Chapter 34 - The Write Off

Present Day

I choke back my surprise when Dr. B parks his truck on the side of the road and climbs out with a knowing smile as he looks at West’s sweater, which is once again swallowing my small frame. “I heard my star pupils need help?”

West nods, looking shockingly at ease as he helps our professor unload a tire from the bed of his truck and roll it into the ditch. Words elude me as I watch them work silently side by side until Dr. B brushes his hands on his cargo shorts and hooks one end of a rope to the hitch on the back of West’s truck and the other end to his own.

Minutes later, the rescue mission is complete. Dr. B claps West on the shoulder and mutters something low that I can’t hear before giving me a hearty wave and a promise to see us soon at our event.

“What was that?” I ask when we’re back on the road.

West shrugs easily. “I spoke to his class a couple of months after moving back, and he sort of took me under his wing after that.”

“Why?”

“Is it so impossible that someone would want to spend time with me?” West asks dryly, but the spark in his eyes betrays his amusement. After a beat of silence, he relents. “It didn’t escape his notice that every story I ever wrote included an absent or shitty father. I assume he knew I was lacking in that area.”

Impossibly, my fondness for both men grows.

“He’s going to call in that favor, isn’t he?”

West laughs and tugs on the sleeve of his sweater meaningfully. “He is after seeing you in this.”

We drive to the festival in our damp clothes, and the large auditorium is already jam-packed when we arrive. The time for planning or brainstorming is gone. We spend the hour chatting about writing, publishing, and our time as Wildcats, and for all my anxiety leading up to it, it might as well be any other event. My fear was completely unfounded. No one says anything weird or rude. No one brings up the past. The questions for the Q&A are pre-vetted, and when it’s over, I’m dizzy with relief. All that worry was for nothing, and the panel was the least eventful part of my weekend.

West and I sneak out the back door, stopping only for Daphne to pull me into a tight hug and drag me away as she whispers “We will be talking about this” with a gleeful glance at West.

“How did you— When did you—?”

“I read his book the first night we were here. Enough of it, anyway. That man is hopelessly in love with you. Judging by the smile on your face, I’m guessing you two worked it out.”

My mouth dries as I look at him over my shoulder, leaning against the door with his hands in his pockets and a hungry expression.

“Go.” Daphne pushes me toward him.

“That went well, right?” I ask as West drives. My suitcase, which we rescued from the hotel, is in the back seat.

He throws me a quick smile before fixing his attention back on the road. “It was great.”

“I hope people liked it. I didn’t want to talk about my new book too much.”

“Why not?”

I shrug. “I just want to give readers what they want.”

I’ve learned the hard way what happens when I don’t. I couldn’t go online for a year, my publishing team resented me, and the movie studio refused to green-light the third installment of the series without a different ending. No one trusted me to write it, so Fox and Juniper’s theatrical fate is now in the hands of the producers and a scriptwriter I’ve never met.

“It’s your career. You shouldn’t feel obligated to talk about anything you don’t want to,” West says with a frown.

“I wouldn’t have a career if it weren’t for the success of those books. And without my success, no one would care about anything I have to say.”

“I would.”

“You know what I mean. Being an author is the only thing I’ve ever been good at.”

West’s frown deepens. “You know you’re worth more than your accomplishments, right? That the right people will love you even if you fail to live up to your own impossibly high standards?”

I’m on the cusp of agreeing with him when I reconsider, unsure if I actually do agree with him. “It’s normal to define yourself by success. You do it, too.”

He runs a tongue along the inside of his cheek before speaking. “I disagree. I defined myself by my failures.”

“Two sides of the same coin.”

He dips his chin in silent acknowledgment. “But I worked hard to stop, because it turned me into the worst possible version of myself.”

I survey his inscrutable profile before sweeping a hand to gesture from my head to my toes. “And is this a bad version of Mars Darling?”

West pulls the truck into his driveway and cuts the engine. “I’m afraid I’m too biased to answer that question.”

“Oh?”

He shifts in his seat so we’re facing each other. His hair is mussed, the shadow on his cheeks darker every day. The top two buttons of his white shirt undone. He looks perfectly wrecked. “It’s true. I met you at the impressionable age of nineteen, when my frontal lobe was still developing, and you burned yourself into my synapses. I’d have to reroute them to change the way I see you. I’d have to tear down the very foundation of myself and rebuild, brick by brick of wishful thinking, for even the chance of ridding my psyche of you. To my mind, there is no bad version of Mars Darling.”

