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I was speechless. Everything in his eyes said he was telling the truth, but that didn’t lessen the shock at all. He pulled me closer and kissed me on the forehead while I gathered my thoughts.

“I just don’t understand how this is real,” I said, my voice muffled by his shirt. My heart was beating faster than I knew it could.

“I know,” he said. “I’m just as shocked as you are, considering I thought you were packing up and leaving ten minutes ago and I’d never see you again.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, pulling away. He wiped away another tear.

“You need to stop saying that,” he said. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”

I bit my lip. I was so tired of pretending that I didn’t need anyone. That I didn’t need him. It was so exhausting, being alone because I thought I didn’t deserve anyone, and no one would ever want me for me. He was looking at me expectantly, as if he had no idea what was about to happen.

My chest heaved and tears made their way down my face as I choked out the words.

“I need you.” His arms immediately folded around me and he pulled me to his chest. He kissed the side of my head fiercely and let his lips linger there. The safety I had been longing for was right here all along.

I let out another sob, this time out of relief.

“I need you so much.” I managed.

“I know,” he whispered, his breath against my ear sending shivers down my spine. “I need you so much too.”

His chest was heaving against mine now, and I never wanted to let go. I gripped the back of his shirt tighter. I knew I was soaking his shirt with my tears, but I couldn’t stop. Nothing in my life had ever felt so right, and I realized how long I’d been waiting for this catharsis.

“COME ON,” HE said, picking me up gently. “You’re exhausted.”

I didn’t protest, I really was.

He set me down on the bed and went into the bathroom. He brought back a warm, wet cloth and I immediately started scrubbing off my makeup. I knew the black and brown stuff that Kenzie had applied was going to make a mess of my face, but I was too worn out to care.

When I was finished with my face, I stood up and turned around, brushing my hair to the side.

“Dean, can you help me?” I asked softly.

I felt him come up behind me and his warm hands were on my back. There were two buttons at the top of the dress, and then it was just the zipper. It felt like it took a millennium for him to unclasp it. He unzipped it slowly, torturously slow, but didn’t do it all the way like I’m sure most guys would have. Instead, he let it stop at the middle of my back where I could reach it.

I let my hair fall back over it and turned to face him. He ran a hand lightly through my hair.

“Thanks,” I whispered, barely able to make eye contact with him. Suddenly I’d become his shy girl now that we both knew how the other felt. Part of me was still wary and I didn’t want to let go the possibility that I
was
just another notch on his belt, but I tried to push that self-preserving notion away and let everything soak in.

I edged past him and into the bathroom and changed into the tank and shorts I’d brought as pajamas. I brushed my teeth and tried to scrub the rest of my makeup off, but I had slight raccoon eyes. Maybe if we turned off the lights, he wouldn’t notice. I doubted he would care, but I still wished Kenzie would have given me a magical solvent to get all this gunk off of my face if she was going to put concrete on as eyeliner.

He knocked on the door, and I opened it gingerly.

“Do you mind?” he asked, gesturing at his toothbrush.

“Nope, go for it.” I shook my head and stepped back to let him in.

He started brushing his teeth nonchalantly with me standing right there. I sat on the edge of the bathtub and watched him. I laughed lightly to myself because he looked like he was ready for a toothpaste commercial at any time. I had a hard time believing someone as beautiful as him was real, let alone that he loved me.

I watched him as he set his toothbrush on the sink next to mine and turned to me. He held out his hand wordlessly, and I stared at it for a few seconds before I took it.

After flicking off all of the lights, he pulled me out into the room and un-tucked the sheets from the bed while I waited. When he held them open for me to crawl into, I obliged. He followed suit.

It was like lying on a cloud. We were facing each other, and I felt like I might be on the verge of another emotional breakdown.

“How is this real?” I asked, breaking the silence. My voice betrayed me, sounding shaky and uneven.

My eyes were adjusting to the dark, and I could now see that he was smiling to himself. He reached out and pulled me closer.

“Have you ever heard of koi no yokan?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“It’s Japanese,” he explained as he trailed his fingers lightly down one of my arms. “It doesn’t have an English equivalent. Roughly translated, it’s a term for the feeling that you have when you first meet someone.”

“Like love at first sight?” I asked, tipping my head up toward his.

“No, not quite like that. It’s more like you know that a future love with that person is inevitable, but it doesn’t exist in that moment.”

“That’s beautiful,” I whispered.

He nodded. “It is.”

His hand moved to my hair, and he brushed it back from my face.

“That’s exactly how I felt when I saw you in the DMV,” he said.

He smiled and I felt like my heart was going to explode.

“Was that before or after you creeped on my I.D.?”

“Definitely before. The creeping only made it worse once I knew who you were.”

“Once you knew who I was?” That made it sound like he’d been looking for me or something.

He shrugged. “Names are nice. Before I knew your name I thought you were just a beautiful girl who accidentally sat next to me.”

“That was a pretty smooth line,” I admitted.

“I try,” He smirked, and those dimples appeared in his cheeks.

We just lay there in silence for a few minutes until I felt like I was there with my best friend again. Everything had changed, yet nothing had changed all in an evening.

“This is so weird,” I whispered finally.

“Why?”

