by Elena Armas
“It’s not like I had never learned Spanish before. I did, in school.” He reached for my hair again, playing absently with a strand, curling it around his index finger. “And now, there’s an app for anything. I learned enough to make a good impression. I still have a long way to go.”
Something must have been plastered all over my face—something I hoped wasn’t the adoration I felt for him in that precise moment—because Aaron’s eyes seemed oddly interested in studying me.
Then, he brought me even closer to his chest, tucked me securely against him, and placed a kiss on my shoulder. I melted into that brush of his lips like butter left under the sun.
“I bet I’m still missing all the interesting vocabulary,” he added, sounding thoughtful. He brushed another kiss on my shoulder. “The best words.”
“Oh.” My lips curled up, interested in the direction the conversation was taking. “You want me to teach you all the dirty words?”
I looked up at him and wiggled my eyebrows. Aaron gave me a lopsided smile that would have made my panties drop to the floor had they been resting on my hips.
“Well, you are in luck; I’m a wonderful teacher.”
“And I’m a highly dedicated student.” He winked. And that goddamn wink disrupted the beating of my heart. “Although I might get a little distracted every now and then.”
“I see.” I placed my index finger against his chest, watching Aaron’s eyes dive down quickly before returning to my face. “Maybe you need the right kind of motivation to keep your attention on the subject.”
I trailed that finger up, traveling across his pec and then up his neck, following the line of his jaw until reaching his lips. They parted with a shallow breath.
“This …” I pushed myself up and kissed his lips gently. “This is a six-letter word in Spanish. Labios. Tus labios. Your lips.”
The only answer he gave me was taking my mouth in his again. As if the only way he’d learn the word was tasting it.
“And this,” I said before parting his lips and making the kiss deeper, our tongues dancing together, “is another six-letter word. Lengua—tongue.”
“I think I really like that one.” Aaron’s head dipped low, his new favorite word reaching my breast. “And this? What do you call this?” he said, grazing his mouth over the peak.
A giggle that soon turned into a moan left my mouth before I was able to answer. “That’s a five-letter word. Pezón. Nipple.”
Aaron hummed while his lips traveled up my chest, placing soft kisses on his way.
“So, we have worked on six- and five-letter words.” He placed more of those pecks on my skin. “Just for the sake of sticking to your method, we should go over four-letter words. Would you teach me one?” Aaron’s wish fell against my skin.
A four-letter word. It shouldn’t have been complicated. There were probably thousands of four-letter words in my mother tongue. But my mind was a treacherous thing, and it betrayed me. Often. And the only word I could think of was a very particular one. One that, despite not being too long, was powerful enough to change things. To change people’s lives. To move mountains and start wars.
It was a big word that I had promised myself I wouldn’t give anybody without being sure I meant it with every single molecule in my body. Without being sure I was safe.
My silence seemed to give Aaron the perfect opportunity to keep exploring my skin. His mouth causing my heart to pound against my chest.
“I don’t know,” I murmured distractedly. Scared and turned on too.
More kisses were brushed against my skin, making me fight to catch my breath.
“It’s okay,” he said like he really meant it. “We can break the rules. That’s the magic in being us, the ones making them.”
He took my mouth keenly, getting me out of my head for a blissful moment. And when we came up for air, his head dipped one more time, placing an openmouthed kiss above my heart. “Corazón,” he said softly, so softly that the word seeped into my blood, mixing with my own so it would never be able to leave. “Heart. That’s your heart. Seven letters.”
Looking into his eyes for a long moment, I swore I could see in them everything he wasn’t voicing. I’ll make it mine. And everything I wasn’t brave enough to say. Take it.
When Aaron finally spoke, it sounded like a promise. “I’ll earn my four-letter word.”
And there wasn’t a doubt in my mind that he would. But at what cost?
Chapter Twenty-Four
The experience of waking up next to Aaron that following morning had absolutely nothing to do with the two other times I had opened my eyes to find him lying in the same bed.
For one, we were naked. Something I thought I could quickly get used to. Effortlessly.
Then, there was this teeny-tiny thing that separated this morning from the previous ones. A technicality really. And that was the beaming grin already on my face. It was stupidly wide, and I was afraid I might have slept with it. Ridiculous, I knew. But who had the time to be embarrassed when Aaron Blackford was right there, all big and naked and ready to be eaten?
Not me.
And not when something definitely not tiny was throbbing against my thigh.
Aaron grunted, shifting and pushing that pulsating part of his body into me.
Ah, hello, new favorite limb.
“Morning,” he rasped. His voice was thick with sleep, begging me to snuggle into him.
“Mmm,” I managed to answer.
It was terribly rude of me, but I was busy with more important stuff. Like learning every inch of his chest with my hands. Or the abs that topped his stomach. And that narrow trail of dark hair. Yes, I needed to get well acquainted with that too.
“Your parents are picking us up soon,” he told me almost breathlessly.
