to him when he stepped away.
“I’ll see you in the morning.” Liam turned away, taking my breath with him when he walked to the door. He turned at the last minute and shot me a smile. “And, Brodie, you can keep the shirt.”
My hand went to my chest and I rubbed the space over my heart.
Liam winked at me and then he was gone, leaving me alone in my kitchen wearing a shirt I hadn’t remembered stealing.
Chapter 14
Liam
Fullycognizantofthefact that I couldn’t be idle for the rest of my life, I’d put a call into Oren last night and we’d spent a couple hours spit balling ideas. So far, all of them sucked. I was determined to make a life here, not just for Brodie, but for myself.
The few days I’d spent in my apartment had shown me that my old life no longer fit me. It had been like wearing clothes that used to fit, and they still technically did, but they sat wrong and the seams itched.
My position at the family company wasn’t an important one. I had mostly schmoozed with people and convinced them to spend their money so we didn’t have to spend our own. I wanted something better for myself now. Something that didn’t make me feel like my soul was leaking out of my ears.
Piper had told me time and time again that I didn’t have to work there, but I’d convinced myself that she was wrong. My family had a company and I was supposed to work there. My parents had been gone a long time, but some of my clearest memories were of Father, sitting in his chair, his long legs outstretched and crossed at the ankles. He puffed on cigars that drove my mother crazy, but not enough to forbid him from smoking them. And in those memories, he told me over and over how one day I was going to work at his company, just like Carol.
My dreams had been their dreams. They’d never been my own and that’s why walking away from it all was a lot easier than I thought it should have been at first. Guilt tugged at me now and then as I thought of leaving Carol all alone, but then I remembered that she was a far better business person than I. Smarter, more passionate, and far more capable than I’d ever been. I think my parents’ dreamswereher dreams.
The only thing I knew for certain that I wanted was a life here, with Brodie in it. But Oren was right. I had to find something for myself in all this change. Something that wasn’t Brodie. But I didn’t know what. Yet.
That was a problem for after breakfast.
