Page 161 of Cross Checked
I let my mouth hover over hers. “Your sculpture is ugly.”
Her gasp was instant and offended enough to almost make me smile.
“Excuse me?”
“The massive glass trauma tower in the corner of your frilly living room is hideous.”
“It is art.”
“It is a safety hazard.”
“It has emotional depth.”
“It is literally held together by glue and trauma.”
“I hate you.”
“No, you don’t.” I kissed her once, not hard, just enough to take the sting out before continuing. “I thought it was ugly before I understood it.”
She went still beneath me as I brushed my thumb along her jaw.
“Now it might be one of the most incredible things I’ve ever seen.”
Her eyes filled again, and she immediately looked furious about it. “That was rude.”
“Truth usually is.”
“You don’t get to insult my art and then compliment it like some kind of emotionally confusing hockey vampire.”
“Hockey vampire? Now you’re just being lazy.”
“You drain my will to argue.”
“No, I don’t.”
“No, you don’t,” she admitted, then narrowed her eyes. “But I’m tired and vulnerable, so let me have the metaphor.”
I kissed her again because I couldn’t not. Just my lips to hers, unrushed but dangerous because she said she only wanted benefits and I just wanted her.
I pulled back when she placed her hand on my cheek. “You think it’s incredible or I’m incredible?” she whispered, like she hated needing to ask but needed the answer more.
I looked at her, really looked at her, and felt something inside me settle into place with a finality that should have scared the hell out of me.
It didn’t though.
“I think you’re impossible,” I said. “Annoyingly cheerful. Loud as hell for someone so tiny. Sinfully sexy in a way that makes me want to bite my own knuckles. You collect Nevers, a thing that is only a thing because you needed it to be. You throw insults that should be offensive, but somehow they come out intimate. I hate you is your favorite term of endearment.You call everything emotionally devastating and still rarely use emotionally in the right context. You talk the most shit when you’re one second away from crying, and somehow every single part of that makes sense to me now.”
Her lips parted.
“And all of it,” I said, brushing my thumb along her jaw, “all the loud, impossible, chaotic, beautiful things that make you—you. They are incredible because you’re incredible.”
Her eyes moved over my face like she was trying to decide whether to believe me. I let her look. I wasn’t going anywhere.
Finally, she whispered, “I hate you.”
My chest eased for the first time in hours.
“See what—”