“Yep.” I was aware. “But one hour is sixty minutes, and if we manage to pack our suitcases in five and shower in … three? That leaves us with fifty-two whole minutes.” Time I was planning to spend learning more of Aaron’s body. “One can do many things with so many minutes. It’s all about time management.”
My fingers continued their pathway down, down, down. Finally closing around his length. Aaron pushed his hips up into my palm.
“Baby.” The word sounded strangled. But I continued palming his hardness up and down. “Do you want to kill me?”
He kept asking me that as if I had the answer.
“No?” I rasped, my focus completely gone. “Yes?”
His hips thrust into my hand again.
“What was the question?”
Aaron groaned, and his hand came to rest on the small of my back, pulling me to his side—hard—making me straddle his hip. Unconsciously, instinctively, I rocked against him, looking for release. Just like Aaron was doing into my hand.
At that moment, I was starting to consider the possibility of forgetting about my suitcase, my parents, our flights back, work, life, and basically anything outside this bed. Anything that wasn’t Aaron. I simply didn’t care enough.
And the next thing I knew, we were up in the air. Well, I was.
With my body in his arms, Aaron crossed the distance to the en suite bathroom in a few long strides. He turned the shower on without placing me on the floor.
“I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but fifty-two minutes is not nearly enough time for what I want to do to you. So, we’ll need to multitask,” he explained, placing me under the stream of hot water. His eyes roamed up and down my body, hunger obscuring the blue in them.
“Time management and multitasking,” I told him, watching him step inside the shower with me. “You have an impressive résumé, Mr. Blackford.”
His hands came to rest on my hips. The grip of his fingers demanding. Desperate. “And I don’t shy away from a challenge. Please add that in there too.” His body pressed mine against the cold and smooth tiles. “I’ll just have to make you come with my tongue while we shower.” My new favorite word peeked out, traveling along his lower
lip.
Hot fucking damn.
“And maybe again while we pack. All of it under fifty-two minutes. But I’m pretty sure I’ll manage.”
Oh boy. And did he ever.
Against all odds, we had made it on time.
Turned out that Aaron’s soft skills were really that impressive.
My parents drove us to the airport with more than enough extra time to have breakfast in the terminal before boarding.
Once in the plane, Aaron’s arm draped around my shoulders, and I snuggled right into his side. My head rested into the crook of his neck, his delicious scent engulfing me and causing a multitude of happy sighs to leave my lips. The feeling of this new sense of normalcy that had been born between us calmed me enough to knock me out, even before takeoff.
It wasn’t until we touched American ground that a familiar alarm went off in my head. The conversation. If I were smart, I would have used that large amount of time we had been confined in the same space to have one. We needed to draw lines, to define and box whatever this thing between us was. To … decide what to do about it. Because while I wouldn’t normally feel that kind of pressure, Aaron wasn’t just anybody. He wasn’t a man I had started casually dating or one I had had a night of amazing, mind-blowing sex with. He was Aaron. My Aaron. My work colleague. Soon, my boss. And that screamed to take a different approach to this. Whatever he wanted it to be. Whatever we wanted to make it.
But for that, we needed to talk.
His hand came to rest at the small of my back, his thumb brushing a circle over my T-shirt. I looked up at him, finding his gaze already on me. Damn, those eyes of his were quickly becoming my favorite thing in the world. Even more so than triple-chocolate brownies.
We had just crossed the Arrivals gate, so we found ourselves in the middle of the terminal. On New York soil. Only a few feet from what awaited us outside the airport. Whatever that was.
“Lina,” he said softly.
Judging by the way he had uttered my name, the weight with which he had said it, I knew he was going to tell me something important. But that simple word—my name, not Catalina, but Lina—from his lips did things to me. To my chest, to my head.
“I love hearing that. My name.” My confession left my lips quietly, as if it were meant to be just a thought. “You don’t call me Lina nearly enough.”
Aaron looked into my eyes for a long moment, not speaking. Not acknowledging my fleeting comment. It wasn’t until I thought he wasn’t going to say anything at all—that we would walk out of that airport in silence and continue our merry separate ways—that he spoke, “Come home with me. To my place.”
Caught off guard, I blinked. In stunned silence, I thought about how I would love nothing more than to spend more time with him. To get lost in him for a little longer before having to go back to real life. Before we had to talk, have that conversation that would consolidate—or not—every single thing that had changed between us.
A conversation I feared more and more with every passing minute.
I wanted to take the leap. Badly. But my experience told me otherwise, warning me of not making the same mistake twice.
And I knew deep in my bones that recovering from that—from losing Aaron, or from possibly dilapidating years of hard work under dirty and unfair accusations, if history was to repeat itself—would not be easy. It would be the hardest thing I’d have to do in my life. I already knew.
As all that swirled in my head, I watched something that looked a lot like trepidation, fear, dance in Aaron’s features.
“Come with me, Lina.”
My eyelids shut briefly.
“I’ll feed you, make sure we stay awake so the jet lag doesn’t last for the rest of the week. Tomorrow, early in the morning, we’ll drive to your apartment, so you can grab whatever you need, and then we’ll head to work.” He paused. “Together.”
