Love in Slow Motion

Epilogue

QUINN

6 Months Later

I wake to the feel of Reed’s fingers tracing down my cheek. I just barely open my eyes, my gaze finding the broad expanse of his chest, dark ink covering half of it. I shift, looking up at him and finding him watching me. He runs his fingertips along my jaw, and he’s watching them go like he’s never touched me before.

When he speaks, his voice is rough with sleep. “You have no idea how many mornings I spent in bed, wishing I was waking up next to you like this.”

My chest pulls tight, and I feel like I’ll burst. Have I ever felt so content? So safe? “Oh, yeah? And when you imagined it, what happened next?” I bite my lip and smile up at him, fully expecting to find hunger in his eyes. Morning sex, after all, is our favorite.

But he just smiles, his eyes roving over my face. “Not what you think,” he says, scooting closer until I feel his legs tangle with mine. “This is what I imagined.” He leans in and kisses me. It isn’t a hot, wet, tongue kind of kiss. It’s not the claiming I’ve become so accustomed to. Instead, he kisses me slowly, his hand going into my hair and his body lazily covering mine, no urgency, no pushing.

When we part, he takes my chin in his hand. “Good morning, beautiful,” he says, and I inexplicably feel tears gather in the corners of my eyes.

“Good morning, Reed.”

“I love you,” he says, so matter-of-fact, so casual, the way someone can only be when they’ve spent six years saying something again and again inside their head.

“I love you, too,” I choke out, far less casual. Even six months in, it’s still a revelation every time it comes out. I still feel like I wake up in a dream every single morning. I don’t know when it will all start to feel real. Maybe never. Maybe that’s always what it feels like when you get a second chance at life.

His mouth finds mine again, his dark stubble scraping against my skin as he goes deeper and deeper. Until what was sweet and gentle becomes desperate and needy. I start making noises in the back of my throat and Reed, knowing this script by heart, starts to lift my shirt, slipping his hand under to cup my breast.

“Wait,” I gasp. I want it so, so bad. But we have plans. “We have to go or we’re going to be late.”

He’s nibbling at my ear and then across my jaw, making soft little grunting noises as he goes. “Does it really matter if we’re on time?”

“Yes,” I gasp as he sinks his teeth into my shoulder hard enough to shock me. I never know when he’s going to be gentle and when he’s going to be rough. It’s thrilling.

“Then I guess we better multitask,” he says. He slides off me, and before I have a chance to ask him what he means by that, he’s reaching back under the covers and lifting me up into his arms. He carries me into the bathroom and sets me on my feet before reaching into the shower and turning on the water.

He leans against the wall and crosses his arms. “Strip,” he says, his voice stern, even as his eyes sparkle with amusement.

I quickly divulge myself of clothing. Reed nods for me to get in the shower, so I do, watching through the foggy glass as he drops his boxer briefs on the floor, his cock jutting out the moment its free. It makes my mouth water.

“Like what you see, filthy little slut?” he asks, stepping into the shower and cornering me against the cold tile. The sting of it on my bare skin is almost too much to stand until he presses his warm body against mine.

He wraps a fist in my hair and yanks my head back. In this position, all I can see is him: the shadow he casts over me, the devilish look in his eyes, the slope of his neck.

“Open your mouth,” he says.

I do, and he spits into it. I make a mewling noise and claw at the tiles behind me, so desperate for him now that I feel like I’ll catch on fire. I want this to go on forever. I want him to use me and bruise me and show me I’m his.

But we’re seriously going to be late.

“That’s my good little whore.” He jerks me away from the wall and spins me around. With a hand at my neck, he bends me forward. “Hands on the wall.”

I do as he says. There are times when Reed wants me to take control. When he wants to slowly move inside me or wants me to climb on top of him and go to town. But other times, times like this, when he’s feeling particularly handsy, he pushes me around like a ragdoll, and I love it.

As soon as I’m bent over, he slips two fingers into me, and I go up onto my toes, shocked by the quick invasion.

“You’re already wet. Did you know that?” he says. He slips his fingers right back out and replaces them with his dick. “I wish I could take my time with you and your tight little hole, but apparently we’re going to be late.”

I bite my lip to hold in a dissatisfied reply.

