He chuckled, reading my mind. “No one’s there, but it was exciting thinking so, right?”

“Oh, thank God,” I said on a relieved sigh.

“As if I’d let anyone see that side of you.”

“You wouldn’t?”

“No way. I like that look reserved for my own eyes.”

I smiled and turned around to kiss him. “I think it’s your turn now.”

He shook his head. “No. That was just for you, beauty. Besides, I want to go home and destroy you in my bed.”

Oh, this guy.

“Yes, please,” I said, and I was sure that wasn’t going to be the last time I begged him that night.

Chapter Fourteen

I love him

I loved him.

I mean, I was pretty sure I loved him the first time I saw him, but insta-love wasn’t a good enough excuse to go around and tell people I loved him. Because imagine the conversation to be had with that one:

“Oh, you love him, do you? That’s wonderful! How long have you guys been together?”

“Um, two weeks?”

“…Oh…” Insert awkward looks all around. “Well, that’s…that’s just wonderful.” Translation: You’re a fucking idiot.

Yeah, there was no way I’d live that kind of judgment down. Mom would have had a heart attack, and Emily would have laughed her tits off. I couldn’t blame them for their scepticism. It wouldn’t have been the first time I’d made such a declaration of love. In high school I was convinced half a dozen times I was in love, only to be thrown aside when the next bit of fluff came along.

I kept this little secret to myself, and it was the hardest thing I had to do when all I wanted was to blurt it out to anyone within a five kilometre radius.

Especially Ben.

Mostly Ben.

It was inseparability at its finest. The first few weeks consisted of dinners out and sleepovers at his place – the latter due to Mom’s return from her trip. She was a woman on a mission, had put her six weeks’ notice in, and was busy clearing out her belongings and drilling into me how to look after the house when I was on my own.

Then she got all perceptive on me.

“You’re glowing,” she remarked the second week she’d been back. “Who is he?”

Either I was walking around with a giddy smile on my face 24/7, or she had some wicked motherly instincts. My guess was both.

“He’s a good guy,” I told her first and foremost.

She hesitated, looking at me with a grim expression on her face. “Are you sure about that?”

“Very.”

“He treats you well?”

“Yes.”

“When can I meet him?”

Never, I hoped. “Soon, I guess.”

“When do you see him next?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Then I want to meet him tomorrow.”

“Why can’t it wait?”

“I want to thank the man that put a smile on my baby’s face tomorrow. He deserves a medal because you haven’t been this happy in… ever, I think.”

“Right.”

I scurried away before the waterworks appeared – from both sides, I should add. Being with him made me emotional. Show me a video of baby kittens and I was a puddle of goo on the floor. Put a romance movie on and I was weeping like a baby. Make me read a book with no happily ever after and I was tearing the pages to bits and pieces and cursing the author’s demise.

What the fuck had gotten into me?

The answer was simple.

L-O-V-E.

It was sappy, but at the end of the day the sappiest shit was always true.

So knowing Mom would pester me until the end of time, I filled Ben in on the details when he called. “My mom is being weird and asked to see you. She’s being all over-protective. You definitely don’t have to –”

“Of course I’ll meet her,” he interrupted. “I’ll swing around tomorrow.”

He showed up the next day, and he was to die for in casual jeans and a white button up. The meeting was short and sweet. He was calm and happy, not at all effected by meeting a parent of the person he was dating.

“It’s lovely to meet you, Miss Landon,” he said, shaking her hand. “Your daughter’s said a lot about you, particularly of you leaving the state soon.”

“Is she that happy about it?” Mom joked, although I knew she was partially serious.

“I don’t think any child could be happy without their parent,” he replied with an easy smile.

Success!

Mom smiled back. “I couldn’t agree more. You take care of her for me.”

Without a trace of humour in him, he said, “Absolutely.”

They made small chat. Weather, job, blah, blah. While she’d acted normal to him, I could see her restraining the stunned reaction she was desperate to give. She was both impressed and intrigued.

The next day when I got home in the afternoon she went to my bedroom and laid it to me thick.

“He’s a lot older than you,” she said, leaning against the doorway.

“Nine years if we’re going to be exact,” I replied. “Why does it matter? Wasn’t Dad older than you by a lot too?”

There was always the hurt in her eyes at the mention of him. “It doesn’t matter if you’re prepared for something serious. He’s well put together, and the way he looked at you was something else. I don’t doubt that he’s genuine with you.”

“You doubt that I am with him?”

She sighed, crossing her arms. “You’re twenty one years old. Do you even know what you want?”

I remembered Ben’s words the first night he was here. “It doesn’t matter what age you are, Mom. You never really know what you want. It changes.”

“Yes, but you learn about yourself along the way. You come to find yourself before you take big steps.”

“I don’t think people ever really find themselves on their own. I think for every special person you meet, you take something from them with you. I think who you are is a built up of everything you’ve ever experienced. He makes me happy. It’s like seeing parts of me for the first time when I’m with him. That rush, that happiness, that need to be connected – he gives it all to me.”

And it really occurred to me then how far into him I was. I realized the more you fell in love with someone, the more you fell in love with yourself. You learn to value who you are because you mean the world to that person and you want to see what they see in you.

That’s what he did for me. The scars that were once associated with self-hatred and fear were now a symbol of a time where I was somebody I never wanted to be again. And looking at them every morning reminded me to keep changing my life for the better.

“I love him,” I then told her with certainty.

She swallowed back her emotion, but her eyes went red with unshed tears. “Then you be happy, Claire, and keep doing what you’re doing.”

