Reverse (The Bittersweet Symphony Duet, #2)

by Kate Stewart

Texas misses you. I fucking miss you.

“I think you’re beautiful,”

“The truth is, ordinary humans are capable of doing extraordinary things every single day without living extraordinary, extra lives. It’s the art, the creativity that sets them apart, not what they fucking eat for breakfast or who they’re fucking. Let them have their eggs in peace.”

“And a perfect fucking mouth,”

Easton Crowne is singing, for me, in my hotel lobby. Not only that, but the man’s voice is staggeringly perfect.

Even so, no part of me wants to share this moment with anyone in any capacity. More than anything, I want to cling to his star as it burns the brightest—if only to be with him for a little longer. If what Easton said is true, and we live in echoes of defining moments, I want to remain in this one for as long as I possibly can.

“In my mind, I’ve already sunk inside you a thousand times.”

As we continue to rise, I can feel myself falling further into infatuation with her. In a matter of days, she’s managed to captivate and draw confessions from me that I never saw myself making to anyone, let alone a practical stranger.

Unable to keep from touching her a second longer, I glance around to make sure we’re alone for the moment, then glide my knuckles appreciatively down her cheek. In the next breath, I’m exhaling a groan into her parted lips as she grips the back of my neck, clutching my hair, clutching me to bring me closer. Because we’re kissing.

I could live a hundred more years of life and will never forget the way she looked at me while I sang for her in the hotel. That will go untouched in memory, as will our kiss tonight.

Just as I reach immeasurable heights by the beauty of new lyrics, Easton removes the headphones and unplugs them, the gorgeous ballad surrounding us both as I open my eyes. The ready praises on my tongue are silenced when Easton’s lips capture mine.

“Don’t go. Don’t fucking leave like this.”

Sobbing again

“Don’t fucking lie to us both,” he bites out, batting my words away. “Easton, even if we could act on this, we live worlds apart.” “Not anymore,” he declares vehemently. The truth of his statement hits hard. He believes what he’s saying, and I can’t, at all, afford to. Get the fuck out of here, Natalie! “We have to be sensible—” “Being sensible isn’t what got you here,” he murmurs. “I wasn’t expecting—” “Me neither,” he fires back, “but I refuse to fucking deny whatever is happening here. You know I won’t.”

“Maybe you should fucking answer it this time, ’cause from where I’m standing, it looks like you want to.”

How the fuck am I supposed to resist this man? How could anyone resist this man?

“I know, baby,” I whisper.

EASTON DONT SAY BABY I AM WEAAAAAK

“You’re already mine,” I declare, knowing that’s the truth for us both.

“Please, baby, please,” he whimpers, “get us the fuck off this highway.”

Again. Weak.

I want to belong to Easton. I want us to exist. Again, I want what I can’t have.

He grips my chin tightly before lifting it to brush his finger along my neck. “I don’t have the urge to call my friends and share my highs and lows. I don’t miss them with an ache so deeply etched inside that it keeps me awake at night, and I sure as fuck don’t drive for hours in hopes they’ll spend a few days with me. And I definitely don’t jerk off to the image of them coming on my cock. I don’t feel this way for my friends, Natalie—close or otherwise—so I dare you to call me your close friend again,” he warns. “I fucking dare you.”

I love this man. His yearning. He shouldn’t have to but he’s so good at it. I love him.

so brilliant, so beautiful, so insightful, and so intoxicating. I hate that he tuned into me so expertly and managed to get truths about me in such a personal way that his words and behaviors with me reflect those points home so thoroughly. I hate that he’s taken so much from me already without me truly realizing it—until now—and I resent the fact that I’m the one who gave them to him. As

“Intelligent men don’t let life-changing women pass them by without trying to grasp onto them with both hands. I don’t need endless months to figure out you’re that woman for me. I’m not most men, Natalie. I know exactly what I don’t want, and it’s everything outside of that door. What I do want is standing in front of me, and the idea of letting her walk away from me a second time is fucking eating me alive.”

“I want more for myself, and I want to give you so much fucking more. So, think of what you’re asking me because I know exactly what I’m asking of you,” his voice cracks with emotion. “This is me fighting dirty for us both, so please just admit it so I can give you the best parts of me, because I want every fucking part of you.”

“I wrote that article because I wanted you to know I saw you, and I love what I saw inside you. Because I was frantic on that plane to keep a piece of you—of us—as close to me as possible. And because I felt the dire need to try to protect you, and that was the only way I could think of doing it.” I swallow. “I’ve thought about nothing but you since I left Seattle.” My voice shakes with my next admission. “I didn’t want to leave you that day, and I sure as hell don’t want to leave you tomorrow. I didn’t want to leave us there. All I truly want—and have wanted since the day we met—is you.”

I’m in love with him.

“I love you.”

He grips the sides of my face, his gaze prodding. “Marry me.”

I exchanged vows with my supernova while the rest of the hovering stars lay witness, enviously blinking before fading into dawn. Easton pushed the matching black titanium wedding band onto my finger just as the sun peeked over the horizon. Though our ceremony was simple, and our traditional vows have been recited countless times by others before us—it was still uniquely ours.

“Wholly, unconditionally, and definitively.”

“Don’t let go,” he replies hoarsely, his grip on my hand tightening as I realize

Lexi’s lips part in shock as the two face off. We all inch back as Ben rings out another declaration. “The man who’s loved you with the whole of his heart, year after year, through Every. Single. Thing. Even when you broke it, even when I begged it to stop, tried to force it, willed it to, ignored it. It never failed you, it never stopped loving you, and it never will. I think it’s past time I let it, and you let me love you with it, for good.” “Ben,” Lexi gasps as her eyes flood, and Ben stalks toward her before cupping her face. “It’s just us now, baby. You and me. It’s our time, Lexi. It’s time.”

A sob escapes me before I rip myself away from his warm embrace and turn, starting at a dead run toward my apartment.

“Yes, there’s a rock star behind you.”

“I’m so glad I did hear it. I was so pissed at you for sucker-punching my heart and disappearing. I was coming to read you the riot act, but hearing that…Jesus, baby, it meant everything to me.”

beam up at him. “He said he would really like to meet the man I fell in love with in Seattle.”

“Baby,”