39. Marley

39

MARLEY

“ O ne hour,” I announce, pacing back and forth in front of the couch in just Liam’s t-shirt. “We go live in one hour.”

“It’s going to be perfect,” Liam drawls from where he’s sitting naked on the sofa with just a throw over his lap.

I chance a look at him and get caught up in the rise and fall of his abs and the thought of how he tied me up over the sofa last night to take my mind off the stress. The way his hard thighs… I shake my head. Sex later, focus now.

Tearing my eyes away from him, I glance at my phone again. “Fifty-nine minutes until I find out if my life is ending or starting.”

Liam chuckles lightly. “Baby girl, the paper is going to be a hit. You have nothing to worry about. You put in the hard work, and so did Fin. Everything is ready. Mr. Schuster is going to be so thrilled.”

My throat tightens when I think about Mr. Schuster’s reaction. I offered to send him a link to the site before it went live, but he ‘wanted to be delighted and surprised’. But what if he’s disgusted and disappointed? After all the money he put into bringing me here, starting everything up, trusting me with Fin…. “I’m going to throw up,” I moan.

Liam reaches out and snags my hand, pulling me down on his lap and the second my skin touches his, I feel calmer. “No, you’re not. You’ll sit here like a good girl and let me kiss you.”

A thread of desire winds its way through my core as I feel his cock harden beneath the blanket. I straddle him. “And what if I don’t?”

He runs his fingers through my hair before gripping it in a tight fist and pulling my head back to expose my neck.

That thread explodes into fireworks as he drags his hot tongue down my neck, pausing to say—"I’ll just have to get the Shibari rope back out, Baby.”

I shiver against him and in a few deft moves, he’s removed the blanket and positioned me over his cock.

“Tell me you want me inside you Marley.”

I struggle to force myself down onto it without his help, but his hands hold me just above him like steel. “I want you inside me, Liam.”

His grin feels like sin and he takes all the breath from my lungs as he plunges upwards, filling me so full I let out a scream before he pulls out.

“Again,” I pant, breathless with the need for him to stop my brain from spiraling, to make me feel anything other than panic. “Please.”

He growls and plunges upward again, stretching me to limits I did not know I had.

“That’s it, beautiful,” He growls, gripping my ass before plunging all the way in yet again. “Come all over me, let out all the stress. Ride this cock.”

Finally allowed to move on my own accord, I ride his cock hard, gripping his shoulders until they’re red, driving us forward quickly into orgasm like it’s a race against insanity.

It doesn’t take long for us to get there. And the second we do, he says, “God Marley, I love you so much,” I come harder than I’ve ever come before.

I collapse against him, shivering, dizzy, unsure if he said what I thought he said, uncertain if I even know my name anymore.

He clutches me to him, dropping kisses all over my head, his body shuddering from orgasm too. “I love you Marley Green,” he says again, and then again as he kisses me.

I pull myself up from his chest to see if he’s just drunk on orgasm, but his face is serious. “What?”

He touches my face and smiles. We’re sweaty and our skin sticks to each other but I don’t mind. “I didn’t really mean to tell you this way, but it’s true. I’m in love with you. I have been for a while.”

Tears rush down my cheeks and my entire body fills with light as I comprehend what he’s saying. He loves me. Liam loves me. Marley Green. It’s the most beautiful feeling I’ve ever experienced. I take his face in my hands and kiss his lips. “I love you, too, Liam.”

The edges of worry that built up as he waited for my response to ease as he smiles. A full smile, one I’ve never seen, one that lights up the entire goddamn world. “You do?”

“I do.” I lean forward and kiss his lips. “I think I have since the beginning.”

His eyes fill with joy. “I think that’s the best thing I’ve ever heard.”

I grin and before I can answer, he continues.

“Before we go any further, though, I want to explain what happened the other morning.”

“You don’t have to,” I say, shaking my head.

“I want to,” he answers, “Well, need to.”

I settle against him, my heart beating wildly at the thought of what he might reveal. “I understand.”

