“Because I walk you home from school?”

“One of them.”

“What are the others?”

With her voice soft, she answered, “You’re important because you look after me even when you don’t think you are. You carry my bag, you sharpen my pencil, you give me cookies from the canteen, you make up silly nicknames for me.”

I scowled. “The nicknames are a stupid idea.”

“Don’t you dare stop, they’re the best!” Her eyes glittered. “You make my days better just knowing you’re waiting for me to start class together.”

I forced myself not to react, even though she’d just given me every gift I ever wanted. “That’s why you like me? Because you don’t feel so alone? Any boy could do that.”

She slipped off her barstool and pressed herself against me. “Any boy isn’t you.” Her head fell on my shoulder. “I have friends. I have company. But...none of them fills up the holes inside me like you do. It’s like...I only need you. And that’s terrifying because I know you hide so much, and I don’t know if you’ll decide that one day—”

“Stop.”

“But you’d tell me, right? If I pried too much or annoyed you enough to push you—”

“Olin.” My voice was fierce. “Enough.”

“I like you, Gilbert, not because of what you do for me, but because of the secrets you refuse to share. You think they’ll change how I care about you.” She pressed a fleeting kiss on my cheek. “You couldn’t be more wrong.”

I clenched every muscle I possessed so I didn’t clutch her close and kiss her back. Kiss her mouth this time. Kiss her until I couldn’t stop.

With my eyes closed, I asked quietly. “You like me?”

“So much.”

“How do you like me?” I opened my eyes, forcing a smile and repeating what she said to me that first day we talked. “Do you like me like me or just—”

“I like you like you.” Her gaze fell to my lips. “I want to like you forever.”

I froze, even as my heart went wild. “Forever is a long time.”

“It’s not long enough.”

I fell deeper into her gaze, feeling the tug to spill everything. Drowning beneath the need to have her know me. Truly, truly know me. To accept me. To no longer fear she’d leave me when she found out everything. To take away her fear that I would ever leave her in return.

Because that would never happen.

Ever.

I would slit my own wrists if I ever thought of abandoning her.

Then you’d leave her in death, you moron.

Okay, I would just have to find a way to be immortal, so Olin would forever be mine.

My hand shook as I reached out and cupped her cheek. She gasped as I ran my thumb over her cheekbone. “Friends isn’t enough anymore.”

Her tongue licked at the icing sugar on her bottom lip. “What does that mean?”

Twisting on the stool, I dropped my hands to her hips and positioned her between my legs. The softness of her blue pinstripe dress that was the school’s summer uniform warmed beneath my touch. I checked my self-control was in full affect, hoping she didn’t look down because I couldn’t hide my reaction to her. Couldn’t pretend I escorted her home because I was a gentleman who kept her safe.

I was the boy who wanted to tear off her clothes and have her beg my name.

I was my father’s son and my father liked his women subservient, submissive, with only money forming a foundation between them.

I was afraid that that was me. That I would fight to deserve Olin only to do something unforgivable.

That was a secret I would never be able to tell her, but it helped make my other one not so dangerous. So what I came from a bad beginning? It didn’t define me. I had no intention of making Olin live such a life.

“It means that I want you to know who I am, so you can decide if you want me.” I sucked in a thin breath. “I live in a whore house. My father is an alcoholic and a pimp. I don’t know which of his whores is my mother. She’s probably dead from overdosing. My room is next to a whore’s whose clients make it impossible to sleep. There’s never any food in the house. My father hates me and loves to prove it.”

There was only one other person who might’ve guessed what I survived at night and that was Ms Tallup. And that was only because I’d bled over my homework more than once and she’d sent me to the principal with the threat of Child Protective Services taking me away.

It was probably why I hated and feared her.

As long as I played nice and hid my frequent injuries, I was permitted to stay in her class. If I didn’t, I would be removed from school, from hope...from Olin.

Before Olin could speak, I rushed, “I’m not telling you this to make you pity me. I’m telling you this because you guessed, and I don’t want to discuss it again. It is what it is, but it won’t be for too much longer. I’m gonna graduate, get a good job, and have my own place soon. We’ll be together on our own terms and none of that shit will matter.”

My tone softened as she stared at me. “And then...when I have my own place, I’ll have you round every day. And every night. In fact, we might as well live together because I’ll never want you to leave.”

She sucked in a breath. “Live together?”

I smirked. “Might as well. Isn’t that what families do?”

“You want to be my family?” She gasped adorably.

“Family have each other’s backs. They’re there for each other no matter what.” I brushed aside her hair, caressing her ear. “I want to be there for you, and you’re already there for me. That makes us family. More so than the ones we have right now.”

“I-I...guess.” She blushed as I ran my thumb along her jaw.

“It’s settled then.” I dropped my hand and captured her hip again, holding her tight between my legs. “After school, we’ll be together.”

“And during school?” Her voice was achingly timid. “What about now?”

Pulling her forward and caging her with my body, I murmured, “We are together.”

“Are we?” She blushed again, a tease glowing in her gaze. “I mean...you’ve never tried to kiss me.”

I narrowed my eyes, allowing flirtation to fade in favour of seriousness. “A kiss isn’t something I can take back. Once I kiss you, you’re mine.”

She shuddered. “Well, you might as well get it over with because—”

“Not yet.” I rose and kissed her forehead, inhaling her scent of orchids and talc. “Soon.”

“You don’t have to wait. I don’t care about your background. Nothing about you could turn me off, Gil.”

I sighed as my ribcage tightened. “I’m sure there are some things.”

Her eyes searched mine nervously. “Don’t ever doubt us, okay?”

Her concern was one of the things I loved about her. She literally held my heart in her dainty dancer hands. She had more power over me than Ms Tallup or my father. I would do anything for her and it was getting harder and harder not to tell her.

But until I felt worthy of telling her that I belonged to her, I would wait.

Because the promise of us was far too precious to rush.

“I’ll never doubt us, little orangutan.” I tickled her, deliberately erasing the intense connection and welcoming light-hearted ease.

“Ugh.” Her nose wrinkled, a laugh tumbling from her lips. “I think I prefer octopus over being called a monkey.”

I pushed her away, closing my legs and facing the first meal anyone had ever made for me. The pancakes were more than just pancakes. Eating them was basically marriage in my eyes. I was saying I do to a question she hadn’t even asked.

My hands shook as I grabbed the knife and fork. “That’s just made me determined to find more monkeys that start with O.”

“You wouldn’t.” She sat back down on her barstool; her cheeks happily flushed.

Slicing into a pancake, I didn’t reply until I’d placed the delicious, home-cooked meal onto my tongue and savoured it.

Sweet like O.

Soft like O.

Perfect like O.