He doesn’t go easy on me. As soon as his cock is settled deep inside me, he begins to pump. He grabs my hips hard with both hands and jackhammers into me, until I’m afraid I might slip. A trip to the hospital would definitely be worth it.

“Harder,” I say, my head hanging down between my arms. At this angle, I can see his feet between mine, his wet, hairy legs, the heavy swing of his balls.

“You want it harder?” he asks, and I recognize that tone in his voice.

I bring my head up and look over my shoulder, watch as he sticks his thumb into his mouth and sucks on it for a second. I know exactly what’s coming. When his thumb finds the tightness of my asshole, I slam my eyes shut and put one of my hands between my legs.

When I start making unintelligible noises, screaming loud and letting it bounce around the shower tiles, Reed chuckles.

“Always gets you there quick, doesn’t it?”

I can barely even process his words. There’s so much pleasure rocketing through my body that the world goes white.

I come so hard that I lose track of time and space, only coming back to earth when Reed yanks me up, my back flush against his body. He pistons into me hard, using me to get himself off. It’s almost enough to send me off one more time.

I know that if we had more time, he would make sure I did.

“Get me there,” he whispers in my ear, and I smile up at the ceiling, at the soft light that shines down on us. I reach back to tangle one hand in his hair and push the other flat against the wall for purchase as I start to rock back on him hard. The slap of our skin is loud, and the sound of it shoves me up close against another orgasm.

“Yes,” he says against the back of my neck. “That’s it. Fuck me.”

I squeak, plummeting over the edge again as Reed spills inside me, his warm cum dripping down my leg.

We stand in the shower far longer than we should, panting under the spray of the water before we finally uncoil our bodies and actually scrub ourselves clean.

Reed

I can tell we didn’t make it in time as soon as we pull up to the lake house. Through the window that peers in at the living room, I can see Mom, Sabrina, and Lydia all sitting around. They’ve clearly already had lunch and have moved on with their day.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see the way Quinn’s shoulders fall. In all fairness, Mom did say to make it here on time or miss out on a hot lunch. She seems to have caught on pretty quickly that Quinn and I have a hard time separating ourselves these days.

I grab our bags out of the backseat as Quinn makes her way up to the door. She raises her hand to knock, but I nudge her aside and throw it open. Quinn still hasn’t quite accepted that she’s still family.

Hopefully, after tonight, she will.

As soon as the door shuts behind us, I hear footsteps coming down the hall. My mother already has her arms open before she’s fully made it into the room.

“Quinn!” she says, wrapping her arms around my girl. I watch Quinn squeeze my mom right back, and I know that as soon as we go to bed tonight, Quinn will cry quietly to herself about how my mother is treating her.

We all know that without the Unstoppable Madison Lynch, Quinn wouldn’t be here.

Mom pulls back, her hands on Quinn’s shoulders. “How is everything going at work? Do you have enough money? Should I donate a little more?”

Beside me, Sabrina rolls her eyes. “Oh, sure. She wouldn’t even give us an allowance as teenagers, but Quinn can have all the money she wants,” she says sarcastically.

Just as sarcastically, Mom looks over her shoulder at Sabrina and says, “If you were single-handedly founding a nonprofit for women in need, you could have all the money you wanted, too.”

Quinn laughs quietly. “Trust me, I don’t need any more money. What you’ve contributed already has been more than enough.”

After everything went down last summer and my mother gave all the lake house money to Quinn, she didn’t know what to do with it. She didn’t have to pay rent because she immediately moved into my apartment in the city, she had a job that paid well enough for everything else, and she was sitting on a two-million-dollar check.

So, she started her own nonprofit for newly single women who needed financial support. It’s been quite a thing to behold.

Quinn and Mom move into the kitchen to speak quietly as Sabrina ducks closer to me, a mischievous smile on her face.

“When are you going to do it?” she asks, and I send her a sideways glance.

“Would you calm down?”

“No.” She elbows me in the side. “I planned something special for the 4th of July party, and I want to make sure you weren’t planning to do it then.”

I had thought about it, right there under the fireworks. But that felt like a little too much. I don’t say as much to Sabrina.

“What if she says no?”

Sabrina scoffs. “Please. She’s not going to say no. The two of you are so emotionally attached, they’re going to have to surgically separate you to bury you.”

I smile. “Maybe they could bury us in one big plot.”

She narrows her eyes at me. “You’re gross.”