He takes a deep breath. “My mother died fifteen years ago,” he starts, wincing with a pain that I can tell hasn’t eased in years. “Cancer.”

My heart splinters for him. “Oh Liam, I’m so sorry.”

He strokes my cheek. “She was the light of our family, the heart, the music... And the night she died…”

His voice trails off into several painful swallows, and I wrap my fingers around him to ground him, to let him know he’s not alone.

“I was with my father at the brewery after we said goodbye at the hospital. Just me and him and I watched him just…fall apart…completely…like every seam unraveled until he wasn’t the man I knew anymore.”

My breath hitches as he continues and my fingers grip him a little tighter.

“I watched him tear his office to the ground with his bare fingers, watched his soul leave his body…held him while he screamed for her. And all I could think was, ‘is this worth it’? Is loving someone worth this kind of pain?”

Tears falling, I press my head against his chest as he draws a shaky breath. “I decided that it wasn’t. I thought that living life blocked off from everyone else would be easier than losing anyone I loved. And it was, Marley…” He pauses and pulls me up until we’re face to face.

He traces the line of my cheek with his finger. “Until I met you.”

Tears rain down as I press my cheek into his hand. “Liam.”

“The night I lost my shit and left you here, I had a nightmare about that night with my father. That it was me , that I lost you and I panicked. I did the one thing I know how to do—run. Only it didn’t work. It was the first time I considered that living without love might be worse than losing it.” He smiles at me and kisses my lips.

“I have a lot of work to do on me,” he goes on. “Gus is helping me find the right therapist, but I want to start this adventure with you with a clean slate. I want you to know that I’m broken, but you’re worth the effort to put myself back together.”

Sobbing, I kiss his lips. “Liam, you’re not broken, not any more than the rest of us. I love you just the way you are now in this moment, and I’ll love you when you’ve gotten help. I’m here for you. Whatever you need.”

His grin lights up the whole damn apartment. “I love you too, Marley…”

Before he can continue, my alarm goes off, and my heart stops.

It’s time for the website to go live.

“Oh my God,” I freeze in his lap, moving to go check my laptop. I stop before I dismount. “Unless you wanted to say more?”

He chuckles. “Go check, you know you want to.”

I kiss him hard on the lips, spring from his lap, and dash to my laptop. With shaking fingers, I bring up the webpage and nearly collapse on the spot when it comes up all bright, shiny, and perfect. “It’s up,” I shout. “And working,” I add as I click through everything. “Check the mobile.”

“Already on it,” he tells me. He holds it up to show me. “Working perfectly.”

“Oh my God,” I freeze, half bent over my laptop, filled with joy, accomplishment, love, and a thousand other incredible emotions. “We did it.”

“Of course, you did,” Liam answers, pride dripping from his voice.

Happy tears start to slide down my cheeks when my phone rings.

“Fin,” Liam tells me, tossing my phone to me.

Instead of answering like an average human, I slide the call open and scream, “We did it!”

“We did it,” she shouts back, “Oh my God, we did it and it’s beautiful! I’m so proud of us.”

“I could not have done this without you, Fin. Thank you for having my back.”

She sniffles. “Thank you for letting me help, for letting me…” her sobs cut her off. “Grandad wants to talk to you,” she says and I hear her say ‘here’ in the background.

“Well, if it isn’t the brilliant Marley Green,” he chirps into the phone. “I knew you could do it. I knew you and Fin could bring this baby back to life. My dear, you don’t know what you did for this old heart of mine. I can’t wait to bring those printers back to life with your names on the top.”

I sob loudly, messily into the phone as Liam’s strong arms wrap around me from the back. “Thank you, Mr. Schuster, for trusting in me. For believing in me.”

“My dear, it has been my pleasure. Now hang up this phone and enjoy your day. We’ll talk more tomorrow.”

“Thank you,” I gush and when I hang up the phone, I feel it for the first time. That I’m where I need to be, where I’m going to stay, where I’m going to make my life, and as Liam turns me in his arms and kisses me, I know it came just in time.