Page 92 of Angels Are Falling

His hands tightened on my hips. “Mine.” A short, possessive, one-word declaration as I collapsed against him, nose pressed to his throat.

He pulled out slowly, and I felt myself being moved—lifted and resettled—before the weight of the comforter came down and my head was against a pillow. His body found mine.

Somewhere in the drift back to consciousness, I realized his fingers were in my hair. He was looking at my face in the dark. I could feel it. He touched my hair, playing with the strands as if this were all he ever wanted. His hands moved over me with a different quality of attention, a fervent gratitude that made me feel seen.

He pressed his lips to my temple, my jaw, my throat.

His lips were close to my ear. “Amelie.”

“Mm.”

“That was everything I’ve always wanted.” His words were quiet, almost lost.

I raised my head. The city lights from the open balcony caught the planes of his face when I looked at him. I had spent so long villainizing him, viewing him as the architect of my ruined marriage. I had kept his face in my peripheral vision because looking directly at him meant acknowledging something I wasn’t ready for.

I looked at him directly now.

He didn’t seem like my enemy anymore. He was the man who had lost his parents and took me to his preserved, empty childhood home. He was the man who had held me while I cried without asking what was wrong. Who had returned my old furniture. Who had put Bella’s fez back onto her head and dismissed Mrs. Bea without raising his voice. Who had brought me to Beirut.

And now, he was the man slowly stealing my heart.

Chapter

Twenty-Seven

AMELIE

The breakfast was light and airy, the juice fresh and cold. It was a beautiful day, and I wanted to soak in the warmth of the Mediterranean sun on our last day in Beirut. We requested to be seated at the outdoor patio for that reason. The only thing dampening my mood was the incessant number of calls and messages from Stefan.

I ignored them all.

Instead, I finally gave myself permission to be happy with Kai. Things had shifted between us since we landed in Beirut. I knew he felt it, too, and was dreading returning home. He thought I’d turn cold the moment we were back to reality, but he needn’t worry.

The last couple of days had stripped away every defense I’d carefully constructed against him. Kai was the same man, same jaw, same hands, same unhurried way of moving through a room, but I was looking at him through entirely new lenses. It was alarmingly easy once I let myself live in the moment.

Only once, over the last two days, did I gather the nerve to ask him about the future. Although I still didn’t understand why me when he could have any woman, I was starting to realize that grief made people do preposterous things. Even a man like Kai could get lonely. Perhaps he bought a family to fill the hole left behind by the insurmountable tragedy of his parents’ death. Now that things had changed between us, what did he want out of this relationship? And how was I supposed to navigate a polyandrous marriage, given Kai’s uncontrollable jealousy and possessiveness? He paid stupid amounts of money to secure my time. He paid a man never to look at me again. He was openly competing with Stefan, orchestrating a charade to make me like him better.

Even if that were the case, surely, Kai knew that Stefan would always be a part of my life. Despite my current anger, the Nobles had been my family since I was sixteen, and that included Stefan. His parents welcomed me into their home with open arms and called me their pseudo daughter. Their younger children thought of me as their sister, rather than a sister-in-law. The twins were in diapers when I met Stefan, and I was in the hospital when Bella was born. When I moved across the country for university, I returned to the Nobles’ home for the holidays, spring break, and summer. The kids had never known a life without me. Although I thought of them as my siblings, too, Stefan was the one related to them by blood. I had no claim without his consent, not that I would ever separate them or make the children choose between us. I couldn’t imagine a life where the five of us weren’t a family.

Well, I supposed it was the six of us now.

What kind of future did Kai envision for us? We discussed it before the wedding. At that time, I assumed Kai would eventually start chasing skirts once he was bored with playing house, and I’d return to my marriage with Stefan. I had since learned that Kai’s attention wasn’t so fickle. He was serious about this marriage, and I was dying to find out what kind of life he imagined for us.

“Kai. Can I ask you a question?” I had asked over lunch on our second day in Beirut.

“Mm.”

“What do you want out of…” I gestured vaguely between us. “This.”

“You know what I want.”

Me. The implication was blatant. Kai had never been subtle about expressing his desire for me.

I turned my cup of lemon-mint tea, needing something to do with my hands.

He watched me pensively. “What do you want?”

What did I want?