“Come on, love,” he says to me as Amara puts the car in park. Already the photographer turns his flashbulbs on us.
I freeze but Lachlan puts his hand on the small of my back and leans in to me, whispering, “It’s all right. Just smile. I don’t like it either but it’s just for tonight and it’s all a good cause. Think of the dogs.”
I think of Lionel as I step out to the sidewalk, Lachlan pulling me to his side, arm around my waist, staring stoically at the cameras. Lionel sidles between us and at the lightest command from Lachlan, sits down, hamming for the flashbulbs too.
I have to admit, it’s hard not to smile when you’re on the arm of this man, especially when people are yelling his name. I know that being the centre of attention is the last thing that Lachlan wants too, but he handles it with so much ease it surprises me.
He doesn’t waste too much time though before he whisks me inside the hotel, Lionel trotting proudly beside him.
It’s crazy inside. There are fancy-dressed people everywhere and even though I know I look the part, I sure don’t feel the part. This is part of some society that I’ve never belonged to and it’s only Lachlan’s vice-like grip on my hand that keeps me sane. In fact, he only lets go to shake the hand of someone and other than that, he’s holding onto me.
I can’t remember anyone’s names. I spot Thierry, John and a few other rugby players in different parts of the venue, and later we see Amara, Jessica and Donald, but other than that, all the people I meet blur into one. It’s pretty obvious right away that a lot of them don’t really care about the animals, or about Lachlan in particular. They just want to be seen doing the right thing in front of the right people. But charity for the wrong reasons is still charity and whatever can help the dogs is always a good thing.
I have to say, I’m completely smitten by the way Lachlan treats me. I was really worried about this event, more so than I admitted to myself. But he hasn’t had a thing to drink, while I swill champagne and feel guilty about it, he drinks sparkling water with lime and that’s it. While he’s approached by people again and again and again, he always introduces me first as his girlfriend. He pulls me into conversations, never leaves me out of them, always has his hand in mine or around my waist. He makes me as part of his world as possible, as if I’m a permanent fixture, as if I always have been.
And I can’t help but stare at him with big, googly eyes. If I was a cartoon, I would have hearts in them and I would be constantly sighing and I’m sure I look no different to someone watching me from afar. I am smitten, hanging onto his succinct words in that elegant brogue, the way he focuses on each and every person with those magnetic eyes of him, holding them in his stare. I know that he’s doing this because he has to, that he’s not usually so personable, but he’s just so damn good at it that he fools even me.
Throughout the night I fall more in love with him. I swear if you look close enough, you’ll see my heart beneath my rib cage, bursting at the seams. I can’t stop smiling. I don’t want to ever stop smiling.
At some point a band starts playing and Lachlan hands Lionel over to Amara and pulls me over to the dance floor.
“You dance?” I ask him as he wraps his arms around me, Lana Del Rey’s “Young and Beautiful” starting to play.
“Not a bit,” he admits with a smile I feel down in my toes. “But I can fake it for a few steps.”
Okay, well maybe dancing isn’t one of Lachlan’s hidden talents. The man can’t be good at everything. But he does a good job of faking it and at least he doesn’t step on my toes.
We stay on the dance floor for more than a few songs. I’m in no hurry to return to schmoozing and I assume Lachlan isn’t either. That’s probably why we’re dancing for so long.
“I just wanted you to myself,” he says, burying his face in my hair. It’s like he read my mind.
“How much longer does this gala go for? I mean, when do you usually leave?” I ask him, staring at the other elegant partygoers gliding past us.
“I’m usually the last one standing,” he says. “I don’t want to be that guy who throws a party, asks for money, and then leaves.”
“No, that’s not you. Then we’ll stay till the end.”
“Till the very end,” he says.
The Beatles “All My Loving” comes on and he holds me tighter to him, his hands brushing down the length of my bare back and holding the small of my waist. He very faintly sings the lyrics in my ears and I close my eyes, letting the words sink deep, letting the moment last for as long as it possibly can. Everyone else drifts away and it’s me and him and a world built for two.
“I’m so in love with you,” he whispers, the roughness of his cheek pressed against mine. “So in love. There is no bottom. I just keep falling.”
I’m falling too. But my heart has grown wings. It threatens to carry me forever and each time I’m dropped, careening toward the abyss, it will pick me up again.
I never thought it could be like this.
I never want it to be any other way.
“I love you,” I say softly, my voice choking as all that emotion climbs up my throat, almost overtaking me. “I can’t leave you. I won’t leave you. I want to stay.”
The words are unplanned and take me by surprise, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t true.
His upper body stiffens, his steps becoming slower. He pulls his head back and eyes me carefully. “Are you being serious?”
I swallow and nod. “Yes,” I tell him, staring deep in his eyes. “Yes, yes. I want to stay. I can’t bear the thought of losing you, leaving you. I can’t go back to the life I had, not after this life here, as brief as it has been. I know what I want and I want you.”
He stops moving and cups my face in his hands and I can feel his strength seep into my skin. “You have no idea how happy you’ve made me,” he says, shaking his head. “No idea. No idea.” He kisses me hard, passionately and fingers sink into my hair, his forehead resting against mine. “I will give you everything you need. I will be everything you need me to be. I’ll take care of you.”
I’m about to protest that I don’t need a man to take care of me, but I clamp my mouth shut and don’t say a word. Because I do need Lachlan, at least in terms of my heart, and I also know how much it matters sometimes to just feel needed. I want him to feel that, to know that I need him as much as he needs me.
“I know you will,” I eventually say. “You’re my man.”
He breathes heavily into my neck, almost a gasp. “I’m going to make you so happy.”
“You do make me happy,” I tell him truthfully. “Sometimes I don’t think it can possibly get better but then it turns out there is more room in my heart than I thought.”
He sighs blissfully, holding me closer for a few moments. Then he whispers, “We need to find a room,” and his voice is back to that warm, growly tone that makes my panties wet in a second. Hell yes, we need to find a room. All these proclamations of love need somewhere to go.
He takes my arm and strides across the dance floor, shoulders back, taking long, wide steps, like he’s the King of everything. My eyes are peeled for a cloakroom as we dodge people here and there, especially avoiding Jessica because she doesn’t need to know what we’re about to do. We disappear around the corner, past the hotel reception, and find the washroom. It’s the best that we can do.
He pulls me into it, looks back and forth down the hall to make sure no one saw us, then locks the door.
I’m backed up against the sink, my hands resting on the edges, waiting for his onslaught.
But he doesn’t attack me, at least not right away. He just stares at me and our eyes are locked with each other.
“What?” I whisper to him, afraid to break the spell.
He tilts his head to the side, observing me, frowning, as if I am some riddle he’s trying to solve.
“Did you mean it?” he asks. “When you said you would stay?”