22. Twenty Two

Twenty Two

A gentle tap rang out on the front door. My stomach plummeted to the floor at the same moment as a rush of heat shot up to my face. I was going to have to talk to Luke. I was going to have to look at him. I was going to have to figure out what the hell I was doing – because if nothing was happening here I needed to make sure I didn’t get his hopes up. I couldn’t cause one more ounce of pain to him.

I checked myself in the mirror and opened the door with a shy smile. For someone who’d been my best friend for so long, who I’d shared so much with, he really set off the nerves in me.

I decided it was better to meet this head on; I looked straight into Luke’s eyes. You know how they warn you to not look directly at the sun? Yeah… Luke needed a similar style of warning .

He was even sexier than before if that was possible. Perhaps I’d managed to forget how inviting he was, but he was drawing me in right now. Was it possible that his eyes had grown bluer over the course of a year? My gaze drifted down his face to his full lips, his happy smile, his soft, smooth neck.

“Lily,” his voice was soft. My eyes bounced back to his and I couldn’t stop my heart spiralling off into random rhythms; it was why I hadn’t looked at him earlier, not properly. Before I knew what was happening I was in his arms, breathing him in, feeling the strength of him enveloping me into his safety. I felt his breath against my face and realised to my shame that stray tears were making their way down my cheeks. “It’s OK, don’t cry.” Luke whispered, which only made me sob a little louder. “It’s freezing out here. Shall we go in and talk?”

I nodded and stepped back, bereft at the loss of his embrace as I motioned him inside, clicking the door closed and shuffling around him and into the living room. This cottage was not made for someone of Luke’s size, I winced as he almost caught his head on a beam.

“Do you want a drink?” I asked, trying to sound casual, as if this wasn’t the most important conversation I could’ve imagined. As if I wasn’t wiping tears off my face that his touch had caused. “I don’t bother having wine in anymore, but I can make coffee?”

He pressed his hand to my forehead and frowned. “ Is this really my Lily?” I laughed and batted his hand away but my heart had doubled in size as he called me ‘his Lily’. “Coffee’s good, thanks.”

“Take a seat,” I motioned towards the small couch that took over most of my living room as I watched him, so familiar, yet so alien in this setting. “Won’t be a minute.”

I worried incessantly as the water boiled, overthinking a hundred outcomes that this could be. I’d assumed he was here because he wanted me, but maybe he was getting married, leaving the country again, just wanted to make sure I was OK as a friend… Anxiety curdled within me as I walked through with two, full mugs, which I placed down on the coffee table. I sat on the opposite end of the couch and turned towards him, expectantly.

“You look good, really healthy, I guess Devon suits you?”

“I needed a fresh start, a change,” I replied, my nerves creating chaos within me. “It makes a little more sense to me now, why you left to go backpacking.”

“Do the last two years ever seem unreal to you?”

“Completely. I try and not think back too much, to be honest. I just see all these segments, where little decisions set me on paths that ended so badly. And I try to remember all the happy bits in between, but it’s tough, you know?”

He nodded, his forehead contemplative as he reached for his drink, those beautiful lips blowing onto the hot liquid. “Things between us, they don’t have to be weird. I don’t want them to be.”

“Do you understand why I didn’t get in touch when Zack and I broke up?”

“It took a while, to be honest. I guess I figured you’d be straight at my door, but you weren’t. But then, what should I expect when I made that choice for you.”

“After I saw you at the mediation, it sounds daft but… I was really proud of myself that I didn’t do anything silly, that I didn’t cheat on Zack, that I didn’t make the situation messier. It felt like I’d actually been a grown up for once. And things were so good for me and him, the house, the wedding, it was all coming together so beautifully. I finally knew I was in the place I wanted to be, with the man I wanted to be with. That constant exhaustion of trying to choose between the two of you was gone, and I was just a normal girl, in love. Until Anna did what she did.”

“I’ve been fearful to find you, to talk. I guess it was easier to stick to the star-crossed lovers narrative then to accept you didn’t want to see me because you didn’t feel the same about me anymore.”

“It wasn’t that simple. My whole life fell apart, my future disappeared, I had no income, no stability, and my heart was beyond broken. It was so crushed, I just drank and wallowed. I couldn’t even consider anything beyond each individual day at that point. ”

“What would you have done if I’d reached out?”

“Honestly, I probably would have been horrible, pushed you away.”

“And now?” he asked.

I chewed on my bottom lip as I focused on him, my vision a little blurred with damp emotion. “I don’t know. You want to be friends again? After everything?”

