Lib Novel Page 17
Pia stiffened and did not reply.
“What?”
She sighed. “Who knew pillow talk would turn into confession?”
Matt chuckled. “We can turn this into something else entirely if you’d rather.”
She flicked her gaze to his, and heat simmered there. “Don’t tempt me.”
Oh, but he wanted to. Badly.
She drew circles on his chest lazily. Stalling. “I’ve just been trying to push my worries out of my mind for so long, it’s hard to actually look at them when prompted.”
He squeezed her hip in solidarity. In comfort.
Exhaling, she said, “Here goes. I have no idea what I want to do with my life. Still. At twenty-three. I should be graduating from college like all my friends from high school. I should be following a passion, an idea. Planning a life. Instead, I’m looking at a future I’m not excited about, that gets me everywhere and nowhere at the same time. I’m saving money and debating whether or not it’s too late, or too embarrassing, for me to go to college at this point.”
Floodgates had broken open. Matt didn’t know what to say, so he said nothing. He just held her and let her spill secrets.
“I became a flight attendant to help my family, so we could get back and forth from the Philippines more cheaply. I did it so my friends and I could take vacations. Get away from L.A. But they’ve always been too busy with school to go anywhere. My family works too much to indulge in vacations. It’s just weddings and funerals and babies in Cebu City. I’m afraid I’m too old to start over, and I don’t even know what I would study. That calling you feel for OrbitAll? I don’t have that. My mom knew she wanted to be a nurse. My dad knew he wanted to be a plumber. They love their work. Felix loves fixing computers. Aron wants to be a teacher. My closest cousin, Ami, is a social worker. It’s like their future spoke to them, while mine has always been silent. So, I let myself stall out.”
Matt’s instincts to fix her problem kicked in. “Something in the world must call to you. You were initially drawn to travel, right?”
“Yes, but only for my family. To make their lives easier. Better.”
She was fierce in her love for her family. He’d seen that right away, and he loved that about her. It was how a family should feel about each other.
“I think it’s all the graduation announcements I’m getting in the mail from friends and cousins,” she shared. “They’ve put me into a panic. I know I have a good job, and I’m trying to appreciate what I have. But my family has been noticing my mood, and the more they ask me what’s wrong, the more wrong it all feels.”
“I understand,” Matt replied, though he didn’t. Well-being wasn’t something his family concerned themselves with. “Can I help?”
She laughed softly. “God, you have. With you, I’m just with you. Just here, now. I love it. And you gave me all the carbs and didn’t make me share.” She sighed happily, and Matt fought the squeeze of emotion in his chest. With Pia, he didn’t feel the vague “legacy” hanging over his head. His ideas didn’t carry so much pressure to be successful. In her presence, his life shrunk to just the two of them sharing one moment.
After she left in the morning, Matt didn’t know how he’d find that feeling again.
10
Sunlight poured in the windows when Pia awoke.
She blinked dreams away and took in her surroundings. Not the usual nondescript, airport-adjacent hotel. No, Pia was in Matt Geier’s stunning Parisian apartment. Naked, she silently amended. Naked in Matt Geier’s stunning Parisian apartment. When she sat up, she could see a peek of the Eiffel Tower through the massive window.
He wasn’t next to her, but his side of the bed still felt warm. She lay back down and stretched. Never,never,could she have imagined sex as good as she’d experienced the night before. What they had shared redefined the word. And after? Their separate confessions affected her almost as strongly as the orgasms had. Sharing her secret shame with him had helped her feel the teeniest bit less alone. Less lost.
Her smile faded. She got the impression Matt saw himself as mostly alone in the world. Possibly even ill-equipped for anything more than casual or surface. With everything in her, Pia disagreed. The man, if given a chance, had a lifetime’s worth of untapped love to unleash. He’d done nothing but take care of her since they’d touched down in France.
If he didn’t live oceans and continents away, if they weren’t from different worlds altogether, Pia would show him what he had to offer. What he deserved in return.
She’d take Matt on dates. Surround him with her family and wear him down with their abundant nosiness. Blow his effing mind in bed. She’d given him a hint of that last night after the confessions had died down. At one point, she’d rolled over without warning and gone down on him. She’d turned him into a panting, grunting, foul-mouthed mess.
Her core pulsed at the memory. He’d paid her back immediately after. Three times she’d gone to new heights, new places, with Matt.
She already missed him. She ran a hand over his spot on the bed, then checked the clock on the wall. Snap, she only had a few hours before she had to get back to the—
Wait, was that her uniform? Hanging up?Ironed?
Pia bolted upright in bed. Matt had ironed her uniform for her while she slept.
“He’s perfect,” she whispered to the empty room. She shook her head at the butterflies flapping about in her belly. They knew as well as she did that he was unavailable for anything more than what they’d already shared.