His face is tight again, jaw clenched. “You realize your mother has the same thing that killed my mom? I thought maybe you would want to confide in me since, of anyone in your life right now, I understand what you’re probably feeling. Also, you know, because you love me.”

I pull back, anger rising like steam in my chest. “You’re giving me shit for not sharing this immediately?”

He closes his eyes, pressing his fingers to his forehead. “I’ve been all over the map about this today, Snap. I get why you wouldn’t want to talk to me about that at first, I do. But then later . . .” He shakes his head. “I felt like my shit was falling apart and it really helped me to have you there. You, specifically. It’s part of what helped me let myself see this thing between us as more than just physical. But apparently you didn’t need the same thing from me.”

I start to interrupt, but he holds up his hand to stop me. “And even after it was clear it was more—even before we said it concretely that it was more between us, we knew it was—you didn’t tell me about all of this. I know what your family is to you, Harlow. I know how close you are. I get why you were such a desperate mess early on and probably didn’t want to think about it when we were together. I get that. What I don’t get is why last night, or all of the other times it was just you and me understanding each other perfectly, you couldn’t just . . .” He trails off, running his hand down his face and lowering himself into a chair across from me.

“I just haven’t really been talking—”

“Don’t say that,” he interrupts, angry now. “Everyone else knew. Ansel, Oliver, Lola, Mia. They all fucking knew. I’m the one in your bed, I’m the one you’re looking at like I’m someone, and I’m the only person who doesn’t know what’s eating you up inside so bad that you came looking for me in the first place.”

I want to get up and go over to him, but his body language is so unfamiliar: shoulders hunched, elbows on his knees, cap pulled so low over his brow I can’t even see his eyes. It’s like seeing the Finn from weeks ago. When he was just some stranger I’d married. “Finn, I’m sorry. I didn’t keep it from you because of you. I just . . .”

He shakes his head, sighing. Finally, after what feels like forever he says, “I . . . understand what you’re feeling—how hard it is to go through this. How protective you feel of your family. And . . . I don’t know, thinking it over, I realize I might have done the same thing if this was all happening to me now. All this, it just surprised me, that’s all.”

“I’m sure.”

“I mean,” he starts, looking up at me, his expression anxious. “Are you okay?”

“Yes and no.”

Silence fills the room for a long, painful minute. I don’t know what else to say. It seems like it would be a good time to finally talk about what is going on with my mom, to update him on everything, but the mood is all wrong. I don’t want to force him to be tender with me right now, and I certainly don’t feel like talking about it if he’s going to continue to be distant and silent.

I slip from the couch and crawl across the floor, letting an unsure smile appear on my lips.

“Hey,” I say, putting my hands on his knees.

He watches me for a moment, swallowing thickly.

“Hey, baby,” he whispers finally, spreading his legs to make room for me. I slide my hands up his thighs, his stomach, his chest, pulling myself up his body until I can press a little kiss to his frowning mouth.

“I don’t like that this is a thing between us,” I tell him and follow it with another kiss. “I was planning on talking to you about it soon, probably even today, but last night I just wanted it to be us.”

He nods. “I know.”

Slowly, under my tiny, sucking kisses he starts to unwind, and I feel his hands move up my sides and down my back.

“It’s just a thing for me, okay? What you’re going through with your mom was a big thing in my life. Easily the biggest. If we’re doing this . . .”

After I realize he’s just going to leave the sentence like that, I say, “I promise I’ll talk to you. I need someone to talk to.”

“Okay.”

Our kisses are short and soft; Finn gives me only the tiniest tip of his tongue to wet my lips against his. His hand slides back around to my front and down between my legs, cupping me over my denim cutoffs.

I wince a little, shying away from his firm grip.

“You hurt?” he asks, pulling back to look at me.

“Just a little sore. You rode me like a rodeo horse.”

Laughing into another series of soft, brief kisses he whispers, “Want me to kiss it and make it better?”

The vision of Finn’s head between my legs and memories of his warm suction and growling vibrations, of the things he did to me last night, make me hungry for different kisses, deeper ones that give me his tongue and his sounds.

His other hand comes up to grip the back of my head and he gives me exactly what I want: the deep, demanding kisses of a man about to throw me down and satisfy me.

His cock presses into my stomach and it’s a presence I can’t ignore. Kissing down his neck I push his shirt up with my hands, nibbling and sucking on his warm chest, stomach, hip bones. He lifts up once I have his fly unbuttoned, helping me pull his jeans down his thighs.

I love the honesty between us, how he watches, eyes steady and lids growing heavy when I draw my tongue up his length from base to tip, sucking away the sweetness.

“Fuck that’s good,” he whispers.

Playing, I lick around the base and up his entire length, making him wet all over so I can take him in my mouth as deep as I can, sucking up and down as he stares, eyes dark and lips parted.

Sliding back up, I release him with a smile. “I like how serious you look when I’m giving you head.”

“It’s something I take pretty fucking seriously.” His thumb comes up to rub across my lips.

I lick his thumb, lick the head of his cock, taking both between my lips, playing with them with my tongue. Beneath my flattened palm, his stomach muscles spasm and tense.

“Let’s go to the bed,” he says, voice tight. “I wanna lick you while you do this.”

I pull back and stand, and when he gets up, he pulls his jeans back up over his hips and bends to me. “Come here.”

His kiss is so sweet, so searching it literally makes my legs wobbly. The band of his arms around my waist and back, the curl of his huge body over mine . . . I feel like I’m climbing him, clawing my way up so I can wrap all around him.