“Well, what about you?” I look over her shoulder, down the long hallway, but there’s no sign of Lydia. I have no idea how she’s so good at disappearing.

Sabrina shrugs, but I know her better than that. She’ll pretend to be emotionless but there are enough emotions raging inside her to scare anyone. “We haven’t discussed it yet. I don’t think Lydia’s ready.”

“Cool. Take your time.” Not everybody can be ready the way I am right now. And I’m only praying that Quinn is.

“Did you know she saw you guys making out in the boat house last summer? You weren’t nearly as sneaky as you thought you were.”

I whip around to face her. “What, Lydia?”

She scoffs. “You know she sees everything.”

All I can do is laugh. Because now, after everything, it just seems funny. At the end of it all, all that work we did amounted to nothing. We tried not to hurt Mom, but she was never going to be hurt by us. We tried not to break up the family, but Chase did it all on his own anyway. We kept ourselves away from each other, but in the end, we still made our back to each other.

“I’m going to take our bags to the room,” I call to Quinn, but she doesn’t hear me. She’s deep in conversation with Mom, and I decide to let her be.

We take the bedroom that was Lydia’s last summer. I suggested we stay in the basement, but when I did, Quinn told me that it would feel like hiding all over again.

I just wanted it because the sound of me fucking her senseless was less likely to make its way to my sister, but that’s okay. We can be quiet for a week. We have a lot of practice.

I start unpacking our things, surprised at how at home I feel here. For a long time, the lake house was a place that made me feel guilty about my family, but now it feels like the place I finally got Quinn. Digging into the bottom of my duffle bag, I pull out the engagement ring I brought. I know it’s soon, but I also know that nothing is going to change, whether I do it this week or wait ten years. I know that Quinn is my future, so why wait?

“Wow.”

I shove the ring back down and turn to see Quinn walking slowly into the room, her eyes on the window. When I follow her gaze, I see what she does. The shimmer of the sun on the lake. The trees in the distance, on other side of the water. It’s beautiful.

“I always forget,” she says, going to stand in front of the window, her arms crossed. “It’s like it can’t really exist, and then I get here, and there it is, as perfect as it was last summer.”

In the reflection of the glass, her eyes move, taking it all in like it’s the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen. And I know she feels it too, the way the lake house is more than just a lake house. The way everything we’ve ever been has been cemented inside these walls.

And watching her here, I know I’ll never be happier than I am right now, with her by my side and my family in the next room and the future wide open.

I slip my hand back into my bag and take out the ring box. Why fucking wait?

“Quinn?” As I wait for her to turn, I settle onto one knee, the ring box open in my hand.

When she spins around to face me, I see the second it takes her eyes to scan the empty space in front of her and then drop to where I’m crouched. She takes me in, sees the ring, and then immediately starts to cry.

“ Baby, ” I say, a laugh in my voice. “I haven’t even said anything yet.”

She sobs and puts her hands over her face. “I know. I’m sorry. I just love you so much. And it’s all a lot to process.”

I stand, moving over to her and pulling one of her hands away so I can see her face. It’s all wet, her makeup smeared.

“Quinn, it was always you. I know you know that. You were always here…” I take her hand and set it on my chest, feel the way her fingers dig into my shirt with satisfaction. “From the moment I looked over and saw you in that hallway, it was a done deal for me. You ripped my heart out of my chest and you never gave it back. I actually, uh…” I swallow, nervous to tell her this last part. “I actually bought this ring last summer before I came here.”

At this, she finally pulls her hands away from her face, her eyes wide. “You did?”

I smile. “I knew I wouldn’t use it, but I wanted to have it, just in case. Because I’ve always been sure that this is what I want. That you are what I want. Will you marry me?”

She nods, her wet hands coming up to circle the back of my neck. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”

She leans in to kiss me as someone says from behind us, “Oh, good.”

We both turn and find Sabrina and my mom in the doorway. When I throw my hands up, my mother throws her hands up right back. “You left the door open. I was worried we were going to have to wait all week and keep this a secret.”

I stomp toward the door.

“Lydia pulled out lunch leftovers for you,” my mother says in a last bid before I slam the door shut and lock it. When I turn back to Quinn, she’s grinning, tears still slipping down her face.

“You better get on the bed,” I tell her, “so I can make sure you understand that you’re mine forever now.”