“No, I never want to be just friends with you again. I want to be your soulmate, your lover, your partner. The one who kisses you goodnight, who wakes up with his arm around you. The one who brings you coffee and rubs your feet when they’re sore. Who laughs with you, dances with you, loves every single damn day with you. Lily, my feelings for you haven’t changed. Every part of me wants you. I’d go anywhere for you. Be anyone for you. We’ve been to hell and back, I know we have. But now we’re both finally in a position that we could make this real. I’m not going to waste a minute, never mind five years, being too scared to admit this to you.”

I gulped back a wave of tangled thoughts and feelings – delight, fear, love, desire, dread. “I couldn’t go through it again…” My voice was barely a whisper, but he heard me, his whole being entirely focused on mine.

“It wouldn’t be like last time. There’d be no guilt, no pressure, no conflict. Just me and you, on a slow journey into us. Oblivious to what anyone else thought.”

His fingers had inched closer to mine, and I couldn’t help but reach out to touch them. “I’m scared… ”

“Sometimes you have to be brave,” The left side of his mouth tilted up into a supremely sexy and cheeky little smile.

“That feels very three years ago.” I laughed, and he shuffled forwards on the sofa, his fingers stroking over my cheek like feathers.

“I would never hurt you, please know that.”

“But I live down here now, and you have the partnership and?—”

He pressed a finger to my lips. “I’m sure I said this before but we could go anywhere in the world together. I’m not going to let something like distance or a job stop me from being with the love of my life. I spent too long sitting on the side lines, putting other people first, I’m not doing that anymore. I want you.”

I gathered in a long breath, taking the moment to compose my nerves, my thoughts. To think about everything that had happened, every mistake, every sadness. But also every happy moment, every sensation of love, hope, joy.

“Can you do something for me?”

Luke nodded, and I leaned forwards, my hand resting on his knee.

“Seeing as we’re being a little bit retro… Let me kiss you, just once. One kiss, and you’ll feel what I feel, I know you will.”

Luke’s leg shook under my hand, and I stroked, soothing and softening. His lips brushed mine, just for a moment, giving me the briefest taste of everything I’d missed.

“What do you feel?”

I ran my fingers across the back of his neck, rubbing up and into his hair as I clambered onto his knee as gracefully as possible.

“That I never want to let you go…”

“Then don’t. Be with me.”

A tear slipped down, splashing onto my lip, before Luke kissed it away. Soft, sweet, delicate.

“Was The Metro you?” I asked.

Luke nodded his head softly.

“I just needed you to know. I couldn’t approach you that morning, but I was sure you felt me.”

“I did. It was weird because I hadn’t listened to Coldplay since we parted, but it was on shuffle that morning.”

“Something in the universe wants us to be together.”

I bit my lip as I looked at him, scared but so sure this was inevitable, once again. As it had been before, as it always would be. Did it even matter what anyone thought? All the past hurt was there anyway, nothing would change it, but did it need to affect forever? My eyes danced across his features, remembering the familiar and beautiful shape of him.

“It’s me, Luke. I want us to be together.”

His lips touched mine, and the rest of the world faded to nothing. His hands ran up into my hair and held my face close as I pulled myself towards him. Our mouths moved together. My legs wrapped around him instinctively as I wriggled forward on his knee, pressing myself to him.

He took hold of my face with both of his hands and kissed the tears away that fell from my eyes. “You don’t ever have to cry for us again, Lily. This can be it. This can finally be it. I love you.” Then his tongue pressed against mine; his hands slid inside my jumper and up my back, pulling me closer still. “I dreamt about this every single night I was without you,” he spoke against my lips as my hands pulled his shirt from his jeans, desperate to feel the soft skin of his back under my fingers once again.

“I love you. I’m so sorry about everything…”

“Stop.” Luke gripped my face between his hands. “Nothing to say sorry for. What happened, happened. It got us to where we are right now, and personally, I love where I am right now.”

I peppered kisses along his jawline, along that super smooth neck, breathing him wholly into me as I did so. “Our new beginning?”

“Absolutely…” His head tilted back, a pleasured sigh falling from his mouth, which I was only too delighted to capture with my own.

“Luke…” My mouth meandered to his ear, leaving kiss after kiss in its wake. “Is it really presumptuous of me if I ask if you’d like to come upstairs?” My sex drive mi ght have been asleep for months, but it had just had the biggest caffeine shot of its life.

“Nope,” he grinned as he lifted me up and my legs gripped him tight.

“This is why I couldn’t look at you earlier.”

“Yeah, we’d get arrested if we carried on like this on the beach.”

