Burned(39)

He leans his body into mine without touching me.
“What do you want, Finnley?”
I take a deep breath and lay it all on the line.
“You. I just want you, but it scares the hell out of me,” I whisper.
He moves forward until the toes of his boots are touching the toes of my heels. Bringing his arms up, he cups my face in his large hands and I feel like I can finally breathe again. One week without him and I missed his touch, I missed his closeness.
“What are you so afraid of?”
I look up into his bright blue eyes and I wonder how it’s possible to feel such a strong connection with someone in such a short amount of time. Years and distance separated us for so long, but right now, being close to him, feeling his hands on my skin, makes it feel like we were never apart—that my marriage with Jordan was just a dream and Collin has always been my reality.
“This, all of this,” I tell him. “I’m scared by how much I need you even though I barely know you anymore. I spent seventeen years with someone I thought I knew and look how that turned out.”
He chuckles and shakes his head at me. “Lee, you’ve always known me. You’re the only one who ever really has.”
I shake my head right back at him and scoff. “It’s been a long time, Collin. I might have known everything about you back then, but it’s all a mystery to me now. I know your mom was a manager of Hills Department Store, your favorite Nintendo game was Super Mario Brothers, you listened to ‘Closer’ by Nine Inch Nails on repeat in your piece of shit Ford Escort and you always ordered mint chocolate chip ice cream when we went to the Dairy Twist. We’re thirty-three years old and the things I knew about you are still written in the diary I kept when I was fifteen, but they really don’t do much for me at this point in time. We’ve spent almost two decades apart and I have no idea who you are now.”
Collin leans forward, resting his forehead against mine.
“My mom is retired from Hills and is happy to stay home and annoy my father on a daily basis, I prefer Grand Theft Auto over Super Mario Brothers because the graphics kick ass, I still order mint chocolate chip every time I go to the Dairy Twist, I still watch Full Metal Jacket at least once a month, I root for the Seattle Seahawks now because the Cowboys turned into a bunch of showboating *s, I drive a red Chevy Tahoe for work and a black Ford F-250 for personal use, and D.J. is still my best friend, even though he was the one who convinced me to break up with you in a note. In thirty-three years of living, Lee, that’s the only f*cking thing I’ve ever regret.”
He pulls his face back and looks down at me. “I’m an open book, Lee. If you want to know something, all you have to do is ask. I know this is fast and everything about it is f*cking insane, but everything about it also feels right. I have thought about you every single day for seventeen years. I don’t know where this thing is going with us and I know you’ve got some personal shit you’re working through, but I’m not going anywhere. I will never lie to you, Lee. If you trust anything that I’ve said, please, just trust that.”
He stands here staring at me, pleading with me to trust him and I know without a shadow of a doubt that I trusted him fully from the minute he said hello at Slammers.
“I just have one more question,” I tell him softly, my arms sliding around his waist and pulling him closer.
“I told you, I’m an open book. Ask me anything.”
Standing up on my toes, I brush my lips against his and speak softly against his mouth. “You didn’t say anything about Nine Inch Nails. I never told you this, but I got a little turned on every time you played that CD. I still get hot when I hear it.”
He smirks down at me, dropping his hands from my face and moving them to my hips. Pushing lightly, he walks us backwards until the backs of my legs bump into the huge speaker on the floor right behind me.