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“Love you more,” she said and hung up the phone. I walked out to the living room to return the phone to Dillon.
He looked up at me, the corners of his eyes creasing in a slight smile. “How is she?”
“She seems good. She didn’t tell me a thing about herself, which is starting to get mighty familiar and annoying.”
He snorted a little.
“Look, I know that I’m pretty closed off. It’s just been my way for so many years that I don’t think about it anymore.” He huffed out a strong breath of frustration. “But for what it’s worth, you make me want to… not be.”
The words were stilted and awkward but said so genuinely that I felt them in my gut when he said them.
I don’t know how long I stood there for, with us simply taking each other in, but when the other shoe didn’t drop, I turned around and walked down the hallway.
“By the way,” he asked as he turned back to his work, “who’s eloping?”
I spun around to see the little grin quirking up on his face and barely escaped from the room without rushing back to kiss the smile off his face.
19
DILLON
That morning, when I woke up, I did what had become my favorite part of my new routine and turned around, burying my face in Macy’s neck and peppering kisses down the back of her spine.
“Are you really that insatiable?” she groaned into the pillow.
I chuckled as I kept moving down her body. “Are you really choosing sleep over sex?”
It was hard to believe she’d been there for a month already, but that was what the calendar was saying.
Before I finished with Macy and left her exhausted with pleasure on my bed, I pressed a kiss to her cheek and got up to take Bucky for a walk. Once I got up, I witnessed Macy roll over, hug the pillow, and plant a sated smile on her face.
Now, after a week and a half of having her stay in my room, I found that far from getting sick of her, I didn’t know how I would ever want her to leave again. As much as we’d agreed that this would be a temporary solution while Alex was in town, I was becoming dangerously used to having another person in my home and my life.
Even more unusual was the fact that she’d made me into a much more social person than I had been in the years since I’d moved home. I was going into town every few days for supplies that weren’t absolutely necessary, garnering fascinated looks from the people who’d always known me as the hermit on the mountain who only came into town as a last resort. But I was getting a lot more used to the presence people around me as I went down the hill every few days, alternating the routine so that I was always there on different days of the week.
The asshole made it shamefully easy to see what he was doing; apparently, he’d established a pattern as soon as he got here, and he never alternated. For some reason, he was still hanging around, something telling him that Macy was still close. The arrogant fucker took it for granted that he was going to find her and get her back, because he felt fucking entitled to her.
There were no words for the anger I felt whenever I saw him, but I tried to stay as even-keeled as possible whenever I did see him. I couldn’t tip my hand.
When I got back into the house, Macy was just finishing making eggs and bacon and putting the coffee on for the two of us.
“Thanks for doing that,” I said, walking up behind her and taking the mug she’d held out to me.
“Sure. Thanks for this morning,” she responded, straight-faced, even though the color stained her neck and cheeks.
“My pleasure,” I said and meant it, leaning down to kiss her.
“Are you going into town again today?” she asked, her eyebrows furrowing with worry as she looked back up at me.
“Yeah. I’m not expecting a lot. I just want to keep tabs on him.”
She sighed. “Okay. I guess it’s worth it.”
I reached out, running my thumb under her cheekbone gently. “Don’t worry. I’ve never given you away.”
“I know. I trust you,” she said, bending her head down to press her lips into my palm.
I couldn’t let her know what it did to me to hear those words, but I leaned down and kissed her again.