It sounded like a dream.
Just like him. He had to be if he thought he had to convince me to go with him anywhere. I wanted to, so badly. I’d follow him anywhere if he asked. But …
But … there was always a but, wasn’t there?
“Aaron,” I breathed, “I’m going to be very honest with you.” I owed him—and me and us—at least that. “I’m … scared. Terrified. You are going to be promoted. To my division leader. And that’s going to change things.”
I inhaled through my nose, averting my gaze to his chest. There was too much in his eyes. They distracted me, stole away my sanity.
“We are not in Spain any longer. This is real life. And this”—I waved a hand between us—“is going to complicate things.” Or perhaps it was the other way around—him being promoted to a position above me would complicate whatever this could be.
He snatched my hand and brought it to his chest. So warm and firm, so full of all the things I wanted but was terrified to reach for. “We’ll talk about it. Later, once we have cleaned up and I have you comfortable and relaxed.” His other hand came to my chin, tilting my head back so he could peer into my eyes. “And tomorrow, we’ll talk to HR. We will ask Sharon, if that gives you any peace of mind.”
Why? Why, world? Why did he have to be so thoughtful? So fucking perfect?
“But before doing that, you’ll have to give us a chance.” It was his turn for a shaky breath to leave his lips. “Do you trust me?”
My hand, which still rested over his chest, right above his heart, fisted the fabric of his shirt. Unable to do anything else but hold on to him. “Take me home, Aaron Blackford.”
Staring at the screen of my phone, I deliberated for the hundredth time if I should reply to the message with the truth.
She’s gonna flip. She’s going to kick my ass so hard that she’ll send me right back to Spain.
Lifting my gaze off the screen and looking at my reflection in the mirror—Aaron’s bathroom mirror—I didn’t like what I saw. It had nothing to do with the bags under my eyes or the messy knot that had been promoted to chaotic probably somewhere across the Atlantic Ocean. What bothered me wasn’t something I could point out with a finger or fix with a shower, a few hours of sleep, and a brush.
Turning away, I leaned on the edge of the impressive and enticing bathtub. Large enough to accommodate two Aarons, just like everything else in his apartment. Spacious and luxurious in a very sober and tasteful way. It suited him so perfectly.
I peered down at my phone again to reread her message.
Rosie: Are you back? How bad was it? Tell me everything in front of a coffee. Or two? Maybe three? How much is there to tell?
Just as I finally worked up the courage to answer, three dots started dancing on the screen.
Rosie: I can come by your apartment, bring the caffeine to you. In one hour? Thirty minutes? Now?
I could picture my friend batting her eyelashes at me. Rosie had never drilled me so hard for a story.
Lina: I’m not at my apartment.
Rosie: Still at the airport? I can come by later. Just give me a time.
Taking a deep breath, I typed my answer.
Lina: I don’t think I’m going back to my place tonight.
Those three dots bounced back to life on the screen. She typed and typed and typed. For a stupidly large amount of time. I frowned at my phone, bracing myself.
Rosie: I KNEW IT.
A strangled sound climbed up my throat. That’s all she was typing?
Rosie: SO? Spill it. Type it, so I can tell you that I saw it coming.
I chuckled under my breath. Had I been that blind?
Lina: …
Rosie: SAY IT. SAY IT OUT LOUD. Say. It.
Lina: Chill, Edward Cullen.
Rosie: Catalina, if you don’t start talking, I’m going to get pissed. And I never do. You still don’t know what a pissed Rosie looks like.
Lina: Aaron’s. I’m at Aaron’s apartment.
Rosie: Of course you are. I want to know the rest.
Lina: The rest?
Rosie: A condensed versi
on—for now.
Lina: We sort of kissed. Kinda slept together.
Rosie: SORT OF? KINDA? What does that even mean?
Lina: *eye roll emoji* We did. Kissed. Had sex.
Rosie: AND?
And so, so much more, I was about to type. But my thumbs froze above the screen. Ugh. Then, they worked at breakneck speed.
Lina: … and I’m a mess. I’m scared and giddy. Stupidly happy too. And he’s so good to me. So good that it feels like a dream I’m going to wake up from with cold sweat sticking to my skin. And you know how much I hate when that happens. Remember when I dreamed that I was getting raunchy with Joe Manganiello and the fire alarm in my building went off right as he was unclasping his belt buckle, and I was cranky for a whole month?
Lina: This feels a million worlds better than that dream. Galaxies better.
It was, and I wasn’t just talking about the way my body seemed to come alive under his touch. Hell, that was the smallest part of all of this.
Lina: I don’t want to wake up, Rosie.
Rosie: Oh, sweetie.
I could almost feel the hug that would have followed that.
Lina: Anyway, I’ll tell you everything about it tomorrow.
This wasn’t a conversation we should be having via text anyway.
Rosie: You’d better do that. Otherwise, I’ll kick your ass.
A knock came from the door.
“Baby?” said a deep voice from the other side. The word traveled right to the center of my chest. “I’m going to start thinking that you are hiding from me.”