Page 55 of Green
“What was 2.0?”
“Us being married. 2.5 was us being married after your breakup.”
“So the new version would be?...”
“Best friends who are secretly married but openly dating each other. Until such time when we decide to be openly married. To each other.”
He kissed my neck.
“You’re really freaking me out right now.”
“Good. You said you liked that I push you out of your comfort zone.”
“I never said that. When did I say that?”
“When we got married.”
“I never said that. I have no memory of that ceremony.”
“Then how do you know you didn’t say it?”
I tried to push him away. He was right again. About everything. I knew it. I just wasn’t ready to believe this was real yet.
He bridged the distance between us again. He cradled my face in his hands and spoke softly. “I’m not going to argue with you about this. I know what I want, and I just came here to tell you. I’ve been lying to myself since I met you, but I know how I feel and I know what I want now and I’m not going to lie to you. I don’t just love you as a friend and I don’t want to lose what we have but I am so attracted to you Gemma. I want to have sex with you and I don’t want you to date anyone else. I want you, I want you to want me, and I know I just said I don’t want to lose what we have—but fuck that—I’m willing to risk it because I think we have barely scratched the surface of what we can be together.”
Holy shit.
“This was always the thing that was just about to happen between us. The only thing stopping it now is you. You can keep telling yourself you’re scared of this if you need to, but you did risk the possibility of going to jail just to keep me from having to move back to Canada. There’s a daring side of you that’s willing to get dirty and I’m going to have so much fun finding it.”
Part of me was still angry—wanted to yell at him again because I was the one who fell in love with him first—he was the one who was having fun with all those other women. But part of me would always remember that I never told him how I felt. And here he was, telling me how he felt. Damn runner, always sprinting ahead of me, even when he started out miles behind.
He watched me engage in my internal monologue, and I watched him decide that he had said all he could say for now. He got up and backed away.
“Okay. I’m leaving. If you want to talk we’ll talk. If you don’t want to talk to me, I’ll wait until you’re ready. If you want to hate screw me, we should do that before I leave.”
I picked up the first thing I could reach and threw it at him. Fortunately, it was just an eraser. Unfortunately, he deftly caught it with one hand. It was hot. I hated him so much. “Get out of here. I have to get up early.”
“I’m leaving,” he said, grinning and tossing my eraser back at me. “I’m turning around and I’m gonna walk out that door. Try not to burn a hole through my ass when you’re staring at it.”
“Out. Get out.”