I laughed at his words, the happiest laugh I could recall in a long time. I’d missed him so much it felt as if my heart scorched through my chest in those moments, like a sun about to collapse in on itself; the burn was so bright.

Our mouths locked back together as Luke stood. We moved towards the stairs where he placed me down, his touch gentle yet so needing. I took his hand and led him up the steep, narrow steps towards my room. “Mind your head, this place wasn’t designed for tall people.”

As soon as we were through the door to my bedroom, he lifted the soft jumper over my head. Our hands couldn’t leave each other alone, desperate for each piece of skin to be reunited with the other.

I kissed his neck again, my favourite place. That insanely sexy point where neck turned to shoulder, I could sink my teeth into that spot all day, breathe in his smell, taste the softness there…

“Lily…” Luke’s voice distracted me from my focus as he spoke. “You know last time when we didn’t use an ything? Is that still a thing or…” The rest of the sentence was lost as I slid back to his mouth.

“That last time is burned into my mind. I know I’m fine, I had to have loads of tests for the egg donation. You?”

He tugged my jeans down as he responded. “I haven’t been with anyone since that night.”

I paused, moving to look him in the eyes. “Really?” I asked with genuine surprise.

He nodded, looking embarrassed. “I couldn’t stand to be with anyone but you, it sounds silly but?—”

Now it was my turn to stop him; I pressed my finger to his lips. “You don’t need to explain. I know what you mean. Knowing you were the last person who touched me was… everything. It’s not silly.”

He lay me down onto the bed, and I almost lost myself there and then. I couldn’t stop smiling. Luke was here and kissing me, and he loved me, and we were about to— “Bollocks!” I exclaimed.

He pulled back from me, alarmed. “What’s wrong? Please don’t let there be something wrong?”

“No, I just realised. It hasn’t mattered so I hadn’t thought about it, but I had to stop the pill to do the egg donation, and there wasn’t any reason to start it again.”

“That I can cope with,” he blew out a sigh of relief. “I thought it was going to be a secret boyfriend or weird trauma. ”

I smiled as I kissed him again. How lucky was I that I got to kiss Luke again? I’d never get bored of it.

“Nothing like that. You know me, sworn off men.”

He stroked his finger down the side of my face as he looked down at me. “Except me, I hope?”

“Except you. I’m sorry about the sex, though.”

He looked momentarily confused before he grinned and reached into his back pocket. “Oh, that’s not a problem. I mean, I wasn’t being presumptuous, but I have to be honest, I was hoping.” He placed the condom at the side of us and threw my bra and knickers to the side of the bed.

“Thank you,” I pulled him down onto me as we met in a frenzy of love, lust, passion, lost time, relief, excitement… every emotion and feeling I could imagine. I just wanted to absorb him into me. It was as though all that love that I’d kept at bay for so long, through fear and regret, just rushed out and into him, flowed through us, around us, into us. It was almost too much, almost…

We headed back downstairs a couple of hours later, holding hands and grinning at each other like love-struck idiots. Luke smiled as he saw all the contents of my shoebox spread out on the dining table.

“You kept everything?” he asked.

“How could I not? ”

“There was a poem I never sent,” he said. “It was my favourite, but there never seemed to be the right opportunity to share.”

“I think you should read it to me immediately in that case.” I smirked at him as I tugged the t-shirt I’d hastily thrown on down over my knees and sat on the couch.

He looked flustered as he pulled his phone from his discarded jacket before sitting next to me. The room was dark now, only a spotlight from the kitchen illuminated the downstairs. The beautiful blue of his eyes was magnified by the light of the phone screen. I also spotted the delicate trace of pink that blushed across his cheeks as he began to speak. I got the impression he knew the words well and didn’t need the phone, it was more of a focus for him. If my heart swelled any bigger I was going to have serious issues. He traced his fingers delicately up and down my arm as he began to speak.

“You have simply

unwritten

everyone else who ever touched me

Your kiss became my first

completely new, and thrilling

So now I need

those lips to touch

every single cell of my being

So that you are the only one

to have ever known me this wa y

You have become

my past

my present

my future

No other hand will graze this skin

No other kiss will land upon me

Enraptured by your touch

Unwrite me, over and over.”

He gulped, his eyes never left my own. “I didn’t even know you wrote words like that,” I said quietly. My heart threatened to leap out of my chest at any moment. “Unbelievably beautiful.”

“I didn’t until… well, you know.”

I saw sadness pass over his face, and I just wanted to kiss every little piece of it away. I hated he’d ever felt the heartbreak of us and I wanted to remove every trace of it. Simply spend forever loving him, making sure he felt it to the bottom of his heart for every single second of our lives together.

