Variation

by Rebecca Yarros

“Not a problem. I’m not seeing anyone, and even if I had been, it’s hard to focus on anyone else once you walk into a room,” he said, like it was a simple fact. What the hell? My eyebrows rose. “No saying things like that.” I stepped backward, bumping into the garage. “You’d rather I lie?” The heat in his eyes made me swallow. Hard.

“I gave it a shot. A real shot.” Her face contorted into a look of abject misery. “And she’s lovely, but you can’t date her, Hudson.”

Dude fuck Caroline

“I’ve waited eleven years to kiss you.”

“And as you reminded our niece, omission would be just that. I told you I want you. I’m done hiding from it. Public. Private. Don’t care. This is real for me. It’s about to get messy.”

“What are you going to do, Hudson? Fuck me so well that I never want to leave your bed? That I’ll be willing to forget everything in our past because you’re that damn good at dishing out orgasms?”

“You’re stunning. A complete damn revelation. I could watch you come apart all day, every day, and never get bored.”

“The middle seat of the last row is always empty. It’s in my contract.” Two lines creased the area between his brows. “And if you’d gone to will call and given them your name, they would have handed you that ticket. That’s in my contract too. It’s always your seat. Every venue. Every performance. I don’t even know why I did it, except I guess I never gave up hope that you’d walk in one day.” There, I’d said it. “All these years?” His voice came out like it had been scraped over the campfire embers. “All these years.”

“There’s no one else.” His lips ghosted across my stomach and his hands slipped under my shins. “Never was. Not for either of us.” He kissed the crease of my hip, then dragged my knee over his shoulder. “They were all just placeholders.”

“The only thing that’s ever mattered is you and me.”

Do you have any idea what you mean to me? You’re my air. And I know you don’t even want to think about going there when it comes to us, that you need things all neat and tidy, but I’m already there. Messy. Tangled. So wrapped up in you that I couldn’t breathe in that ER because I needed to be here with you.”

“I’m the one who needs you.” He lowered his head toward mine. “I need you, Allie. I always have.”

“Until then, I’m not risking everything you’ve worked for because I’m impatient.”

THIS MAN