Chapter 35

THIRTY-FIVE

Nathan

I left The Hut and drove straight to Mina's apartment. I needed her. I couldn't imagine going through this without her.

She comforted me for who knows how long, running her hand through my hair while I rambled, lost in my pain. Lost in uncertainty. She listened to my past, my present, and my fear of the future all jumbled up and spilling past my lips in an incoherent stream of consciousness. And now here I am, smiling. Totally aware that she is the ‘something good' Nick told me to look for when he was standing in my office at the foundation six months ago.

That conversation feels like another life.

One where I was hurting and receding, pulling inward and losing trust in the world.

Mina resuscitated me. She helped me remember who I am. She reminded me the world has enough assholes who are only out for themselves, and I shouldn't be so quick to add my name to that list.

She's a damn miracle. An answer to questions I didn't know needed answered.

I am better with her. I feel safe to be myself with her. Mina won't take advantage of me. She isn't with me for personal gain…

I almost laugh out loud at the thought. The only reason we're together at all is because I'm paying her to pretend to be my girlfriend.

But a pretend girlfriend wouldn't have invited me in tonight. She wouldn't have listened to me talk and held me patiently when I couldn't. Blossom would have told me I was making too big a deal. That I was wallowing. That she couldn't be around me until I was in a better place.

Mina opened her arms to it all.

That damn article blazes through my mind, the headline lit up in flashing neon. It's Fake, Folks!

She would have invited me in if she were gathering more info for Fallon fucking Mae…

I banish the thought and pull Mina into my embrace, my heart full for the first time in maybe my whole life. I'm wide open and vulnerable to her. It scares me to death but I'm safe. I know she sees me. I know she cares about me.

I know that she's with me for me.

Not what she can get out of me.

My jaw drops at the thought and Mina narrows her eyes. "You look like you just thought of something important."

"I think I did." I smooth her hair back, cupping her face and getting lost in her eyes. Blue like the clearest parts of the ocean, streaked with the gray of a foggy morning with hints of green grass poking through. The same colors in my favorite of Mom's paintings hanging in my living room, like she saw into my future and knew Mina would be here.

Waiting.

Mine.

I angle my head, leaning closer, eager to kiss her, to taste her, to erase any distance between us so it's just her and me and me and her, closer and closer until we're one. Her presence erases my pain and I need her. In my heart. In my life. She's already taken up a full time residence in my brain, she might as well claim everything else as well.

"What?" Her lips whisper against mine. Gaze fluttering to my eyes and then back to my mouth. Her hands swooping up my arms, along my neck and into my hair, pulling me close like she's read my thoughts and agrees.

I brush her lips with a kiss. Her chest heaves. Her fingers clench. So ready for more, but I pull back, smiling down at this woman I wasn't prepared for. "I think I'm falling in love with you."

The words are hoarse and rough, slow and faltering, refugees stepping into the light of day after being trapped underground.

"I crave you, Mina," I say, cupping her cheeks and gazing into her beautiful eyes. "I don't know how to be without you. You've brought me back to life."

"Nathan…" she begins with a smile, but I haven't gotten it quite right yet and I need her to know what's in my heart.

"It's more than that, though." I brush my thumb across her cheek. "You didn't just bring me back to life. You've shown me what it means to truly live."

A soft smile plays across Mina's face. "I'm falling in love with you too, Nathan. I think I have been for a long time."

My name, from those lips. It's medicine for my heart. It's a jolt of need straight to my dick.

My mouth finds hers. My hands travel her body. There is solace here. With her. I stop thinking and start feeling. Pulling her to her feet. Tugging at clothes until she's bare. Pressing her against a wall, pinning her wrists above her head and freeing my throbbing cock.

I will give her all of me.

The best of me.

The worst of me.

My hopes and dreams and fears and sadness.

I am safe with her and will keep her safe from the world. She will have everything she ever wanted because that's what I found in her.

Mina's breasts press against my chest, and I bend to take her into my mouth. Licking. Sucking. Teeth grazing her rose-colored peaks.

She moans my name, her hands in my hair, head tossed back, chest heaving.

"I love you, Mina," I whisper at her throat, kissing the delicate skin below her ear.

"I love you too," she whispers back and then I'm past speaking, past thinking. I slide my aching dick into her sweet warmth and lose myself to her.