We spend the next hour making our way through the ballroom, saying our goodbyes, posing for a few more photos, and hugging Jules and Nate.
"I"m so proud of you, kiddo," I hear Will murmur to Jules.
"Thanks," she smiles up at him. "And don"t call me that."
He laughs, a real Will laugh, and my stomach clenches. G.o.d, I love his laugh.
I love him so much, and he"s about to break up with me, I just know it.
He escorts me out to the curb and asks the limo driver to take us back to the church where his car is parked. Once inside, Will sits at one side of the limo, and I slide over to the other side, knowing I"m not welcome to sit next to him.
And not being able to touch him is killing me.
So, I"ll let him decide when he wants to talk about what"s eating at him. We sit in silence all the way to the church. He gets me settled into his s.e.xy car, and is silent all the way to my house.
I notice he doesn"t take me back to his place.
When he parks in my driveway, he cuts the engine and we sit in silence, not looking at each other, just looking straight ahead.
Finally, after what feels like forever, I break the silence.
"Will," I whisper, "please talk to me. I can"t apologize to you if I don"t know what I did wrong."
He scrubs his hand over his mouth roughly, then abruptly gets out of the car, stalks around to my side, and opens the pa.s.senger door wide, indicating I should get out.
So I do.
He follows me to my door, watches me disarm the alarm, and then turns to go.
"Please, don"t go. Will, come inside and talk to me."
"I can"t talk to you," he murmurs, not meeting my eyes. "It hurts too d.a.m.n much to talk to you, Megan. It"s killing me to look at you."
"What the f.u.c.k is going on?" I demand, my hands on my hips. "Don"t be a p.u.s.s.y, Will, just say what the f.u.c.k is wrong!"
"You are!" His head snaps up, his eyes p.i.s.sed off. "I tell you every f.u.c.king day how much I love you, Megan." He moves closer to me, his face inches from mine. "Every single day, I say it. I show you. I make sure you know that I am completely in love with you."
I swallow hard, my eyes wide, and just watch him as he unloads, while my heart is breaking. I feel tears gather in my eyes.
"But you can"t say it back," he continues. He throws his arms up and stalks away, but then turns back to me, his mouth set in a grim line. "You can"t tell me that you love me, yet you just stood on a stage before two hundred of my nearest and dearest and told another man that you love him."
My mouth drops and a tear falls down my cheek.
"I saw you," he spits out. "I saw you tell him you love him after he whispered in your ear and kissed you, which almost earned him a punch in the jaw." He rubs his mouth again and then plants his hands on his hips and another tear falls down my cheek.
"I"m so in love with you, Megan, I can"t see straight. You mean more to me than anything. More than my family, more than football. More than anything." He shrugs and holds his hands out to his sides, as though he"s showing me everything he has.
"But you can"t say the same to me, even though I know you love me. I just don"t think you love me the way I love you."
He closes his eyes and sighs, and then looks down at his feet. He"s standing before me, in his suit, and I want so desperately to take him in my arms and tell him how much I need him.
How much I love him.
He slowly raises his head and pins me with his sad blue eyes.
"If you can"t love me the way I love you, maybe we"re just wasting our time." His shoulders sag and he runs his knuckles down my cheek. "Good luck to you, Megan."
He turns on his heel and walks down my stairs and to his car, and I"m stuck.
What the f.u.c.k just happened?
He reaches his car, opens the door, and I spring into action.
"Wait!"
Chapter Twenty-Seven.
~Will~ I open my car door, my heart in my throat, and have to physically stop myself from running back to her and begging her to forget everything I just said.
I"ll take whatever she"s willing to give me, for the rest of my life, if I can just have her.
But not ever hearing the words come out of that sweet mouth will make me resent her eventually, and that"s something I never want to happen.
Ever.
I love her too much for that s.h.i.t, so it"s best to cut our losses now.
"Wait!"
She sounds panicked. I clench my eyes shut and grip the car door tightly. Just go back to the house, babe.
"Will, wait." She"s at my side now. I look down into her tear-filled hazel eyes and it takes everything in me to not gather her to me and tell her everything will work out.
Because I don"t think it will.
"Meg, look..."
"No, you look," she cuts me off, her hands in fists on her lush little hips, fire coming out of her eyes.
I"ve p.i.s.sed her off.
"You don"t get to drop that bomb on me and then just ride off into the sunset, never to be heard from again, Will Montgomery. And if you think you"re breaking up with me, you have another thing coming."
I love it when she"s p.i.s.sed. But the knot in my stomach hasn"t eased yet.
"Will," she starts and takes a deep breath, "I love you more than you will ever understand."
The breath leaves me, and I can just stare down at her, my jaw dropped to my knees.
"What?"
"Of course I"m in love with you, Will." She swallows and closes her eyes. Before she can say another word, I take her face in my hands, the touch of her skin a balm to my frayed nerves, and make her look at me.
"I don"t want you to say those words just because you"re afraid I"ll break up with you without them."
