Light the Lamp (19 page)

I pulled into the garage at the condo and found a spot. When I parked, we sat there for a minute with the engine running.

“
I mean, you want me to do what makes you happy, and you want that to make me happy. You’re always trying to take care of me, to give me things that you think I need whether I need them or not, and to do things for me even if I can do them myself.” Finally, she looked up, her eyes so filled with anguish that it made my chest ache. “I never know if you’re really doing all this for me or if it’s for Liv.”

I opened my mouth to interrupt, but she cut me off before I could.

“
And it doesn’t really matter who you’re doing it for, because I am not Liv, and I can never be Liv. I’m me. Noelle. I’m right here, trying to be part of your life like you seem to want, but you won’t let me in. You won’t let me give back to you. I’m sitting around all the time, doing nothing other than being your so-called lucky charm. That’s not enough. I’m starting to really care about you, Liam, and it scares me because I don’t know where you are. Where your head is. I can feel where your heart is, and it’s all over the place and hurting and you won’t let me help.”

There were a thousand things I needed to tell her. How I wanted to let her in but didn’t know how. How I wanted to take care of her and give her all the things she needed and more because she deserved to be taken care of. How simply the fact that she existed and was in my life was enough to make me happy, and I just needed to learn to give her the things she needed. How I didn’t care if my luck all dried up today, as long as she was with me. How I wasn’t a hundred percent sure, but I thought I was falling in love with her even though I’d been certain I would never love again after I’d lost Liv. But the only thing that came out of my mouth was, “I know you’re not Liv.”

“
Do you?”

The doubt in her voice and the hurt in her eyes were enough to puncture my lungs, just like a broken rib had a few years ago. I didn’t know how to prove it to her, how to make her understand where I was coming from and what I wanted us to be. How could I make her understand when I still didn’t?

“
I’ll see you upstairs, Liam.” She opened her door and got out, leaving me sitting in my running car, my forehead against the steering wheel.

 

 

I fixed my
peanut butter and jelly sandwich with double peanut butter and poured a glass of milk. By the time I’d finished that, Liam still hadn’t come upstairs, so I put together a turkey sandwich for him—a little mayo, lots of turkey and low-fat cheese, loaded high with lettuce, tomato, and a couple of pickles just like he’d made every sandwich I’d watched him make over the past several days—and set it on a plate at the table.

Since he hadn’t come in yet, I put all the extra food away and wiped down the counters, making certain there was no mess from my efforts. That still didn’t fill enough time for him to join me, which I believed in the end would be a good thing. It meant he was thinking long and hard about what I’d had to say. Maybe he was coming to terms with the fact that I’d be leaving soon…because I would be.

He had to realize that. He needed to accept it. We both did.

When I’d done everything I could think of to pass the time before eating and he still hadn’t appeared, I decided not to wait for him any longer. I sat down at the table and ate my sandwich, finishing it off with the milk like I had been doing since I was a kid.

It was only once I had nothing left of my meal that he came through the door, looking at me with that ragged expression he’d had on his face when we talked in the car.

“
I made you a sandwich,” I said.

He nodded and sat down, but he didn’t even look at it. “Thank you.” His eyes never left mine, staying fixed so long it left me squirming. “You already ate?”

“
I did.”

“
Okay.” He worked his jaw, and I knew he was trying to sort out how to say something.

But I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear what he wanted to say. It was probably something that would only upset me, since it was taking him so long to sift through it all.

“
You should eat,” I said, carrying my plate and glass into the kitchen. I busied myself with putting them in the dishwasher. When I was done, I turned on the faucet and washed my hands.

As I reached for a towel, Liam brought his plate into the kitchen and put it into the dishwasher.

“
I need to apologize to you,” he said when he straightened.

I didn’t want him to apologize. He hadn’t intentionally hurt me. He couldn’t help the fact that he was still grieving. She’d been his wife, the love of his life. That couldn’t be easy for him to get over. Could you ever really get over something like that? What I wanted was for him to give me a reason to stay in his life, one that we could both live with.

I shook my head, trying to push past him because I felt slightly trapped. “There’s nothing you have to—”

He put a hand out to stop me, settling it on my waist. “Don’t run away from me. You had your say in the car. It’s my turn to talk.”

The way his fingers curled around me, gentle but possessive, made my breath hitch in my throat. I swallowed hard and looked up, meeting his gaze. His eyes were dark, but in a different way than when he was thinking about Liv. They latched on to me and wouldn’t let go. His eyes kept me in a far tighter grip than his hand did. He would let me leave if I needed to go—I could feel that—but he wanted me to stay.

“
Okay,” I said, my breaths coming quick and shallow.

“
I’m sorry.” With his free hand, he took the towel and tossed it on the counter behind me. “I should never have let you go to bed last night without explaining, and I inadvertently hurt you. You asked me if I was about to kiss you or Liv, and it was like someone had hit me over the head—because I hadn’t thought about Liv at all, not since we were at the park. The rest of the day was all about you. No one else. I’d only thought about you, I’d only seen you, I’d only been talking to you and attracted to you, and I was going to kiss
you
. When you said her name, it made me think about her, and then I felt guilty that she hadn’t crossed my mind. I wanted to kiss you, and I still want to kiss you, but there’s a part of me that feels as though I’d be cheating on her if I do.”