“Oh.” Breath rushes from my lungs. What a liar he is, to have spent so long bemoaning his way with words.

His eyes are sharp and focused on mine. “As long as you’re happy, I’m happy.”

A warm, contented feeling brushes against sensitive skin. West’s simple statement is the sincerest thing I’ve ever heard, which makes my next thought all the more worrisome. What if the only way I know how to be happy is through success?

I push the notion down, burying it deep enough to avoid, at least for tonight.

“Hey, West?” I lean close.

“Hmm?”

“You’re better at the whole talking thing than you give yourself credit for.”

His half-moon eyes drag down to my lips, and my mouth goes dry. He smirks. “Does my lexical prowess turn you on, Mars?”

I can only nod. The space inside his truck shrinks, and my limbs feel suddenly heavy. I shiver.

“Are you cold?”

“A little.” Unlike West’s, my long hair is still damp.

“Do you want to come inside?”

“Where else would I go?”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yeah, I do.”

We get out of the truck, and West walks around to the passenger side to take my hand. I glance down at our intertwined fingers as anarchy brews in my stomach. I’ve written so many West-and-Mars scenes in my head. The ones where we’re driven together by dramatic circumstance and the ones where I yell at him and the ones where we fall into his bed, but I imagined fewer of the in-between moments. With his sweater on my body and my hand in his, this suddenly feels very real.

He unlocks the door and lets me in first, and now that it’s not dark and I’m not flustered into oblivion, I use the moment to move slowly through his home, taking it all in. He has pictures hanging on the refrigerator and built-in shelves filled with books and succulents and knickknacks. The living room has a rug.

“You like living here, don’t you?”

West hangs his keys on a hook by the door. “I do.”

Those two words crack something open in my chest.

“Was that the wrong thing to say?” he asks.

I shake my head, even though it was. I wanted him to say that he hates the desert and he’s coming back to New York with me.

West sits on the small couch in his living room and pulls me down until I’m sitting next to him. “What are you thinking about?” I ask.

He shoots me a suggestive glance.

“Other than that,” I say.

“There’s very little room for anything other than that,” he says. He shifts me until I’m sitting on his lap facing him, my knees straddling his waist. He grips my thighs in his hands, and his thumbs trace small circles over my dress that make it hard to focus on anything else. I inch closer, my fuse lit.

I drag my fingers through his hair, scraping my nails lightly against his scalp. His head lolls back as his eyes fall shut. His fingers are nearly bruising my thighs now, and it’s the best feeling of my life. I run my hands over his chest and arms and trace his edges, resting a thumb in the notch between his collarbones. I brush my nose against the line of his throat, feeling his heavy swallow. He’s patient as my fingers and eyes rove over him, but the corded tension in his forearms betrays him. “Either kill me or put me out of my misery, Darling.”

“I need a minute to get used to the idea that this is real,” I say.

I can hear the rush of blood in my ears and count the beats of my unsteady heart. It’s hard not to wonder how many heartbeats I have left in this limbo before West and I fall into something that will change everything. I shift my weight and feel him under me, and his eyes fly open. His fingers tighten, searing through the fabric of my dress. The burn of his eyes on mine tells me that, like it or not, everything has already changed.

I kiss him. Not a first kiss, but one that feels like a daybreak all the same. When I realize this, I draw back, but he catches my chin in his hand and pulls me to him. When our lips touch again, it’s like slow-dripping molasses, his tongue unhurried and exploring, licking promises against mine with every stroke. His hand slides to the back of my neck and holds me there, and for the span of a few heartbeats, I think I could spend the rest of my life kissing West like we’re in a hazy, slow-motion daydream.

My hands slide down his arms. I brush my thumb across the skin where his tattoo used to be and pull my mouth away, resting my forehead against his as I inhale a shaky breath.

I lift my eyes to his, and he understands the question without my having to ask.

“It’s still there if you look closely,” he says. I raise his arm and see that he’s right. It’s faded, but buried under layers of healed skin is the faintest outline of an orange blossom tattoo that matches mine. “I had it lasered a few months after the article came out, when my self-loathing was at its peak. I changed my mind after a couple of sessions, though. Decided to write us a different ending.”

