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"No, that’s not—fuck. Close your legs." He reached for my knees and gently pushed them together. "I can see how wet you are and I can’t concentrate." He swore under his breath. "This is fucked up. I wanted to tell you at the aquarium—I put the whole thing together. The whole goddamn thing. Deals with the devil were made—Cleo owns my summer now and Ryan had to go ahead and—"
"Adam, what are you talking about?"
"This was supposed to be nicer. I didn’t want to do any impulsive shit," he insisted.
"Adam."
"When you were drunk, for your overnight shift…we danced, and you were stumbling over the place, and I had to pick you up, and put you to bed." Adam shook his head. "And I was exhausted—I was tired as shit—the whole day was shit."
I could feel the restlessness from him, he couldn’t stop shifting, blurring his words together.
"And I got on my knees and…" He hesitated. "I told you that I was falling in love with you and you fell asleep before I could finish."
I stared at him. Stunned.
"It’s been you since the beginning, ice princess," Adam said. And where he’d been so shaky before, there was a new strength to his words. "It’s always been you. There’s no one else. It’s just you.”
My throat squeezed. "Your coach said—"
"Coach Lawson wanted to call the whole babysitting thing off on Monday. After the RA conference," Adam stopped me before I could even finish.
"When—when we came back?"
"Right then. He said he went overboard—he was worried about his stepdaughter transferring here next semester—and we could call the whole thing off." A low laugh burst out of him without humor. "I pulled every goddamn trick in the book to make sure that didn’t happen."
"You kept this going," I realized.
"I did. Because I selfishly wanted you all to myself. And I thought maybe if you stuck around for long enough, you could learn to like me. Because I am obsessed with you." He took a deep breath. “That kiss in the blue room? Fucked my head up. It did. It fucked me up and I know I’m not what you were expecting, but I’m your soul connection, Piper. It’s me. Right here. I’m the one for you. And if I’m not, I don’t give a fuck.” His voice dropped. “I’ll do anything to be that guy."
My heart pounded in my chest, my ears, my whole body, as I gazed up at him. He did all of it for me. The aquarium—the whole night. Adam knew that was what I wanted, the toe-curling magic you find in movies, the kind of thing that makes your stomach do flip-flops and your breath catch in your throat.
But the aquarium didn’t give me that. Adam did.
He always did.
I pushed up gently from the bed while Adam kept talking, adding on more and more things to his confession like he was trying to convince me.
He ran his hand through his hair again. "Do you know what I dream about now? This is some weird shit, Piper. In the dream, I was waiting for you at the airport. That was the whole dream—that was the entire dream. And I was so fucking happy during it because I thought, she’s coming home. Piper’s coming back to me—"
"Adam?" I reached up and put my hands on the side of his face, looking up at him.
His hand covered one of mine. "You don’t have to say anything. I just—I needed to tell you."
"I love you," I whispered.
"You—?" Adam’s face cleared. "You love me?"
"I do."
I loved him with the kind of deep, bottomless well that I never loved Thomas with. And every day, I loved him even more. I loved every part of him, even the parts that drove me up the wall.
"You love me?" he repeated, a lone smile on his face. "You love me?"
"Corny jokes and all," I promised.
"Well, I have that fucked-up kind of love for you," he admitted, drawing me closer. "If you ever divorce me, I’ll keep a shrine in my house."
A breathless laugh escaped me and he laughed too, crashing his lips against mine.