Her eyes smile up at me and for the first time in the past few hours, a calm settles over me.
"You"re smarter than that," she murmurs in her sweet voice. "And you know me better than that."
I pull her up into my arms, nudge the car door shut with my foot and carry her inside her tiny house.
I plan to sell this townhouse and move her in with me as soon as possible.
Which means next year, because she"s so d.a.m.n independent. G.o.d, I love her.
I carry her into her living room and sit on her couch, cradling her on my lap. Her eyebrows climb into her hairline.
"I thought you"d be taking me upstairs."
"Later," I respond and trace her lips with my fingertip. "First, talk to me."
She sighs and bites that lower lip.
"I couldn"t tell you I love you because in my life, that"s always meant that people would leave." She shrugs and blinks, trying to hold back tears, and it"s like a fist clenching my heart.
I hate it when she cries, because she rarely ever does.
"Go on," I whisper and smile down at her. I love the way her small body feels in my arms, all soft and small and like she"s meant for me.
"I think I loved my mom when I was small. I don"t really remember," her brow creases as she thinks. "But I was taken from her, and honestly, I"m thankful because that was for the best. But then I was tossed from foster home to foster home. I met Leo in the first one, and I latched onto him like he was a lifeline, because for me, he was." She looks up at me with pleading hazel eyes, begging for me to understand, and I think I"m finally beginning to.
"He was the first person I"ve ever had in my life that was truly family to me. He took care of me, and was kind to me, and didn"t want anything from me." She swallows, and brushes the tears on her cheeks. "But then I was taken out of that first home, and Leo was taken away from me. Thank G.o.d I didn"t lose touch with him."
I cradle her to me and let her talk it out.
"It was always made very clear to me in each of those homes what my place was, and it wasn"t as a part of the family I was staying with. I was relieved when the state emanc.i.p.ated me at sixteen and I could go live with Leo."
She pulls back and looks up at me. "But then, after I"d been with him for years, and we"d had the band and done well, he decided to take the band and go to L.A. to try to make it in the business."
"Why didn"t he take you with him?" I ask.
"He insisted I stay here and pursue my nursing career. He knew I was good at it, and I"d worked so hard for it. And I think he could see the toll the long hours of working and then playing gigs on the weekend was taking on me. He didn"t want me to quit."
I frown down at her. "I hate to say it, but that makes sense, sweetheart."
"Yeah, now it does," she agrees and nods. "But then it just felt like another person I loved, the most important person I loved was leaving again."
"I"m not going to leave you, baby," I don"t care if she can"t stand that nick-name. "I love you so much, Megan."
She cups my face in her hands, the way she always does, and pulls her fingertips down my cheeks, her eyes happy. "I love you too."
Sucker punch to the gut.
"Say it again," I whisper.
"I love you too, Will," she whispers.
I stand with her still in my arms and carry her up the stairs to her bedroom and set her on her feet. With my fingertips, I push the straps of her dress off her shoulders and watch it fall off her delectable body and pool on the floor at her feet.
"f.u.c.king h.e.l.l, you"re naked under there."
She"s standing before me in just her black stilettos and diamond earrings, and it"s all I can do not to come in my pants like a f.u.c.king teenager.
She smiles shyly. "You"re entirely over-dressed."
"Undress me," I demand, holding my arms out to my side, but she shakes her head and sits on the bed, then scoots on her a.s.s to the middle of the mattress, leaving her heels on.
"I wanna watch," she responds with a sa.s.sy grin, showing off that dimple.
"So d.a.m.n lazy," I smile down at her and can"t get out of this G.o.dd.a.m.n suit fast enough. Her eyes darken as they roam over my nakedness and I smirk at her.
I will train every day for the rest of my life to keep that look in her eyes when she looks at me.
Finally naked, I climb onto the bed and cover her small body with mine, her hips cradling me, my elbows on either side of her head, brushing little wisps of hair off her forehead with my thumbs.
"I love you," she murmurs with a happy smile.
"G.o.d, I"ll never get tired of hearing those words come out of your s.e.xy mouth, babe."
She chuckles and grips my a.s.s in her hands. I tip my head down and kiss her, gently at first, and then harder and roll us so she"s straddling my hips.
She sits up straight and rocks her hips, rubbing her already wet p.u.s.s.y against my c.o.c.k. I suck a deep breath in through my teeth. "Easy, baby, or I"ll come before we even get started."
"Really?" she looks happy with herself as she continues to torture me, the little vixen.
"Megan," I warn her, and suddenly she"s scooting down and sucking on my c.o.c.k, jacking me off at the same time and I jack-knife up on the bed. "Holy f.u.c.k!"
She laughs and laps at the head like it"s an ice cream cone, and then sinks over it again, sucking as she pulls up. I thread my fingers through her soft hair and moan.
"Meg, come back up here." She shakes her head stubbornly and continues to wreak havoc on my c.o.c.k.
"I swear to Jesus, Megan, if you don"t come up here..."