I nod, the riot of emotion in my chest making it hard to speak.

“Anything else you want to know?” he asks, and I know that if I decide to ignore the heat simmering in my blood, West will sit with me on the couch and answer my questions until the sun comes up. But the tension between us is nearly at a tipping point, and West’s hands are wandering, and our collective patience is a rubber band stretched beyond its limit.

I shake my head. “Is there anything you want to know?”

He traps my lips with another long, slow drag, worrying my bottom lip between his teeth. He releases it and then soothes the tender spot with a swipe of his tongue. “Can I take you to my room?” His voice is a low rumble that makes me want to press my hand against his chest and feel it.

“Please,” I beg.

His hands slide up my sides as he walks me backward down the hall and into his bedroom. I lift my arms, and he pulls his sweater over my head and throws it to the side. “Your dress, too,” he says.

If possible, I flush even hotter as I slip my dress down my shoulders and let it puddle at my feet. West’s eyes darken as his gaze wanders over me. I feel his attention everywhere, the weight of it dancing over my skin like popping firecrackers. A spike of heat here, a crackle of energy there.

He curses softly as he drinks me in, and it occurs to me a beat too late that perhaps I have a reason to feel self-conscious. He’s seen me like this before, only now there are added years and pounds and scars on my frame, telling stories that he doesn’t yet know. I hear the whisper of a learned instinct to hide my body, but it’s quickly smothered by the dark heat in West’s eyes.

His face creases with longing that I’d recognize anywhere; it’s the same sensation that lances through me every time I see him. It’s hot and demanding and unrelenting, and when he looks at me like that, I feel like tissue paper held over a fire. Like he’s singeing me from the inside out, burning me up until I’m ash.

“I can’t stop looking at you,” he breathes.

“Let me look at you.” I’m in nothing but scraps of lace, and he’s fully dressed, which won’t do at all. I cross the scant space between us and undo the first button on his shirt.

He lifts a brow as he watches my hands move lower. With each button, I press a kiss into the hollow of his neck.

“Careful.” His voice is a low warning that makes me want to do dangerous things just to hear him say it again. “A man could get used to being undressed like this.”

“That’s the point. I never want you to undo a button again without thinking of me,” I say, pulling a bark of surprised laughter from him. I push his shirt over his shoulders and press a soft kiss right over his heart. Lips still against his skin, I tip my head up and lock eyes with him. I snake my tongue out and lick up his chest in a slow drag, and West decides in that moment that he’s had enough.

I gasp as he lifts me and sets me on the edge of the mattress.

“On your knees,” he rasps, looking drugged and desperate. He puts his hands under my elbows and pulls me up to my knees, a move that brings us eye to eye again.

I rake my fingers through his perfect curls, reveling in his unraveling. “Did you know I had a sex dream about you in this bed last night?” I screw my eyes shut tight as his teeth find my earlobe.

He exhales a sharp curse near my ear. “Did you know that I touched myself thinking of you last night?”

I press my hand to my mouth to trap the mortifying sound I feel coming.

He pulls it away. “Let me hear you,” he demands as his lips work their way south.

He presses an open-mouthed kiss to my ribs. The inch of skin beneath my bra. With each kiss, I feel starbursts in my bloodstream.

“How many first kisses have we had?” I wonder aloud, partially to keep myself from fully giving in to the breathy whimpers clawing up my throat.

“Too many and not enough,” he says at last, his attention narrowing to the fabric between my legs. He drops to his knees and peppers a trail of kisses up my thigh to the triangle of lace, pauses, then leans in and presses a hot kiss against the fabric. My fingers tighten desperately in his hair. I would do anything to keep his mouth where it is, but after that torment disguised as a kiss, he diverts his teasing attention to my breasts. I’m already writhing in wonderful misery when he pinches my nipple through my bra. My head falls back as a lightning bolt cracks through me.

We meet for another long kiss, and then his eyes light with renewed intensity and astonishment as he brushes his thumb over my lips and across my mole. “You have no idea, Mars, how long I’ve thought about this. How much I—” He cuts himself off, pained. “I want you anywhere, for as much time as you’ll give me,” he vows.

“Prove it.”

West’s pupils flare, and I have one second to drink in the breathtaking, restrained sight of him before the bars on his self-made cage well and truly break.