When the six weeks were up, she gave me a heartfelt goodbye. We arranged visits for the next year before I drove her to the airport in what was now my car. I watched her stride away with all her bags and suitcases, but it didn’t hit me that she was really gone until I was home.

I walked through the house and felt its emptiness. She went chasing her happiness with Kevin, and she left behind a giant hole. It was bittersweet because I knew it would always come to this, and it was for the best.

I couldn’t reach out to Ben. He was away on business for a couple nights. He did this sometimes, and I kept my nose out of it, trusting his word when he told me before he was looking to get out of whatever he was involved in. When we were together, it was always just about us. We locked the outside world up, ignoring it to focus on each other and the special connection we had.

So because he was away, I called Emily up. I needed her company. I needed the sadness that came with Mom’s departure to retreat back into the ocean where the waves could carry it away.

Emily Jones never failed me, and I loved her to death for being there for me. She cancelled her plans with other friends and came over. We got fat off ice cream and watched trash television until the wee hours of the morning.

“Move in with me,” I told her before I fell asleep on the couch next to her.

To my surprise, she yawned and whispered, “Yeah, I think I will.”

It took her a week to bite the bullet. Bit by bit, she brought her life into the house, decorating the guest room into hers. She seemed content about it, but I always spotted a conflicted shadow in her eyes. Again, withdrawing from me something negative in her life that I wished she’d open up to me about.

My life was full and my last semester of classes were nearing the end as December approached and the heat of summer flooded in.

The days went on, the weather grew warmer, and I couldn’t be happier.

Chapter Fifteen

You’ll be disappointed by the answer

He drew circles around my clit, slowly stroking me. Pinned down with no control, I did nothing but ride it out. I gripped his hair as he continued to torment me, sucking and swirling until I couldn’t take it anymore. I gasped and my body went tight as the orgasm tore through me.

Fuck, would this ever get old?

His tongue continued stroking me for several more seconds before he gave me a kiss on the stomach and moved up to lay beside me.

“You still seeing stars, beauty?” he asked, pressing his lips along the base of my neck as I stared up at the ceiling in a daze.

“I don’t think I’ve stopped seeing stars with you since the moment I met you,” I let out breathlessly.

“You and me both,” he murmured in my ear as his hand trailed down the front of my body and settled between my thighs.

“You’ve ruined it. It’s not working anymore.”

His fingers roamed up and down my wet sex. “Not feeling anything?”

“I’m all numb after that. Back to back orgasms are really exhausting. That whole five orgasms in one sitting that I read about is so full of shit.”

He chuckled. “Five? That might be possible.”

“No, it’s not.”

“See, now you’re telling me it’s not possible, which means I’m taking it as a challenge. And you know how I am with challenges –”

“You always have to win, I know.”

So now that he was a man on a mission, he continued to stroke me, waiting for that lick of pleasure to come back to me. No matter how sexy he was naked, I really was dead down there.

“Did um…” Hmm, how was I going to word this? “Did you like going down on me just now?”

I turned my head to him, meeting those grey mischievous eyes.

“Have I ever not?” he asked, spreading my legs wide open for better access.

I ran a hand through my hair, splaying some over my cheeks to hide my blush, and I said, “I’ve been reading those women’s magazines –”

“I know, you’ve left some behind. Weird shit in there, little lady.”

I let out a laugh. “Yeah, well, anyway, there was this section about oral sex, and some chick was asking how to make her, um, you know, down there –”

“Her cunt?”

God, he’s vulgar. “Her hoo ha,” I corrected him sharply.

Those plump lips of his curved up. “Right. Her hoo ha. Continue then.”

Where the hell was I? Oh, right.

“So she was asking how to make her hoo ha taste better during oral sex. And they recommended –”

“Who recommended?”

“The sex advice people, or whatever.”

“Right, the ‘sex advice people, or whatever’. Of course.”

I ignored the humour in his voice and continued. “And they recommended she eat a lot of yogurt. Anyway, I thought that was interesting advice. Emily thought so too. So we’ve been eating a lot of yogurt.”

His jaw locked up. He was trying not to laugh. “Okay.”

“Which brings me to now. Has it… tasted differently?”

He licked his lips and thought for a moment. “You know, I wasn’t paying attention. I might have to have another taste of you to know for sure.”

“What? No –”

But he was already there beneath the covers. He licked me and shot back up, a look of surprise in his eyes as he exclaimed, “Holy hell, the ‘sex advice people, or whatever’ were right. Tastes like strawberry yogurt.”

I giggled and shook my head. “I’ve only been eating mango.”

“They taste the same, don’t they?”

“No, they don’t actually. Not at all.”

He laughed and dipped his head, kissing me harshly, purposely invading my mouth with his tongue in a possessive kiss. “Well go on then,” he said huskily, “taste yourself on my tongue. Do you taste mango?”

“No.”

He rubbed his nose to mine. “Then you have your answer. Bullshit advice. I think I should ban the magazines from your life. Might do you good.”

“It’s not my fault for being curious.”

“Well, thank you for five minutes of incredibly interesting conversation with me. Yogurt tasting pussies was fun to talk about –”

I smacked him on the back. “Asshole.”

He laughed again, pressing his body against mine and stealing away my breath as he kissed me again. “Yeah, but your asshole, right?”

“Since the moment I kissed you on the train.”

“Absolutely. I thought about you every day after that kiss.”

My chest tightened as I searched his face. “So why did it take you so long to reach out to me?”