Page 30 of Wrapped Up In You
“I think I’m going to go home tomorrow.”
He came around and sat on the edge of the couch near my hip, where there really wasn’t room for both my body and his, yet I still scrambled to move as far in as I could to make space for him.
“Why? I thought you were going home on the twenty-seventh?”
His voice held a tinge of panic that was endearing yet made all of this so much worse. Hope was a dangerous thing.
“I just think our lines have gotten crossed here, Lu—Jonathan. This was just going to be a fling, right? Well, it doesn’t feel like a fling anymore, and I’m afraid one of us is going to get hurt.”
“I don’t like it when you call me Jonathan.”
“Out of all of that, you focused on the name I call you?”
“I don’t like it. Everyone calls me Jonathan. Jonathan is serious. He’s organized and on time and boring as fuck. Lucy is…fun. He’s silly and sexy, and he doesn’t worry so much about every goddamned thing. I want to be your Lucy.”
Oh, dear god. How was I supposed to do the right thing here? My throat was thick with emotion, the backs of my eyes burning with unshed tears.
“What’s going to happen when we go home? Are we going to keep doing this? Are we going to announce to our family that we’re dating? How’s that going to work?”
He fumbled with the blanket, digging around until he uncovered my hand, then grabbed it in his, holding it tightly. “I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t fucking know. I just know that imagining life without you right now…hurts. It fucking hurts, and I’m scared. I’m scared of losing you, and I’m scared of keeping you.” He brought my hand to his lips and kissed them before resting his forehead against my fingers. “Mostly, I’m scared of losing you.”
“I’m scared too,” I whispered.
“Give me more time, okay? Give me tomorrow while I figure shit out. Please? I’m not ready to watch you go.”
Every last bit of resolve was smashed to smithereens as I swallowed past the lump in my throat. “Okay, Lucy. I’ll stay. One more day.”
“Thank god.” He kissed my hand again, then stood without letting it go. “Will you come to bed now? We don’t have to do anything but sleep if you don’t want to. I just want to hold you.”
“Yeah.” I tossed the blanket off me, untangled my legs, and stood. “I’ll come with you.”
I was afraid I might follow him anywhere if he’d let me.
17
JONATHAN
December 26
Iwoke to sunlight streaming in through the windows and a sleeping Hayden wrapped in my arms. I’d lain in bed for hours after he’d fallen asleep, savoring the feel of him in my arms and wondering what the hell we were going to do about this situation between us.
I was nothing if not a champion worrier, so my mind had managed to conjure up every possible way this thing between us could go south. We were so different. Our parents would never accept it. Society would never accept it. He would get discovered by a record label, become famous, and want nothing to do with me.
But for every one of those disastrous imagined scenarios, I’d come back to just how right it felt with him. Yeah, we were different, but we also complemented each other. Wasn’t there something to the saying “opposites attract?” Our parents would accept us, or they wouldn’t, and damn, I hoped they would, but if I had to choose between Hayden and our parents’ approval, I’d choose Hayden every time.
And that’s really what it came down to. Life without Hayden was no longer an option.
I just had to convince him of that.
I pressed a kiss to his shoulder, allowing my lips to linger there before moving a half inch and repeating the gesture. I continued in this way, lazily pressing kisses across the ridge of his shoulder, enjoying the way the heat of his smooth, sleep-warmed skin felt beneath my lips. As I pressed one more kiss to the base of his neck, right where it met the curve of his shoulder, he breathed deep, coming awake and sighing contentedly. I smiled against his skin, enjoying everything about this moment. The simplicity and pleasure of waking up next to someone you were into. Leisurely taking the time to savor and feel and enjoy without allowing worry and stress to intrude.
He rolled halfway onto his back, just enough so he could look at me with lazy eyes.
“Good morning,” I murmured, pressing kisses along his stubbled jawline.
“Mmmm. Good morning to you.” I felt his smile underneath my lips as I continued my way down to nibble on his ear.
“How’d you sleep?” I asked, licking the spot just behind his ear. He practically purred like a cat. “I slept like the dead.”