“Mars, darling. Bra off. On your back.” His voice is a low rumble that threatens to topple my foundation. I comply, and West curses roughly under his breath as he watches. He lowers his mouth to my chest, and when he flicks his tongue over my nipple, my back arches to meet his mouth. When he flattens his tongue and starts to suck, I nearly black out.

The inkwell of our long-suffering patience has officially run dry. He whispers incantations into my skin as I undo his belt and his jeans with eager, clumsy hands.

His words are interchangeably filthy and sweet, murmured spells that make promises and demands, and it’s the single most arousing moment of my life. It’s so hot it’s almost worth the decade without his mouth on me; he never used to talk like this.

He pulls off my underwear and utters “Look at you” in a way that makes me painfully, achingly aware of the pulse between my thighs. He settles between them and moves my leg over his shoulder, pressing a single kiss to my calf. My breath stutters, and when he gently rests his whiskered jaw against my inner thigh, I stop breathing completely. When our eyes connect, I nod, and I can’t quite make out the string of words that roll off his silver tongue in the seconds before he presses it against me.

I fling my forearm over my eyes and pant as he drags his tongue slowly over me in life-ruining licks. When I tilt my hips to expedite the process, he reaches up and presses a large palm across my lower stomach, pinning me to the bed. My breaths become shallow as he finds a blinding rhythm, and I dig my heels into his back, wondering if he’ll bruise.

“West.” His name falls out of my mouth without intention, but he hears meaning in my voice anyway.

He lifts his head, looking at me with glassy eyes. “Tell me,” he insists.

“More pressure.”

Like any good writer, he takes notes like a pro, dipping his head and sucking my clit firmly into his mouth. Before long, the pressure sliding up my spine is hurtling toward the brink, dragging me with it. My fractured breaths alert him to my unraveling, and he releases his strong grip on my leg to find my hand and thread our fingers together while I fall apart on his tongue.

He wipes his chin on his wrist as he sits back on his heels, hair utterly destroyed, eyes bright, smile wicked. “You taste fucking perfect. I fear you’ve just given me another decade of inspiration.”

“You’re good at that,” I say hoarsely, my throat dry, my head dizzy.

“That’s because you inspire art, Mars Darling.” He winks, and I sink my head into a pillow and laugh.

“Did you just call yourself an artist at going down on me?”

He grins at me like he can’t believe his luck as he moves up my body, coming to rest with his hands braced on either side of me. “Is it unjustified?” A cocky tilt of his chin has me laughing again. I lace my fingers around the back of his head and pull him toward me, pouring the words I’m not saying into a long, searing kiss.

I love you and I love you and I love you.

Everything after that is a perfect, frenzied blur of strong hands and quick kisses and hushed exclamations, broken prose spilled from his lungs into my hair, my lips, the crook of my neck.

When he finally pushes into me, his eyes screw shut, and his features melt into an expression that rides the line between pleasure and pain, his mouth a tight grimace. We hold perfectly still for an unbearable length of time until his eyelids flutter open and we look at each other in shock. Curls falling around his face and arms corded with tension, he doesn’t have to say the next words aloud.

There you are, his body says.

What took us so long? mine replies.

It is a returning and a discovery. As we move together, West finds my gaze and holds on, hardly daring to blink. I trace his lips with my finger, mesmerized by his slow undoing. He slides his hand between our hips, his thumb tracing circles that quickly pull another sob from my throat. He swallows my cries with his mouth, chasing my release with his own before falling onto me, crushing the very last of the air from my lungs with a desperate huff.

He flips us, his arms snaked tightly around my back as he pulls me in to his side. I settle my head on his chest and listen to his runaway heart as he drags my leg over him.

“I’m never leaving this bed,” I promise.

His deep laugh vibrates against my ear. “Convenient, because I wasn’t planning on letting you.”

Spellbound and spent, I watch West trace his fingers over the soft slope of my hip and down my side. I shiver under his touch, my mind already dashing away with the moment. I want to save it, hide it, tuck it in a place I’ll never forget.

“How did you do that?” I breathe.

West lifts my hands and twines our fingers together. “How’d we do that?”

“Fluency in a dead language,” I whisper.

He kisses the back of my hand. “Never dead, just lost for a while.”