Page 43 of Burn the Script

“This.” I threaded our fingers together, and his sleepy eyes went big with surprise. I smiled at him. “Walk with me.”

Hand in hand, we strolled along the moonlit beach like we had all the time in the world—a world of our own. For a while, we existed outside of his house, just a normal couple who needed little entertainment and few words because we enjoyed being in each other’s company.

Out of dozens of seashells we came across, a particular one caught Graham’s notice. He dropped to a knee to examine its spiral shape while his other hand coasted up and down my calf. A pleasant, fluttering sensation attacked my chest cavity, and I swayed a little.

“That’s pretty,” I said.

“It’s a turret shell, also known as a tower shell. Sounds like something from a fairy tale, don’t you think?” He looked up at me and smiled—the kind of smile encased in the fondest memories. “I thought of this shell the first time I saw you.”

Mama Mary, catch me.

I knew nothing about ballet, but my head felt dizzy like my heart was doing pirouettes. Graham was kneeling before me on a beach, and I was damn close to floating away.

Sliding my fingers into his hair, I asked, “Can we keep it?”

I’d done my research on our vacation destination, and the law said we couldn’t take seashells home with us. Regardless, I wanted my fucking princess shell. I wanted to display it in my apartment as a reminder of this moment.

“No. I’ll find one for you back home,” he said.

Returning the shell to its nest in the sand, he treated it with the care and tenderness he’d always given me, like it was precious. Graham was the precious one. He viewed the world with kindness in his heart and optimism in his eyes. And he looked at me that way while I constantly prepared for the worst. I wasn’t prepared to lose him though, was I?

Something bad could happen to one of us before I confessed my feelings. He’d never know for certain that he owned my heart. It permanently fused to his that night on the boat when he embraced my past instead of running from it.

“I love you!” I blurted.

Time stopped somewhere inside the echo of my shout. Only the sound of a loud, shaky exhale told me he was still breathing with his hands pressed to the sand. When seconds passed without him moving, my stomach sank, and every inch of my skin burned with embarrassment.

Finally, he looked up. His eyes glistened, and his throat bobbed on a hard swallow. “Do you mean it?”

“Yes, I mean it.”

“Please…” He grabbed my hand and held it between both of his. “Look me in the eye and say it again.”

“I love you.”

My head spun before my back hit the sand with a hard thud. The fall wasn’t graceful. I’d have bruises later, but the possessive way he covered my body and sealed our lips together was worth the pain. I got lost in a whirlwind of tongues and his whimpers of relief. My legs locked around his thighs, pinning him in place as he pulled back and let out a trembling breath.

“I thought I’d never hear you say it.”

“You doubted me?” I asked.

He shook his head, and for the first time since we met, I saw something ugly in his beautiful amber gaze. Fear. And I hated that I was the reason for it.

“I doubted myself, worried I haven’t earned your love yet. That I might never earn it.”

“What?” My question was little more than an incredulous puff of air.

“You think you’re a hard man to love, but loving you is the easiest thing I’ve ever done. Keeping you is the hard part.”Sighing, he lay beside me, propped on an elbow with a leg draped over both of mine. His fingertips traced the line of my jaw and neck. “I’m madly in love with you, Miguel. It’s probably unhealthy and mostly one-sided, but I’ll spend every day proving the secrecy will all be worth it in the end. That I’m worth it.”

Splaying a hand on his stomach, I said, “You have nothing left to prove, Graham. And the feelings in here”—I slid my hand to his chest—“the empty ache when we’re apart and the stronger beat when we’re together? That’s definitely not one-sided.”

The wet eyes looking down at me with bottomless devotion sparkled, and his smile rivaled the moonlight. “You’re obsessed with me.”

I laughed. “How could I not be? I never stood a chance against those lips and all their convincing ways.”

Graham leaned in and kissed me with his sweet, perfect lips, a series of lingering pecks because the smiles were stuck on our faces. And when he stood and pulled me from the ground, saying, “Let’s keep walking,” I latched on to his arm and vowed never to let him go.

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