Yours Truly (Part of Your World, #2)(78)

It stole the air from my lungs. It stole the strength in my arms and legs. It made me weak with disappointment and hopelessness, and I knew I would always carry the ache I felt in this moment.

Briana was a catastrophic life event. A thing that changed everything. And I wouldn’t be the same after this. All the women I’d ever met and all the women I ever would fell away beneath her.

She had me.

And it wasn’t because I was slightly buzzed, or feeling sentimental, or because of the way the fire lit her face, or how my shirt clung to her body. She had me. And I suspected she always would. No matter how this ended.

Nothing could have prepared me for her.

I reached out and put a hand to her cheek. A rule, broken. A boundary crossed. I had no reason to touch her like this. Nobody was watching.

But she didn’t move away. She just closed her eyes and leaned into it and I tried to pour all the love I felt into this tiny contact. Like maybe it would help me reach her. Maybe she could feel it and it would change something that likely wasn’t ever going to change.

“What does this one mean?” she whispered.

“This one what?” I said softly.

She opened her beautiful eyes and looked at me. “This quiet,” she said dreamily. “I know all of your quiets. I know when you’re alone with me and you’re quiet, it’s because your brain is still. And when you’re in public and you’re quiet, it’s because your brain is loud. But I don’t know this one. What’s this one?”

I held her gaze. “This one’s you.”

She smiled and then scooted over and curled up against me and I got to put an arm around her. She snuggled into me and it was everything. My entire universe condensed to a single place and time.

“Jacob?” she whispered.

I put my nose to her hair. “What?”

A long pause.

“I love you.”

I breathed out into her hair and closed my eyes.

She was drunk. Everyone loves everyone when they’re drunk. But even though she didn’t mean it the way I did, I almost said it back. But her breath had gone steady and I knew she was asleep.

It didn’t matter.

Nothing we talked about tonight would feel real tomorrow anyway. At least not for her. But I got to hold her. That was real. That was at least something.

The fire burned down to embers and I stayed there until my back hurt from leaning on a hope chest. Then I picked her up and carried her to bed. And while she was cradled in my arms, she muttered something about teleporting.





Chapter 33

Briana



The door was open.

I woke up sprawled half on top of Jacob with a headache, the driest mouth I’d ever had, and a rock-hard boner under my thigh.

Oh my God. I bolted up and scrambled out of the bed.

Jacob sat up, only half awake. “What happened?”

“Nothing. The door’s open. Plan worked,” I said, grabbing my clothes without looking at him. Then I realized that every time I bent down, my ass peeked out from the shirt he’d loaned me. I tugged the back down with one hand and fled the room clutching my clothes and what was left of my dignity with the other.

I couldn’t remember half of last night. My memory got foggy somewhere after shot number three. I think I told him about the glitter. Ugh.

I took the longest shower of my life, chugged some water and Motrin, and came down to face the firing squad. Alexis immediately cornered me in the kitchen, but I had no gossip for her other than I got blackout drunk and woke up with a hard-on under my leg.

Jacob kept looking at me over the table at breakfast.

I’d glance up and he’d be sort of silently gazing at me. I usually knew what he was thinking when he was quiet, but I couldn’t read him this time, which made me certain I told him about the glitter and now he was probably wrestling with the fact that his fake girlfriend was also likely a serial killer.

He must have carried me to bed. No way I’d gotten myself there. I’d been passed out and flat on the floor and he’d probably had to dead-lift me.

Jacob was so soft and gentle I never really gave him credit for how physically strong he was. He reminded me of those sweet, docile draft horses they use for riding lessons for children. You forget that they weigh a couple thousand pounds and could pull a loaded wagon.

I wished I’d been coherent enough to remember him carrying me. The whole thing was probably very sexy.

After breakfast, Jacob and I drove home in our separate cars.

On the way home I thought about the penis. I thought about the penis a lot.

I knew there was going to be a peen encounter. I just knew it.

I knew clinically that his erection didn’t mean anything. He’d been sleeping. It was just a sign of a properly functioning blood and nervous system, nothing to get excited about. Only I also knew that the next time I picked up my vibrator, that was one hundred percent what I’d be thinking about. Jacob, warm and sleepy in the bed with me. Me, waking up to him hard. Only in my fantasy scenario I didn’t run from the room. I slipped a hand under the waistband of his underwear to wake him up instead…

What if we just did it?

Hooked up for the duration of this arrangement. Two grown adults with needs and an understanding, that’s it. Friends with benefits.

As if that’s all he’d be…