“Because,” I tried to explain. “All I was trying to do a few weeks ago was get a new license after I turned twenty-one. Then I met you, found out I’d inherited my three stepsiblings, got crushed by a million pounds of snow, went to Disneyland, and now I’m here with the guy I love at a fancy ball, sleeping on a cloud.”

“Sorry,” he said. “Could you repeat that?”

“Which part?”

“The part about some guy.”

I couldn’t help but smile. I didn’t realize my confession until he pointed it out, and now my heart was racing a mile a minute.

“I love you too,” I whispered. I was shocked at myself, but I repeated it for him.

His face changed then and he leaned down. I thought he was finally going to kiss me, yet again. He did, but only on the corner of my mouth. It wasn’t quite where I wanted it, but it was a start.

“We’re kind of weird,” I said a moment after he pulled back.

He looked perplexed. “What do you mean?”

I shrugged.

“Well, we became friends because we were trapped in an avalanche. Who does that?”

“Isn’t that how everyone becomes best friends?”

I laughed. “Yeah, it’s actually kind of weird if people don’t get trapped under five tons of snow together. Who wants to start a relationship that doesn’t involve that from day one?”

“They’d fail,” he said, pushing a tendril of hair away from my face. “Everyone needs an avalanche.”

“I’d like to thank our avalanche,” I said.

“It really did us a favor,” he agreed. “Also, you forgot about one little detail of our story.”

“Which one?” I asked, my eyebrows knitting together.

“The part where you were drugged and decided you would tell everyone about my rugged sexuality.” I could see him grinning in the dark.

I pushed his chest slightly.

“Hey, speaking of, you and your rugged sexuality better calm down or we’re going to have to get another room.”

He put a hand up in mock defense, but he also looked down and realized how close we actually were.

“Only gentlemen here,” he said. “You got lucky.”

“I did get lucky,” I told him, touching him on the nose in a very Emma-like way.

“I’m glad you didn’t know the old me,” he said softly after a moment, like he was ashamed of himself.

I tipped his chin, like he always did to me, so he was looking at me again.

“I did see it,” I said, and his face fell. “But you aren’t that person anymore.”

“Thank God,” he said. “I hated being that person. I just didn’t know what else to do.”

“That sounds like a shitty way to live.”

“It was. It really was.”

We had another moment of comfortable silence and my eyelids fluttered.

“Can I take my shirt off? Is that going to freak you out?” he asked, bringing me back. “I’m really hot.”

I laughed, wanting to make some witty joke, but I was too tired.

“Go for it, but try to keep your rugged sexuality to yourself.”

I felt him sit up, and I realized he wasn’t joking. I didn’t realize how hot I was until the cold air rushed between us. I sat up and pushed the giant, fluffy comforter down so it was just the sheet covering us.

“Much better,” he said, pulling me back toward him as he both adjusted our pillows.

“Night Dean,” I said, shutting my eyes in an effort to try to stop staring at him.

“Goodnight Lauren,” he whispered and kissed my forehead. “I love you.”

I would never get tired of hearing that.

I WOULD ALSO never tire of waking up next to Dean Powell. It was so much better than waking up alone, and it made me never want to wake up alone for the rest of my life.

Surprisingly, I woke up before he did, yet again. We were still facing each other, and one of his hands was draped over my hip. His dark eyelashes were fanned out over his cheeks, and his hair was sticking up in odd places. I didn’t want to make any sharp movements and wake him.

I merely turned my head to see what time it was when he took a sharp breath and his eyes flew open. He looked at me for a second as if he was trying to process who I was before his expression changed to something more content.

“Hey,” he said, his voice muffled as he turned it into his pillow.

“Hey yourself,” I whispered back as I now smiled at our usual exchange. Or more that we
had
a usual exchange.

“How did you sleep?” he asked as he sat up and rubbed his face.

“Like a dream,” I said. It was true.

He smiled and pulled me closer. It was much colder this morning than it had been last night, and I snuggled in. How was it that boys were always warm?

My reverie was interrupted by three sharp knocks on the door. I jumped and his hands tightened on my shoulder and waist. A moment later, he released me and shuffled out of bed. After looking through the peephole first, he turned to me and rolled his eyes as he unlatched the door and opened it.

“Well, well, well,” I heard Kenzie say, and I knew she was giving a shirtless Dean her classic elevator eyes. “It’s time for breakfast, lovebirds. We’ll see you downstairs, if you can tear yourselves out of bed.” She put emphasis on the last word and giggled as she walked away, most likely to tell Luke how she’d found us.

I rolled my eyes at Dean as he shut the door.

“She’s got it all wrong,” I said.

He crawled back in next to me.

“I don’t want to go,” he said, shutting his eyes like I remember doing as a child when I didn’t want to wake up for school.

“Me neither,” I agreed.

His stomach growled and betrayed both of us.

“I guess we’d better face her at some point,” I said.

He laughed.

“Let her think what she wants.”

“I’m pretty sure she’s going to, regardless of what we tell her did or didn’t happen last night.”

He grinned wickedly as he hopped out of bed and started to get dressed.

“You’re terrible,” I told him.

“I know,” he agreed. “This is going to be the most interesting breakfast I’ve had since the Siberia talk.”