Refusal.
“Why don’t you take pictures anymore, Rune?” I asked. Rune looked away. “Please, don’t ignore me.”
Rune sighed in defeat. “Because without you, I didn’t see the world the same way anymore.Nothingwas the same. I know we were only young, but without you, nothing made sense. I was angry. I was drowning. So I gave up my passion because the passion within me had died out.”
Out of anything he could have done or said, this saddened me most of all. Because the passion had been so strong within him. And his pictures, even at fifteen, were like nothing I’d ever seen.
I stared at Rune’s hard features, his eyes lost in a trance as he stared blankly at the empty stage. His wall was back up and the tension in his jaw was back. The sullen expression had returned.
Needing to leave him be, not to push him too far, I leaned my head back against his shoulder and smiled. I smiled, still hearing that piece drift into my ears.
“Thank you,” I whispered, as the lights on the stage faded.
Lifting my head, I waited for Rune to look at me. Eventually he did.
“Only you could have known that this—” I gestured to the auditorium—“would mean so much to me. Only my Rune.”
Rune pressed a soft kiss on my cheek.
“Itwasyou at my recital the other night, wasn’t it?”
Rune sighed, then eventually nodded his head. “I was never going to miss you play,Poppymin. I never will.”
He got to his feet. He was silent as he held out his hand. He was silent as I gave him my hand and he led us to the car. He was silent as we journeyed home. I thought I must have hurt him somehow. I worried that I had done something wrong.
When we arrived home, Rune left the car and walked around the hood to open my door. I took his proffered hand as I jumped down. I kept tight hold as Rune walked me back to my house. I expected to go to the door. Instead, he led me to my window. I frowned when I saw the frustrated look on his face.
Needing to know what was wrong, I ran my hand down his face. But as my finger landed on his cheek, something in him seemed to snap. He backed me against the side of my house. His body pressed against mine and he cupped my face with his hands.
I was breathless—breathless at his closeness. Breathless at the intensity in his dark expression. His blue eyes searched every part of my face. “I wanted to do this right,” he said. “I wanted to take this slow. This date. Us. Tonight.” He shook his head, his forehead creasing as he fought whatever he was battling inside. “But I can’t. I won’t.”
I opened my mouth to answer, but his thumb drifted to graze my bottom lip, his attention on my mouth. “You’re my Poppy.Poppymin. You know me. Onlyyouknow me.” Taking my hand, he laid it over his heart. “You know me, even under this anger, you know me.” He sighed, edging so close that we shared the same air. “And I know you.” Rune paled. “And if we only have limited time, I’m not going to waste it. You’re mine. I’m yours. To hell with anything else.”
My heart fluttered like an arpeggio in my chest. “Rune,” was all I managed to say. I wanted to shout thatyes, I was his. That he was mine. Nothing else mattered. But my voice failed me. I was too overcome with emotion.
“Say it,Poppymin,” he demanded. “Just sayyes.”
Rune took a final step, trapping me, his body flush with my own, his heart beating in tandem with mine. I dragged in a breath. Rune’s lips brushed against mine, hovering, waiting, primed to possess them completely.
As I looked into Rune’s eyes, his black pupils all but eliminating the blue, I let go and whispered, “Yes.”
Warm lips suddenly crashed to mine, Rune’s familiar mouth taking them with single-minded determination. His warmth and minty taste drowned out my senses. His hard chest kept me pinned to the wall, trapped, as he owned me with his kiss. Rune was showing me to whom I belonged. He was giving me no other choice but to submit to him, to give myself back to him after withdrawing for too many years.
Rune’s hands threaded through my hair, keeping me in place. I moaned as his tongue pushed through to meet mine—soft, hot and desperate. Lifting my hands up his wide back, they landed in his hair. Rune growled into my mouth, kissing me deeper, taking me further and further from any fear or trepidation I harbored at his return. He kissed me until there was no part of me that didn’t know who it belonged to. He kissed me until my heart again fused with his—two halves of one whole.
My body began to weaken under his touch. Feeling me completely surrender to him, Rune’s kiss slowed to soft, gentle caresses. Then he broke away, our breathing heavy, an arc of tension above us. Rune’s swollen lips kissed my cheeks, my jaw and my neck. When he finally withdrew, his quick breaths blew against my face. His hands slackened their grip on me.
And he waited.
He waited, watching me with his intense gaze.
Then my lips parted, and I whispered, “Kiss three hundred and fifty-seven. Against the wall of my house … when Rune took possession of my heart.” Rune stilled, his hands tensed, and I finished with, “And my heart almost burst.”
Then it came. Rune’s pure smile. It was bright, it was wide and it was true.
My heart soared at the sight.
“Poppymin,” he whispered.