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Daniel stood, brushing off his shorts. “I told you, it’s not ruined if I’m with you.”
Amelia could only look at him, wondering how she could ever go back to seeing him at work, all stiff and polished. Here, he had been himself, wearing casual clothes and letting his hair curl freely. He was an entirely different man than the one she thought she knew.
He held out his hand to her, offering her help to get up. She took it without hesitation, allowing him to pull her to her feet. His hand was warm and comforting, just as it had been on her back. She blinked at him for a moment, intensely grateful for his presence, before she pulled her hand out of his to brush the sand off of her own outfit and to pull her unruly hair back.
After she texted her family that she would have to skip the taco shop for the night, they made the short walk back to the condo. When they got into their room, Amelia lay on the bed. All she wanted to do was sleep.
“I can go out on the balcony if you need alone time,” Daniel said, pulling out a book from his bag. “I’ll just be reading.”
She usually would kill for alone time. When she was with Andrew, she always wanted to be away from him when she was upset. But the idea of being in this room and Daniel being somewhere else made an unknown emotion swell in her—one she didn’t like.
She immediately knew she didn’t want him to leave.
“Stay, please,” she urged.
“Are you sure?”
She nodded.
“You’re not just saying that for my sake?”
“I don’t . . . I don’t really want to be alone right now.” She felt a blush rise to her face. “I understand if you do, but I kind of liked it when you were there with me.”
The bed dipped with his weight.
“Okay, I’ll stay.”
“But you don’t—”
“I’m fine with staying,” he said. “It’s a little dark to be reading outside anyway.”
Amelia nodded, and he sat against the headboard, just barely touching her. She had room to move if she needed to, but she stayed rooted to the spot, enjoying his warmth.
For what felt like forever, she sat in silence. Usually, she would play on her phone, but she was so focused on being next to someone that she forgot to. She was lying down while he was sitting up, and if she moved just slightly, her head would be in his lap, which would be unbearably intimate.
“What are you reading?” she asked after a long moment of silence.
“It’s a fantasy. It’s one of my favorites, actually.”
“What’s it about?”
“Oh, you know, a kid in a bad environment being taken to a magical place where he can be himself,” he replied. “It’s a common trope, but . . .”
“It resonates with a lot of people,” Amelia said. “Maybe I can read it sometime. It sounds really good.”
“I could . . . read it to you now,” he offered. Eyes wide, she looked up at him and found his face turning red. “Never mind, that was a weird suggestion—”
“No,” she interrupted. “I’d love that.”
“Here goes nothing,” he muttered. “This is going to be mortifying if I’m a terrible out-loud reader.”
But he wasn’t. Hearing a world told through a voice she knew kept her engaged in a way most audiobooks couldn’t. It didn’t matter that he didn’t start on chapter one. She was putting together pieces, hanging on to every one of his words.
She didn’t want to fall asleep, even though she was exhausted. She clung to consciousness for longer than she should have, but eventually, she dozed off to the sound of his soft, low voice.
Chapter Fourteen
Daniel
