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“Liam, I didn’t know what to do. I’m …”
We stare at each other as all my insecurities about us rear their ugly heads.
“All I want is you, Gabrielle. You’re the woman I want to introduce to my family, the only woman I’ve ever wanted to bring around them. I want to hold my girlfriend’s hand in public and not worry that she’ll try to bolt.”
Taking a deep breath, I wave him inside. He follows, but only so much as to stand in the foyer.
“I’m trying, I swear, I’m adjusting. It’s just taking me awhile. It freaked me out when you wanted to go so public today before I’ve ever been to a family gathering. Maybe we could start small, just like that space we talked about you giving me. I can’t just jump right in as much as I’d like to. I want you too, I just … I’m trying. I don’t know what else to say.”
Liam drops his head and a beat passes. I’m almost sure he’s about to call this off.
Until he reaches for my hand and laces our fingers together.
“It feels like I’ve been waiting so long for this, that all I want to do is dive in headfirst and make up for all the time we’ve lost. But I get it. I know why you’re cautious. I’m sorry. I got in my head about it all and I told you I’d give you space?—”
“I’m sorry, too,” I whisper, stepping into him. “I wish I could just stop overthinking, but it doesn’t work like that.”
“I know.” Liam brushes the side of my face with his fingertips.
“We’re going to work it all out, okay? I’m trying, Liam.”
“I know we will.”
We’re stuck at an impasse of wanting more but not allowing ourselves to have it. Or at least I’m not allowing us. But I hope he can hang on enough until my head catches up with my heart.
“Come to bed with me?” I ask, knowing we both know that means something way more than sex.
Being in the comfort of his arms is the only way I want to end the day.
“There is no way I could leave you now.”
We both know he means something way more than just tonight when he says that.
16
LIAM
My phone buzzes on Gabrielle’s nightstand as I watch her in the bathroom applying her nighttime skincare.
I’m lucky she even let me in when I came over half-cocked, ready to demand she let me in at a pace she isn’t ready for. Per usual, her openness surprised me, and here I am under her sheets as she performs a ritual I’m blessed to even get to watch.
Alana’s name pops up, and it’s later than my sister usually calls, so I don’t send it to voicemail. Even if I realize my girl is about to come to bed in an oversized T-shirt, and I’m pretty sure she has no underwear on beneath it.
Dammit, my family has the worst timing.
“Why are you calling me so late?” My grouch side comes out full force.
“Hello to you, sunshine. It’s not that late. Not for those of us who wake up at the ass-crack of dawn.”
“Are you seriously making fun of me for getting up to run the farm that produces the food that pays your paycheck?” She can’t see me, but my eyebrows are raised.
Alana huffs on the other end. “Fine, fine. But I had to tell you something, and I didn’t think it should wait until morning. I just texted you the video.”
Putting my phone on speaker as I go to my messages, open up Alana’s, and see that she has indeed sent me a video to some social media site I don’t subscribe to.
“Oh, what the hell is this? You sent me some stupid meme or whatever and had to call me about it?” Social media and I are not friends.
“Of course not, you idiot. Open the video and watch it.”
