Page 182 of A Smile Full of Lies
“Oh?”
He kissed my forehead.
“They’re proof that I loved every part of you before you ever let me dream of touching you.”
My knees buckled. He caught me, his arms strong and sure, pulling me against his chest, wrapping around me like armor. I buried my face in his skin, breathing him in — soap and citrus and something darker. Something one hundred percent him.
“I didn’t mean to find them,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“I wasn’t trying to?—”
“I know.”
He held me tighter.
“I just wanted to upload the press pack.”
His chest rumbled with a low, broken laugh.
“Figures the thing that outs me as a long-time stalker is your fucking work ethic.”
I pulled back, eyes wet, lips trembling.
“You’re not a stalker.”
His brow arched.
“Don’t lie to yourself, princess. I am absolutely, one hundred percent a stalker. I’ve been stalking you for seven years now, and you fucking like it.”
And maybe I should’ve been afraid then. Maybe I should’ve flinched at the confirmation of every twisted suspicion I’d ever had about him. But I didn’t.
Because I knew what it looked like when someone watched you just to hurt you.Thathad been Thayer.
This? This was something else.
“I don’t want you to delete them,” I said.
His brows lifted.
“No?”
I shook my head.
“They’re ours now. All of it. Even the fucked-up parts.”
He was still for a moment. Then nodded once.
“Okay,” he said. “They’re yours too.”
I pulled him into a kiss, and it wasn’t desperate or frantic or frenzied. It wasacceptance.
We lay down together on the bed, his arm around my waist, my head on his chest.
Thunder rolled again outside, the rain still whispering against the windows, and I said the words I hadn’t planned to say out loud yet:
“I think I love you more because of the darkness. Because you let me see it… you let me in.”
