Page 85 of Quietly Falling
He’s silent, his body shaking as he holds me tighter, his tears hot on my skin, and my heart breaks all over.
Has anyone ever held him like this?
Has no one seen how badly he’s hurting?
But they have—Sorren and Rhea, Mason and the guys, the girls and the kids and so many more.
Theyallhave.
And they knew that we’d somehow make it here, that we’d somehow make it through, that I’d be the one to make him see how much he brings to this world.
“Say you’re mine,” I whisper.
“I never want to be anyone else’s,” he says, pulling back and not shying away when I wipe the wetness from his cheeks. “I love you, Ella, more than I ever thought possible. More than I ever thought I deserved.”
“You deserve it all. And I promise to show you every single day. I…” Emotions clog my throat as I stare at the man who stole my heart, the one who had simply been a crush but turned out to be so much more. “I love you, and I never realized how much I’d been missing out on.”
“Not anymore.”
“Because we’re way past falling, huh?” I tease, and his expression is tired but hope flickers in his eyes.
“It’s the easiest thing I’ve ever done; I was just scared it was gonna be ripped away.”
“And what do you think now?”
“I think I’d like a shower and to fall asleep with you in my arms,” he says, kissing me slowly, “and then tomorrow I’d like to figure out how to start living for the next sixty years.”
“It’s going to be amazing.”
“Because you’re everything.”
41
BODHI
It’s nearly noon by the time Ella and I manage to get out of bed. Last night had been a trust fall off the highest building without a parachute, the adrenaline almost too much to bear.
But I hadn’t hit the ground.
My descent had been slowed not once, but twice.
By a bonfire.
And in her arms.
I feel lighter and wrung out all at once, but I still owe her some of my truths. Because I don’t want there to be anything standing between us.
Like my past.
“Take a walk with me?” I ask over my second cup of coffee, the spoon of cereal halfway to her mouth.
“Right now?”
“When you’re done.” I smile, noting that her face is still flushed from the time I spent between her legs. My scalp prickles with the way she’d gripped my hair, holding me against her pussy as she bucked her hips.
It was heaven.
And I needed it desperately after yesterday. I’d been in and out of therapy, but I’d never felt as much relief there as I did in Ella’s arms, losing myself in her body. But it was more than that.