“I don’t think we ever need to worry about that again.”

“You have to stop switching off and hiding away on your own, though. You have to talk to me, involve me in your decisions.”

“I know,” I agreed. “I don’t always handle things well, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t have to ever apologise for being you.” He kissed me softly. It was almost as though we didn’t physically touch, our souls just reached out for each other in delicate, smoky wisps.

“Remember when we said it just wasn’t the right time for us?” he asked.

I nodded, adoring the warmth of his breath on my face as he spoke.

“Now is the right time, isn’t it?” His eyes were wide.

I took both of his hands in mine and rubbed my lips against his as I spoke. “This is absolutely the right time. This is forever. I’d say I love you again, but we both know it’s more than that. I don’t ever want you to leave.”

Then, all that poetry, the shoes, the words, were pushed to the floor. Luke lifted me onto the table, his mouth desperate against mine. His hands gripped me tight as if petrified I would slip away from him.

This was rough, hard, frantic… but I needed it as much as he did. There’d been so much pain between us and we needed to express it somehow; expel it. Luke drove into me deeper and harder each time. The lip of the table cut into the backs of my thighs, but I didn’t want him to stop. I never wanted him to stop. He bit at my shoulder as my nails sank into his flesh. The room felt as though it was on fire as our breaths came faster and faster and then he was pushing me deeper down. My back ached with the unnatural bend as he pressed me into the hard table; his whole body stiff against mine as he buried himself deep inside of me, his breath gasping, shaking, and hot.

His face sank against my shoulder as he pulled me down to the floor. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…” he began to say.

“Shhh,” I pressed kisses against his hot skin and wrapped my arms around him. “It doesn’t matter. We found each other.”

“But I didn’t use a condom…” his breath shuddered, and a shiver ran through his body.

“It’s one time, don’t worry. I’m going to get straight back on the pill because I want you every single day from now on. Is that acceptable?” I tried to look serious as he lifted his face to mine, then our lips met with the softest of kisses. I could taste his stray tears which had fallen in the emotion of the moment. “What’s meant to be, will be. You taught me that.”

Luke pulled me against him; we were a tangled-up mess of tears and laughter, kissing and love, hope and trust. It had taken a lifetime to get here, but here we were.

Before my eyes even opened the next morning, I took a long, deep breath, and instantly I remembered. The scent of Luke, his proximity, it slid over me like melting chocolate – smooth, silky, and utterly delicious. My entire body was warm and relaxed, wrapped in his arms; we could have been floating in the clouds. I was weightless and light, utterly content, and that didn’t just apply to my body. It was as though my mind had been soaked in hot caramel; my thoughts were slow and sultry; I was delirious with love and desire.

A small sliver of fear remained; this was a big step and I knew the heartache that awaited me if it should all go wrong. Yet I also knew I’d take any risk for this man. I trusted him implicitly. I was his entirely, and I wouldn’t let anything, any emotion, any person, come between us.

Luke’s fingers slid gently into my hair, and I blinked my eyes open, meeting his. The world could have ended, and I wouldn’t have noticed; there was nothing except him in that moment. Sunshine hadn’t been in abundance lately, yet the vaguest hint of freckles remained smattered across Luke’s nose and cheeks. His skin so soft, broken only by the stubble that had grown overnight. His hair, that gleaming blond, flopped over his forehead, and I couldn’t help but smile as he softly blew it out of his eyes. His eyes… The blueness entranced me; they always made me think of the beach; a beautiful azure ocean under a clear cerulean sky. It was as though nothing in the world could ever hurt me while I had those eyes watching over me.

The room was silent as his lips brushed against mine, barely touching as his hand gently stroked through my hair.

“Is this real?” I whispered.

“Completely,” he replied, his breath tickling my lips. “I never want to wake up without you again.”

“Do you know it’s Monday?” I sighed sadly at the thought that this fairy-tale twenty-four hours might be ending. “Don’t you have work?”

I squealed as Luke pushed me from his chest, pinning my arms down on the bed as he moved over me. “Are you trying to get rid of me?” he asked, as his lips flurried a trail of kisses along my neck and towards my collarbone.

“Never. What are we going to do, though?”

“I have two weeks off, we can figure it all out. As long as we’re together, I don’t care where.” His kisses worked up the adjacent collarbone as he headed back towards my mouth. “Have you got work today?”

“No, the bakery doesn’t open on a Monday,” I replied, purposefully lifting my hips and pressing against him. The way he had my arms pinned down was driving me insane. “I should probably book that doctor’s appointment, though, if you’re going to keep putting me in positions like this.”

