Finding Mr. Write (Business of Love #5) - Ali Parker Page 0,53
she can do things with that tongue—oh God can she do things with that tongue—that will make it hard for you not to fall in love with her.
I chewed the inside of my cheek.
This was uncharted territory for me. I wasn’t writing about a fictional character I’d plucked from the depths of my mind. I was talking about the woman I’d just slept with. The woman who lay in my bed at this very moment sleeping like a baby. A real, in the flesh, living, breathing, beautiful woman.
I’d never been the guy who was lucky enough to feel this way. That was why I’d written about characters falling in love. It was as close as I could get without getting hurt.
The longer you stare at her the softer her petals look. She’s a flower you cannot pluck but do you ever want to? You could put her in fresh water, not too warm but not too cool. You could keep her safe. You could keep her close.
But that’s not how this works.
My chest ached.
What were these thoughts and feelings spilling out of me? Since when had I ever felt like a woman was mine? It sounded a little creepy on the page, certainly off-putting, but the desire was there. I didn’t want her to leave my bed.
Or my life.
Briar moaned softly and rolled over in bed. Her eyes fluttered open and she drew the blankets up under her chin as her gaze focused on me. Confused, she lifted her cheek from the pillow.
“What are you doing over there?” Her voice was thick with fatigue.
“Writing.”
“Writing?” Briar looked over her shoulder at the clock on my nightstand. “It’s four thirty in the morning.”
“I’ve had worse timing. Believe me. Go back to sleep.”
“I can’t. Not when you’re sitting there so ominously. Have you been watching me, Shakespeare?”
I loved when she called me that. Why was that? What sort of pet name was Shakespeare? And why did she insist on calling me by the name of a poet when she knew I didn’t like poets?
She was a riddle I would never make sense of.
“Perhaps,” I admitted. “I couldn’t sleep, so I came over here and started writing.”
“About what?”
“You.”
She propped herself up on one elbow. “Can I read it?”
My stomach did a back flip. “What?”
She giggled and sat up. The blankets fell away, exposing her nakedness, and I didn’t hide the fact that I wanted to see her. She rose smoothly and padded over to me. Then she popped out a hip, rested one hand on it, and held the other out expectantly, curling her fingers inward, gesturing for me to hand the notebook over.
My writer’s anxiety squirmed.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” I said.
“Just a little bit?”
The first page wasn’t too vulnerable. At least it didn’t have the part about being in love with her on it. She could read that, couldn’t she? I wouldn’t be playing too many cards? I wouldn’t scare her off?
I swallowed and held the book out but didn’t let it go when she tried to pull it from my hands.
“Oh come on, Wes. Don’t be a baby!”
“You can read the first page,” I said steadily. “But only the first page. When the rest is ready, I can show you, but I’m private about these kinds of things.”
She nodded her understanding. “First page. Cross my heart and hope to die, I won’t go past that. Unless you give me permission.”
I released the book.
She brought it with her back to the bed and sat on the edge with the book resting on her knee. Her hair fell from where she’d tucked it behind her ear and hid her face from my view while she read. I didn’t say a word. I just sat there and stewed in the all-consuming nerves of having someone read my work.
One might think that nervousness would go away with experience.
It did not.
When she was done, she lifted her head and closed the book. She didn’t say anything for a minute and I feared the worst. She hated it.
Briar licked her lips and turned to me. “You wrote this just sitting there?”
I nodded. “I had inspiration.”
She swallowed and I realized there were tears in her eyes. “Nobody has ever said such nice things about me before.”
“I find that very hard to believe.”
“I mean it,” she whispered as she got to her feet and came back to me. She crawled into my lap and put the book down on the armrest.