A quiet groan rumbles down his chest. “What are you thinking about? You’re being so quiet all of a sudden.”
“I’m thinking that you’re mine,” I whisper.
He pulls back, looks between our bodies, at my hand fisted around him. “Fucking all yours.”
We watch what I’m doing for a few more beats of silence.
“What are you going to do with me?” he asks, looking back up at my face.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Touch me, kiss me.” He lies back down and shrugs a little against the pillow. “I don’t know. I want to do it all.”
My stomach tightens from the way he watches with wide, intense eyes.
I shift closer, feeling his cock slide over me and he hums, smiling. “This works. You could get yourself off like this and let me watch you come.” His grin widens. “I sure do like to watch you come, Miss London.”
I smile down at him, tracing the line of his collarbone with my fingertip. “You’re my favorite.”
His eyes widen playfully. “Your favorite of anyone?”
Something fills my chest, climbs up my throat. I nod, unable to agree out loud because it’s true. He is my favorite person in the world. “You’re so sweet to me.”
“Well, I would hope so. I love you.” He smiles again when he says it, and the way his eyes turn down a little at the corners just as his mouth turns up makes my heart trip over itself.
“I know you do. I feel it.” I bend, kissing him. My heart peeks over the ledge and sees nothing but wide-open air. “I love you, too.”
He stops breathing, his thighs tense beneath me. “You don’t have—”
I cut him off. “I’m not just saying it because you did. You know I wouldn’t say that if I didn’t mean it.”
It hurts and it soothes just watching Luke struggle with this much emotion. His eyes are tight; he swallows a few times.
“Yeah?” he manages, finally, but his voice still comes out a little strangled.
I nod. “I love you.”
I know without a doubt I never felt this sort of bone-deep comfort with Justin, and even his widest smile never made me melt the way a single, flirty glance from Luke can.
His eyes search mine for a few, jagged breaths. “London?”
“Yeah?”
“Will you move to Berkeley with me?”
My blood turns to smoke, muscles dissolve. I knew this was coming, at least the inevitable choice of moving together or navigating the distance.
He’s watching my mouth, not for my answer but because I’m smiling. I can tell he doesn’t know what it means, though, and his eyes grow anxious.
I lean in, kissing him.
“No, babe, stop.” He holds me back with one hand curled around my shoulder and my heart trips. He called me babe. Not the intentional teasing of Logan or Dimples, but something instinctive, something that rolled reflexively off his tongue.
“Be real with me right now,” he continues. “The idea of being up there if you’re down here . . . I can still choose UCSD.”
I meet his eyes and they’re not smiling, but they’re clear. I see for the first time that his left eye is a little lighter than his right, and it occurs to me that I will never forget this detail about him. Every time we are together, we are collecting these things that make up this amazing Us, and this one makes my throat grow tight with suppressed tears.
He called me babe.
His eyes are two different colors.
He wants me to move with him to Berkeley.
“I’ll move.”
His eyes flash wide. “What?”
“I’ll move to Berkeley with you,” I tell him. “I want you to go to your first choice. I don’t want to be apart.”
“You’ll live with me?”
My chest flips at this enormous detail. “Yeah. I mean, assuming that’s the situation you meant. We can get separate places instead.”
“No,” he blurts, quickly shaking his head. “That’s what I meant. Living together.” His head jerks back in sudden skepticism. “Wait. Seriously? You’re serious?”
I bite back a giddy laugh. “Yes, I’m serious.”
“You love me and you’re moving with me?”
I can barely handle his adorable mania. Bending, I slide my lips over his. “I love you and I’m moving with you.”
Speaking against my mouth, he mumbles, “Holy fuck. Now we’re going to have sex for the first time in this bed. How am I going to last long enough to make sure you come first?”