22. Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Two

P ixie drove toward a familiar spot unbidden.

She'd come here so many times when she'd needed to be alone with the sea, to escape the world around her.

Today, she was coming to be alone again—but with Eva.

Sutro Heights was a dreamy combination of flowers and the sea, two motifs that appeared in her art over and over again, so it came as no surprise she was drawn to this place. Tonight, she wanted to be by the Sutro Baths, a relic of a past time, and there was no one else she'd rather take with her.

She pulled into the Lands End parking lot, though they were going downward, not up. "Have you been here yet?"

"Nope. Most of San Francisco is still brand-new territory for me."

Pixie flashed Eva a grin. "Consider this a part of your education." She cracked the door open, and the salt air swept her way. Pixie drew in a long, deep inhale, waiting for Eva to get out before locking her car. She took the first steps toward the trail, and Eva slipped beside her, offering her hand. Their fingers intertwined, like so many other times tonight, and the zing of electricity circuiting through her lit her up.

It was the perfect symbol of what she'd felt from Eva from the start—like the woman had been instinctively reaching toward her. Her friends looked after her, and she knew, deep down, they cared about her, but she'd also kept them at a distance.

Because none of them were hers . Not like Eva was.

She wasn't supposed to hook up with Eva, let alone fall for her, yet she hadn't been able to stop from tumbling headfirst. They reached the top of the trail and made their way down. In the distance, water pooled in the ruins of the baths. The ocean crashed below, white swells unfurling like blossoms. Above them, the sky spanned out, the color of shadows and sin, navy blues, deep purples, and velvet black. Her heart thundered louder than the crash of the waves as they descended closer to the baths.

"If the position in Portland isn't your dream, what is it?" Eva asked, her voice slicing through the somber dark.

Pixie licked her lips. Hell of a question. For so long, she'd spent her life surviving. College had been an awakening, the first time she'd gotten to unleash, to not be responsible for another human. But in the last five years, she'd felt…aimless.

Art was her passion, but she'd found success with that, enough for a livelihood.

"It's going to sound stupid," she said, the wind almost stealing her words away .

Eva squeezed her hand as they headed farther down, the roar of the ocean getting louder the closer they got to the baths. "It won't. I promise."

"I…want a home." She might as well not even be wearing her sweats and hoodie with how stripped down she felt. Except Eva's hand in hers made it easier to be brave. "I've never had one. Even my condo is just a place I happen to live, not somewhere I planted roots."

When Pixie glanced in her direction, their gazes snagged. She could drown in those dark eyes, a depth there that sparked colors to life in her brain.

"I understand completely," Eva said, her voice thick. "When I think back on the relationship with Jack, what hurt me most was losing my home. We'd already been drifting before we crashed and burned."

Pixie squeezed Eva's hand, still intertwined with hers. No wonder this pull had grown so strong neither of them could ignore it.

"Come here." Pixie drew Eva toward the overlook. Her heart kept rising as high as the stars in the sky as if she could float among them. She found a spot along the wooden railing and hoisted herself up. Eva sat beside her, nudging in until their thighs touched.

The waves thundered ahead of them, the violence of the ocean beckoning her like it always had. Years ago, the sense of oblivion had tugged her forward as if she could unload her burdens and lose herself there. However, now she saw it as it truly was: a wild, uncontrollable force. A little bit like fate, a lot like love.

"You make me want to stay," Pixie confessed, the truth bubbling up inside her, refusing to be stifled anymore. "My whole life, I've longed to run from this place. From the memories, the hurt, the responsibilities of being around the area meant. However, if you're in this city, I want to be here too. "

"I want to move to San Francisco. After getting uprooted from my old life, I'm shaky about landing anywhere, but this is the first place where anyone welcomed me. My brother lives here. And if I'm being honest, you are a major factor."

"So I'm not alone in what I'm feeling?" Pixie asked, her heart thrumming hard.

Eva wrapped her arm around Pixie's shoulders, drawing her in close. Pixie leaned her head against her, drawing a deep inhale of her peach shampoo. Strands of her ponytail tickled Pixie's face, and the heat from Eva's body softly pressing against hers seeped into her. She didn't dare move away from the comfort of this moment.

"You're not alone," Eva said. Those words sank into her bones like a brand. After so, so long bearing the world's weight on her shoulders, like she was the only one who could carry it, she was beginning to realize maybe she didn't have to.

That maybe the others wouldn't abandon her just because her family had.

And that was due to Eva unlocking her door as if she'd been waiting with a key.

The wind whipped her hair around, and she drank in the salt-scented air. Up here, she felt a little wilder, a little more real. With Eva wrapped around her and facing the roiling ocean below, Pixie was as unending as the sprawl of the water stretching across the horizon.

She'd never fallen in love before, but with this woman—she just might.

** *

After an hour of sitting and watching the waves, Pixie's fingers and cheeks had turned to ice. They'd chatted idly amid long stretches of silence, ambulatory conversation that only happened with true comfort, where neither felt forced to perform some social dance and could speak at whim. The waves crashed in a cyclical rhythm, a melody that soothed her soul.