Luke reached over to grab his phone, frowning at the glare. “It’s barely even seven.”

I wriggled out from under him while he was distracted. “Plenty of time then, I’ll get an appointment for later today, and, in the meantime I have a plan.” I pushed Luke down onto the bed and clambered over him, my legs either side of his hips. His body felt perfect against mine, warm and firm, positively oozing sexual tension.

I wanted to taste every single bit of him as I began a journey down his body, covering him with kisses, licks and soft bites. He’d always been fit but had obviously worked out a lot over the last year. I rubbed at his defined shoulders as my mouth grazed over the muscles in his chest. His stomach was insane, I had to stop myself from biting down; I wanted to devour him completely. As I sucked softly on the skin just below his belly button, his breath shuddered and I grinned to myself as I wriggled down lower, purposefully letting out a long breath, knowing he’d feel the hot air upon him.

He twitched as I traced featherlight kisses up and down his length. A memory flashed into my mind of the night we’d laughed about micro penises and how much it had turned me on when he’d been pressed against my back. I was almost drooling. I wanted him so badly as I moved lower, his hands in my hair and my mouth full of him.

There wasn’t anything sexier than this, knowing he was mine in every way. In that moment I had him completely enraptured, under a spell as I moved up and down, running my tongue over that soft skin, feeling the throb of lust that ran up him in response to me. With a delightful shiver, I remembered the previous night, the feeling of him inside me, how perfect we were together.

His breath was ragged as he gripped my hair. I shifted so his knee was between my legs, and as I rubbed against him, he pressed deeper into my mouth. We moved faster and hotter, until he held me down, my mouth flooded with the taste of him. Mine. That’s all I could think; Luke was all mine.

I placed gentle kisses along him and back up his stomach as he took a moment to regain his breath. Nuzzled into his neck, I felt as if love overflowed out of me. I snuggled back into him, sleepy and content. For the first time in so long, the future felt amazing.

I hated leaving Luke in bed the next morning to open up the bakery, but, as he kept reminding me, we had forever together. I knew in my heart that I wanted to go home, back to Luke’s house, and be there with him. How could I let Zoe down, though? Especially whilst Isla was so young. The bell above the door rang out with its tinkling sound just before eleven, interrupting my thoughts. I looked up to see Zoe stroll in, her eyes narrowed; that beaming smile of hers missing.

“Morning,” I said. “You OK? Bad night with Isla?”

Zoe shrugged and paused a moment, open mouthed, before she began. “I’m rubbish at bad news, and I should lead up to this somehow. But I don’t know how, and I just need to tell you, but I feel like the worst person in the world and… I’m so sorry, Lily?—”

“Take a breath.” I came out from behind the cake display and stood beside Zoe. “What’s wrong? What bad news?”

“Marcus got a promotion, which is brilliant, but it’s in the French office. We’re moving to France,” she said, looking down at the ground.

“That’s not bad news, that will be an incredible adventure for you. How exciting.”

“It means I’ll need to close this place down. Which means no job, and you’ve been so amazing. I feel horrible.”

I stroked her arm absentmindedly as I thought, remembering some of Luke’s wisdom. The universe gives you what you need when you need it. This job had happened at a time I needed to get away, and now… now I had Luke and a whole world of options. This job wasn’t for me anymore, the universe had already given me the best thing possible.

“Zoe,” I couldn’t help but grin as I spoke; her eyes widened with surprise at my reaction. “Don’t worry, everything is perfect, it’s fantastic news,” I laughed, giddy with love and excitement as I took her arm and twirled her around in a little dance.

She joined me, her eyes moving up and down my body. “Is this anything to do with that Lexus outside the cottage?”

I nodded, biting my lip in anticipation as I thought of going home with Luke. Home. Luke. Words I’d never thought I’d get to put back together again.

“Coffee, now,” she ordered, a smile on her face as she headed through to the back. I spent the next hour filling her in on the saga that was us. Every time I said his name, I couldn’t help but smile. The heat in my heart was bursting out of me; like I was swirling around in love-drenched delirium; I adored the feeling!

When Zoe met Luke later that day, her eyes nearly popped out of her head, I was ridiculously proud to call him mine. We agreed I could leave in a week’s time as she wanted to wind the business up quickly and get on with her French house hunting. Luke asked if I was interested in taking the business over, but the same thought was central in my mind - I wanted to go home. Maybe I’d start a business there; I wasn’t sure. What was meant to be would be, of that I was sure now.

I smiled across at Luke as he drove out of the village and headed north. We were going home… Together.