Page 164 of IRL: In Real Life
“Smart.”
“I’m learning.”
He kissed me then, and all of my other questions faded away.
When he pulled back, my family was still loud behind us. My mother was still directing leftovers like a field marshal. Somebody had put on another Maze song. Somebody’s child was crying because they were tired and sugared beyond reason.
It was home. Peace. Love loud and ordinary and all around us.
And standing there with Micah’s hand warm at the back of my neck and his future already reaching toward mine in ways I could actually feel, I knew the thing my heart had been trying to tell me all along.
This was mine.
This was love.
This was real.
By daythree in San Juan, my hair had given up.
Humidity had already been testing me, and Micah Sutton had finished the job. I had arrived on the island with my pixie laid smooth, bronze and auburn catching light exactly where it was supposed to, every edge respected, every layer in formation. By the third morning, after ocean air, rooftop heat, and a man who kept putting his hands in my hair like he paid my stylist himself, it had bloomed into a soft little curly wash-and-go that no amount of mousse and prayer was going to talk back into obedience.
Micah loved it.
Of course he did.
That was his character flaw.
I stood at the mirror in our suite bathroom with gloss in one hand and a look on my face that said I was trying not to make this his problem, even though it absolutely was. Behind me, Micah lounged against the bathroom door in an open white linen shirt and tan slacks, one hand in his pocket, the other holding his drink like he had nowhere to be except exactly where I was.
“Don’t,” I said, catching his smile in the mirror.
“I didn’t say nothing.”
“You were about to.”
He pushed off the doorway and came up behind me, warm and broad and entirely too pleased with himself. Both hands settled low on my waist. Then he kissed the side of my neckwith the kind of lazy affection that made annoyance hard to hold onto.
“I like it,” he murmured.
“You like all the versions you cause.”
“That’s true too.”
I rolled my eyes, but my mouth softened anyway.
“Mena is going to cuss you out when I get home.”
He laughed low against my skin. “Mena been cussing me out in theory for months.”
I cracked up because he wasn’t lying.
At this point, even Mena had accepted that my maintenance schedule and Micah’s appetite were in direct conflict, and my scalp was collateral damage.
I turned in his arms and smoothed both hands up the front of his shirt.
“You are very pleased with yourself.”
“I’m in San Juan with my woman,” he said simply. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
