Boys Like You(66)

My hands crept up her bare back and I held her there, fighting for some kind of control.

I banged my head back into the pillow and swore under my breath.

“Nate?” she whispered into my neck. “Don’t stop.”

I turned my head and grimaced, fighting for some kind of control because things were moving fast and she felt way too damn good in my arms.

“Nate? Don’t you want…me?”

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I inhaled a deep breath and reached for her, cupping her jaw so that I could stare into her eyes. I didn’t say anything. My mind was searching for the right words, so for a long time, I held her. I held her until her breathing slowed, and eventually, so did mine.

“Tell me it’s not just me who feels this connection,” I finally said, needing to hear her say the words.

“No,” she whispered. “It’s not just you, Nate.”

“Have you felt like this before?”

She shook her head no but didn’t answer.

“This connection that we have, Monroe. It’s not like anything I’ve ever felt before.” I had to try to make her understand. “And we have to work to keep it strong. Things are going to be tough with you back in New York, but we can make it work.”

“Okay…”

“No, I need you to listen. There is no okay. There is no right or wrong here. I don’t want to do anything to make you regret me. To make you regret us.”

“I could never regret us. I want this, Nate. I want to know what it feels like to belong to someone. To belong to you. In every way possible.”

God, to hear her say those words.

I searched her face. I looked into her eyes until my own blurred and I couldn’t see shit.

“Are you sure that you want to…”

But her mouth was on mine and there were no more words.

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There was only the taste of her lips, the feel of her tongue, and her body against mine. Hands seeking and legs entwined.

I held her as long as I could before I thought I was going to explode, and when she finally moved onto her back and reached for me, I was done for. I wanted her and I wanted to be her first.

As corny as it sounded, I wanted to be her only guy.

But most of all, I wanted to hold this feeling that we had inside me forever. And there in the dark, with Monroe in my arms, I tried to do just that.

? ? ?

We fell asleep, and when I woke up with blankets tangled around

my legs and a warm body cuddled against me, it was her eyes I saw staring up at me. Her eyes and her pink cheeks and that slow smile that got me in the chest every time.

“Hey,” I said roughly, kind of choked up as the memories of the night before chased through my mind.

“Hey,” she replied softly.

I glanced toward my window. “Guess we’re in trouble, huh?”

She nodded. “Yeah. I texted my mother a couple of hours ago and told her we got held up and, uh, were stuck at Brent’s without a ride home.”

“Shit, really?”

“She was all about coming for me, but I told her that I’d be home for breakfast, and for whatever reason, she let it go.”

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Monroe exhaled a shaky breath and her lower lip trembled.

“What if we don’t see each other again? What if you go back to school and fall into your old life and forget all about me? What if all of this slips by as if it never happened and I don’t get the chance to be with you again?”

“That’s not gonna happen.”

A tear slipped down her cheek. “How do you know?”

I leaned my forehead against hers. “Because I promise it won’t.”

A heartbeat passed between us.

“Nathan?”

“Huh?” I trailed kisses down her neck and it was hard for me to think straight. Hard for me to even hear the words she was saying.

“I love you.”

“I know.”

“Nathan?”

“Yeah, babe.” I was reaching for her mouth. Wanting one more taste.

“Do you think we can do it one more time…you know, since we’re in trouble already?”

After that, there was no more talking. After that, there was just the two of us, struggling to stay inside the little cocoon we’d created.

And for now, that was good enough.

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Chapter Thirty-Two


Monroe


My gram told me once when I was eleven that I could do anything. She’d been very matter of fact as she poured us each an iced tea on a steamy afternoon It was the kind of afternoon when the air sizzled and stuck to the insides of your clothes. The kind of afternoon that made your skin clammy and your muscles lazy. I remember that the birds were quiet but the locusts chimed like mini buzz saws.

Funny, the things that you remember, and the things that you can’t forget no matter how hard you try.