Page 100 of Lease to Love

"You're the person who takes care of everyone.”

His fingers curled gently around my hip.

"And all I want,” he said, eyes never leaving mine, “is to care of you."

He looked at me like there was nothing complicated about it. Like taking care of me wasn't a big deal. Like it was simply what he wanted to do.

I didn't have an answer. He seemed to know that.

"Let me take care of you, Summer."

It wasn't a question… But I nodded anyway.

His lips brushed my shoulder, then my throat, each kiss slow enough to make me aware of every place he touched. His hand slid from my hip to the thin strap of my dress, and I felt another shiver move through me as his fingers lingered there.

"It doesn't matter what this dress cost," he murmured against my skin. "Or the shoes. Or any of it."

I watched him in the mirror. "Roman..."

"It doesn't." He kissed my shoulder again. "I'd buy you a thousand of them if I had to."

His eyes lifted to mine in the mirror. "If buying you things made you smile the way you make everyone else smile… It would be money well spent."

I let out a choked little sob.

"I'd rather have the smile," he whispered. "The real one."

He hooked one finger under the strap and looked at me in the mirror.

The question in his eyes wasn't really about the dress.

Are you sure? Right now? After everything you just handed me?

I didn't know what tomorrow looked like for us. Didn't know what a word like boyfriend was supposed to mean once it stopped being a lie we told other people.

All I knew was that his arms were the only place I'd felt safe enough to be every version of myself at once in weeks. Years, if I was being honest.

So I did the honest thing. The scary thing.

I looked him in the eyes and nodded.

He slid the strap from my shoulder, then moved to the other side and did the same. His movements were unhurried, almost reverent, like he had all the time in the world and nowhere else he needed to be.

"You know what I see when I look at you?"

I shook my head.

"I see a woman who survived."

His mouth brushed my temple as the second strap slipped down.

"A woman who built something beautiful out of something that broke her…”

His hand returned to my waist.

“A woman who loves people so hard she forgets she deserves to be loved just as hard."

The dress slid lower.