I opened my mouth to tell him I understood, but he put a finger against my lips and stopped me. His other hand moved behind my back, drawing me closer to him, into his warmth and presence and strength. The way he held me left me feeling heady, a little dizzy. Needy. It was an unfamiliar sensation, but not an uncomfortable one. I’d never really dated much. Most men didn’t understand me. They thought I was flighty or weird or something. Even if they flirted at first, they often stopped before long. I was okay with being different, but it seemed as though they weren’t as okay with it as I was.

“
No, not if,” he said. “When. Because I’m going to kiss you unless you tell me you don’t want me to.”

I trembled and licked my lips, my tongue brushing lightly against the pad of his finger. “I want you to kiss me.” And I did. I wanted that and so much more. I wanted to be wrapped up in his arms so we could hold each other. I wanted to touch him and soothe some of the guilt he was carrying. I wanted him to let me in.

Maybe once he kissed me it would be easier for him to do that. There’s something special about a kiss. It’s more than just physical. It’s an emotional connection, a sort of bonding between two people. It might be my way in.

“
Good.” He removed his finger from my lips, sliding his hand to the back of my head and angling me toward him. “Noelle, when I kiss you I need you to know that I’m kissing
you
and no one else. I need you to believe that.”

I nodded. “I believe it.” At the very least, I believed that was what he wanted to be the truth. Wanting it was the first step in making it happen.

He kept staring at me, his gaze traveling over every inch of my face, my neck, my shoulders. It felt as though he was taking me all in, memorizing every detail, so I did the same. I studied the growth of stubble lining his jaw, thinking back to how it had scratched and tickled my lips when I’d kissed him there before. I watched the hard bobbing of his Adam’s apple, imagining how it would feel to press my lips over him there as it moved.

I put both my hands flat against his stomach, moving them up slowly to feel the muscles of his abs and chest rippling beneath my fingers. He was still wearing his suit from after the game, but I splayed my hands along his rib cage beneath his jacket, the fabric of his dress shirt smooth to my touch. Everywhere my hands traveled, his muscles contracted. His heartbeat pounded beneath my fingers in a frantic pace that matched my own.

But he still hadn’t kissed me.

I debated kissing him instead of waiting for him to take the initiative but nixed the thought almost as soon as it came into my head. This needed to be his decision. It needed to move at his pace, not mine. He had to be the one to take this step.

Liam would kiss me when he was ready.

He moved the hand at my waist upward, slowly, tracing a painstaking line to the center of my back between my shoulder blades, and then down again. His touch was barely there, little more than a whisper over my shirt. He trailed the fingers of his other hand through my hair, letting it gradually fall to brush against my shoulder. The pad of his thumb danced over my cheekbone.

There was such a sense of gentleness to the way he was holding me, his movements almost reverent in nature.
“
Du är så vacker.”
 

I broke out in goose bumps from the awed tone of his words, the lyrical sound of his native language coming from his tongue. His voice had always drawn me in, but it was different when he spoke the language he’d grown up with. “What does it mean?” I asked.
 

“
Sorry.” His lips curled up in a small smile that made me mimic the gesture. “When I get caught up in the moment, I forget to use English. It means you’re beautiful.”
 

I’d barely whispered, “Oh,” when his lips came down to meet mine. It was a tender kiss, soft and teasing as he moved his lips over mine. I stretched up on my toes, sliding my hands along the expanse of his chest until I reached his shoulders.
 

His arm came around my waist, and he lifted me in the air, holding me tight against him. I let out a little sigh from the new sensation, unable to stop myself from smiling against his lips.
He was hard everywhere—hard and strong and emanating this amazing heat that encompassed me and drew me in closer. I lifted my legs and wrapped them around his waist, and he groaned.
 

The next thing I knew, he had my back pressed against the wall, and he pulled away slightly to look at me, his breaths coming as hard and fast as mine.
 

“
You undo me.” He held my waist with both hands, his thumbs grazing my rib cage. His hips pinned me in place so I couldn’t move, not that I wanted to be anywhere other than exactly there.
 

“
Maybe you need to be undone.” My words were hardly more than a whisper.
 

Liam let out a strangled sound from deep in his throat.

At that moment, I knew I was right. He was keeping everything locked inside, and he needed to let it all unravel or else it would keep coiling and tightening and smothering him. If the simple act of kissing me was helping him to let go, I didn’t want it to end. I wanted to take things further. I wanted to tug at the loose end of his rope and see how far I could pull.
 

I started with his tie, slipping my forefinger into the knot and sliding it until it came undone, too. He watched, transfixed, as I tugged the remaining length free from his collar. I let it go, and the fabric fluttered to the floor.