"You want to get out of here?" Pixie asked but didn't move from her cozy spot in Eva's arms. "While the view's gorgeous, I'm pretty sure I'll get frostbite."

Eva snorted. "Like it even gets cold here." She ran her fingers through Pixie's hair, which sent a shiver down her spine. "Where do you have in mind?"

"How do you feel about another surprise?" Pixie nuzzled against Eva.

Eva continued to play with her hair, which had her nerve endings lighting up despite the cold. The heat of this woman, the way her curves fit against Pixie's, made her core throb, and a deep satisfaction stirred inside her like a wooden spoon through home-cooked soup. A comfort existed here she'd never known, one she'd experienced at Whipped but never in one person before.

"How about we do away with surprises, and you just tell me what you have in mind?" Eva said. "I'll be frank. My control freak tendencies can barely handle them."

Pixie snorted. That didn't shock her in the slightest. "I've got a studio in town, separate from my home one. Sometimes I need access to more than I've got set up in the condo, and the extra storage there works well for me."

Eva let out a low whistle. "I knew you were successful as an artist—and it's well deserved—but it sometimes slips my mind with how down to earth you are. Owning a condo and a studio with San Francisco prices is something else, dove."

A blush heated her cheeks. Truthfully, Pixie often forgot the levels of success she'd reached in the art world. She didn't rub elbows a ton unless her work was on display at a show, and even then, she preferred to stay in the background, letting the dealers do the talking for her. "Just lucky, I guess."

Eva pinched her in the side, hard enough she yelped—and liked it a hell of a lot.

"Lucky, my ass. You're so damn talented and deserve the rewards."

"Ugh," Pixie said, heat flushing through her body as she ducked her head.

"So, why the studio?" Eva asked.

Pixie shifted a little. "I figured if we wanted somewhere private…"

Eva slid her hand up Pixie's thigh, and Pixie spread her legs. Even though she'd iced over, inside, she burned. Eva seemed to have a magnetic pull to Pixie's clit, since she reached between her legs and tapped it. Pleasure burst through her in a heady swell, and Pixie let out a gasp.

"Dirty girl," Eva purred. "If you need to get fucked filthy, why didn't you say so?"

Holy hell, the way this woman talked. Pixie couldn't help the whimper that slipped out as she pushed against Eva's hand, which was firmly pressed between her thighs.

"Let's go," Pixie blurted. "Before I beg you to fuck me here."

"Mmm, tempting, dove." Eva gave her clit a light slap, which sent a spike of bliss right through her, even through her clothing. Eva removed her hand, and Pixie had to bite back her protest. "However, I'm not going to pass up the chance to take my time with you. Besides, I want to see your secret studio."

She laughed. "Is that a euphemism? "

"It should be, Miss Come-to-My-Private-Studio."

Pixie hopped up and began the trek to her car. "More like come in my private studio," she called over her shoulder. Eva's sharp laugh echoed in the wide emptiness out here, and the sound was one she wanted to wrap around her like a blanket.

The hike up felt faster than the one down, with the adrenaline swirling through her veins. While most people hadn't been to her home studio, no one knew about her private studio. Given a fair amount of her work was from home, sometimes she needed a change of surroundings, and the facility had everything she needed, as well as a place to store her overflow of paintings. She moved plenty of pieces, but a lot she'd done as a jaunt, ones that might not sell but still spoke to her.

In no time at all, they reached her car. The second she blasted the heat, it warmed her icy fingers and toes, the feeling addictive.

"God, that's good," Eva moaned, the sound traveling straight to Pixie's core.

"Thought you were impervious to the cold, Elsa," Pixie snarked back as she set off down the road.

"Nah, I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to tease you."

Pixie's heart thudded hard. She loved this. The ease with Eva, how the woman aligned with her better than anyone else. Closeness wasn't foreign to her—Micah, the crew at Whipped, all of them had introduced her to a warmth she was eternally grateful for. However, this was the more she'd been craving. The silent thrill paired with hearth-fire warmth that crackled through her tonight.

The buildings of San Francisco rose around them as she zipped through the city, which glowed with streetlamps. Even though she hadn't been to the studio in a while, she found her way there from memory alone, having driven to this spot countless times over the years. After growing up like she did, she coveted these private things the world couldn't try to steal from her. They were hers.

Yet tonight she was going to share this place with Eva.

The woman had effortlessly worked herself into Pixie's heart, but then she'd come with Pixie to check in on her mother and sat next to her at her favorite spot. Fuck, Pixie was gone for Eva Abrams.

She pulled into the nearest street parking she could find and shut off the ignition. "Okay, we're here."

"Let's go, dove," Eva said, hopping out of her seat.

Pixie's heart thumped hard, and she sat in the silence of her car for a moment.

If she did this, there was no going back.

Her heart would well and truly belong to Eva.

She pushed the car door open and stepped out. The wind smacked at her cheeks, but she took the first steps toward her studio.