From the Bookshelf of Turning Pages At Midnight…

‘An exhausting grief swept over me as I stared at this man I’d loved but no longer trusted, at least in the way I had before. “So I suppose you’re right … you don’t deserve me because everyone deserves someone who loves them through everything. Through anything. And maybe it’s an impossible wish, but I want to be loved by someone who would die before deliberately hurting me.”’

‘My gaze caressed that aquiline profile I knew as well as I knew my own face. I wanted to reach out and touch him. I wanted to forgive the past and throw myself into his arms and kiss every inch of his mouth and taste him on my tongue and drown in all the love that still existed within me for him. The love that swam through my blood like millions of tiny pieces of metal filled with atoms seeking their northern poles and knowing they could only find them within Mac.’

‘I took in her face, and everything in me went calm and still, the chaos inside finally slotting into place like a puzzle, its restlessness fizzling out with relief. She’d caught the sun these past few weeks, freckles glowing on her cheeks and sprinkled across her nose, her skin a soft golden tone. It made her eyes an even paler blue. Arro was beautiful, but beyond the kind of beautiful you experience when you look at an attractive person. She was beautiful to me in a way that burst from the inside out. The kind of beauty that caused this rising, aching sensation. The kind of beauty that reminded me why life was worth living.
Fuck, I loved this woman.’

‘My stomach dropped. “All right,” I replied. “Does that mean you don’t want to give me a chance?”
Tears brightened her eyes as she tugged her hand from mine. “I don’t know what to do. I’m terrified of walking away from this, but I’m also scared that if I give you a chance, I might realize I can’t trust you, and then I’ve just messed you about.”
“Arro.” I grabbed for her hand again, holding it tight between both of mine. “Let me take that risk. I’m willing to take it. Just try … We’ll go on dates, we’ll spend time together, we’ll see how it goes. And if you decide after that, you don’t want to be with me, I’ll abide by it. No questions, no pushing you. I just want a chance.”
Her mouth, swollen from my kisses, trembled. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
Heart pounding, I answered hoarsely, “Any time I get to be with you—a day, a week, a few months—it’ll be worth it. I’d rather have a moment with you than nothing at all. It’ll last me a lifetime.”
Arro’s eyes turned smoky with tenderness and desire. “Sometimes you say the most perfect things, Mackennon Galbraith.”’