Page 129 of Overdue I Love You's
Dean doesn’t hesitate wrapping his arms around me and nuzzling me into his chest, but it doesn’t last long.
I pull away, but he keeps his hands on my waist. “Tell me what happened.”
“Nothing that’s worth bothering you with.” A forced smile. “I promise.”
Dean wipes away a tear slipping down my cheek. “You’re crying for a reason.”
“Oh this?” I wipe away another. “Very normal for me.”
I sniffle, trying to blink away the blurriness.
“Was that your sister?”
I nod.
“She didn’t know you were on a dating show, did she?”
I nod again.
Guess we’re both hypocrites.
“Why?”
“The same reasons you didn’t tell your brothers.”
He presses his thumb against the pulse on my wrist. “Our reasons are not the same.”
And when I look directly at him. Tears shedding. Mascara messed. My chest convulses. Dean stares at me with all his layers peeled away.
In front of me stands a man whose meaning stands in front of him.
I don’t have it in me to ask—to confirm it.
Instead, “You don’t want a girl who doesn’t own up to her mistakes or neglects responsibilities. If you keep picking me, what does that say about your self-respect?”
He finds my gaze again. “The most self-respecting act I’ve done is loving you, Nova.”
I shut my eyes. “Don’t make this hard for me, Dean.”
“Tell me that the kiss we shared was a mistake,” he rasps.
It isn’t. How can it be when I’m thinking about him? The way he smiles or laughs or lets go. I’m thinking about how he’s patient and kind. How his silence is a blanketing presence in my loud thoughts. I’m thinking of the way he calls me lovebird even when I don’t know why.
Dean, I’m always thinking about you.
There’s a section in my brain that’s simply labelled Dean. I’m figuring out how it functions and how it works, but for now it just is.
“My life,” I release a stammered breath. “It’s a mess. That’s why I came onto this show, Dean. I need the winning money. This has nothing to do with you. You’re everything I’ve believed I didn’t deserve yet somehow still got.”
“Then trust that I can help you. Didn’t we decide to do this together?”
“If,” my voice comes out shaky. “You told Azar to pick between you and the woman he loves, who would you want him to pick?”
“The woman he loves,” he doesn’t look away.
“Now see that’s where we’re different because,” there’s a high pitch in my tone before it settles into the base of my sternum. “If the roles were reversed and I asked my sisters who I’d want them to pick, I’d want them to pick me.”
He lets me continue.
