The Price of Inertia (The Seven Sins #4) - Lily Zante Page 0,138

lungs now join my heart and fill, fill, fill, as if they too will burst from too-muchness. Too much happiness, too much joy, and too much gratitude.

I slide my hands around his neck. He dips his head, claiming my mouth as his tongue sweeps in and dances with mine and we kiss, feverishly, as if we’re afraid to let each other go. His strong, powerful arms wrap around me tighter, making me feel safe and wanted. After losing my way, wandering restlessly in my maze of no hope, I finally feel as if I have come home. With Ward, I am home. He is the thing that completes me. He swallows me up and makes me his and I don’t want anyone else because no one else compares.

“I love you,” I tell him, and we kiss again, making up for the long, lonely months and holding on to one another, never to let go again.

Epilogue

A year later …

WARD

When she came to me, almost a year ago now, standing in my conservatory looking thin and gaunt, I had to fight my initial urge to hold her. She looked frail and brittle and it was plain to see that she wasn’t coping.

I didn’t intend to touch her, or kiss her or tell her how much I missed her—not on that first day—but Mari has a hold on me that I don’t fully understand. My determination to stay composed and in control lasted all of ten seconds. I couldn’t hold back. I had to tell her I loved her, because I did.

She had looked me up and come to me, and that was all the validation I needed. Not a day had passed that I didn’t think of her. It got so bad that I had made plans to return to Chicago when I started writing my next book. Chicago has different memories for me now, and if I hadn’t heard from her when I did, I was going to seek her out.

But after a lifetime of holding back, keeping my thoughts and emotions to myself, I no longer have to do that, not with Mari. She is my soulmate and we fit together to make the perfect whole.

“How many words?” she asks, her hand skimming over my head. I glance up and watch her float by in a sexy turquoise bikini. She returns to her desk and gets back to work.

There’s goes my goal for the day. My fingers hover over the keyboard. I won’t reach five thousand words. Not now.

Our temporary castle for the next two months is a luxury apartment nestled high up on steep cliffs overlooking the Aegean Sea. In Santorini. This sparkling Greek island with its cool-white-and-deep-blue buildings is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen.

I only have to look up from my couch to see the tangerine sunset above an azure blue pool that glistens under the sun. The wide open doors let in a cool breeze but Mari has a desk fan on, as she works in full sight of me. I take a moment, maybe ten, to admire her side profile.

How she expects me to reach my daily word count is beyond me.

We don't often get out of bed until noon. Then we have breakfast outside in the huge veranda dotted with terracotta plant pots and with pink bougainvillea flowers striking a contrast against the bright white walls.

This is my version of paradise, but it's Mari who makes it so. I could be anywhere and I would be happy, as long as she's by my side. I need nothing and no one else.

I save my document then close my laptop. She hears the sound and glances at me. “Packing up so soon?” she asks, then gets back to her work, typing away on her laptop. She's my unofficial marketing person and assistant and manager. She's the help I needed all along but refused to take.

Rob loves her, because she's taken all his worries away and given him his life back. That and because he can see how good she is for me. These days, there is no reason for him to babysit me or to worry about my deadlines.

I reach my targets and goals, most of the time, and my next book is on track to be finished in time so as not to give Rob a heart attack.

My TV interviews are bearable because Mari is waiting in the wings. Knowing that she's there gets me through the interviews, laughing at the