Then

I’m wearing a cowboy hat and painting Nash Hawthorne’s nails a very fetching shade of black.

His fingernails.

His thumbnails.

And then I make him wait until those nails are dry.

“You’re killing me, Lib.”

I smile a cowboy kind of smile to go with the hat. “I’ve always been good at waiting.” At dreaming. At hoping. And I am done punishing myself for that.

Nash’s eyes are brown, darker around the outside and center of his iris and almost amber in between. Right now, the expression in those eyes isn’t measured in the least.

The black velvet cowboy hat on my head goes surprisingly well with my corset.

When his nails are dry, he lifts first my right wrist and then my left to his mouth, his lips brushing over my pulse, over the words I’ve tattooed there, reminders that I’m a survivor, that I can trust myself.

And him.

My hands make their way to his neck and jaw. He needs to shave, and I really hope he doesn’t.

I hope.

And I hope.

And I hope.