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Chapter 21

Clara was on top, driving herself down on him while John was clasping her hips as if holding on for dear life. He moaned loudly and closed his eyes again. John had done it so many time in his life that he had lost count, but it was different with her because he loved her. There had been a few women that he had loved, but by now John could no longer deny it. He was madly in love with her.

Her breathing was becoming heavier and John could tell she was close when her movements sped up and she was riding him desperately and every time he sank into her John could feel himself closing in on his own climax. Clara gasped right before her walls started pulsing around him and his movements stilled in an instant. She felt too good, too tight and John uttered a low grunt when his orgasm shot through him and pleasure took over for one sweet moment before she collapsed next to him.

They both remained completely still for a long moment and the only sound that could be heard was that of their breathing. While John was waiting for his heartbeat to slow down again, he thought once again that he loved Clara. He loved everything about her. Her face. Her smile. The way she looked at him as if he was the best thing in the world without even really knowing him. The way she wasn't afraid to speak up or boss him around. The way the butterflies were dancing in his stomach when she looked happy. The way she could make him fall apart under her touch. John had no doubt. He was in love.

"Hey," Clara uttered softly and turned around to smile at him. Her cheeks were still flushed with the afterglow of her arousal and John thought that he had never seen her look more beautiful. Maybe he should tell her? Confess his feelings?

Instead he decided to do something different. "What are you doing after this?" John asked her.

"Uhm, I was gonna take a shower and then suggest we get coffee from the station," she replied before she started to frown at him. "Cause we still haven't bought coffee."

Clara poked his chest with her index finger and started to laugh, but John didn't feel like joking around right now. He wanted an answer to his question and that wasn't it.

"No, I meant-" he paused, "after Norway. After this trip is over."

John looked at her, trying to read her thoughts from her face, but he only found surprise and maybe a hint of confusion.

"I, uhm, I don't really know," Clara admitted after a moment. "I mean, I've been trying not to think about it, but I suppose I'll have to go back home at some point."

He reached for her hand and placed a soft kiss on the back of it before resting it on his chest. "How about we don't go home?" he suggested carefully.

Clara chuckled in response. "What are you suggesting? Stay here? In the motorhome? I mean, it's lovely, but it's hardly a permanent living situation. Besides, I've got some money saved up, but I will definitely run out at some point."

"That's not what I meant," John replied, looking straight at her to make sure Clara knew that he was serious. "But we've got the motorhome. We could go elsewhere. You wanted to see the world, so why not do it?"

"Because of the money-"

"Don't worry about that," he interrupted her, squeezing her hand in his own.

Clara smiled at him in reply, but there was still so much sadness in her eyes that John knew he hadn't managed to convince her. "Where would we go?" she wanted to know.

John shrugged. "You choose. Europe, America, Asia. . . it's your choice."

Yet all Clara did was laugh in reply.

"I mean it, Clara," he said sincerely. "You've got your whole life to sit at home and teach pudding brains. That option will still be there when we get back. Just run away with me some more."

With a sigh she finally looked at him and it seemed that her laughter had died for the moment. "Can I think about it?" Clara asked him. "I mean, we've still got time here in Norway. There's no need to make a decision right now."

"Absolutely," John replied with a smile before he bent forward and placed a soft kiss on her lips.

"Alright," she agreed. "I'm gonna take a shower and get us some coffee. Do you wanna set up breakfast in the meantime?"

A frown appeared on his face. "What happened to today is my turn?"

Clara grinned at him in reply. "Nothing. I'm just feeling nice."

With a smile John placed his arm around her and pulled her closer to kiss her again. Yes, he was definitely in love with her.

When Clara entered the Arctic circle station she couldn't help but smile to herself and yet she knew that maybe she shouldn't. John had asked her to run away with him to wherever the road would lead them and even though her heart had skipped a little beat upon hearing the words she had been so desperate to hear, a part of her had thought that she shouldn't agree on the spot. She had wanted to, but she knew that it was better to at least consider it for a few days. There was no rush, no need to make a decision right away and yet she knew that she would have loved nothing more than to agree.

There was something about John that made her feel utterly free. With him all of her worries and fears were so far away that they didn't seem to matter anymore and Clara really wanted this feeling to stay. Once she was back home everything would remind her of Danny again, of the life they had never been able to live. She would be reminded of all the pain and the suffering and just sink back into the hole she had finally managed to crawl out of. John had helped her out. He was the reason she hadn't really thought about Danny except for a few brief moments in the last two weeks. Maybe it was wrong, maybe it was the wrong way to deal with her problems, but Clara really wanted to just run away with him for a while longer.

When she moved forward in the queue Clara decided to ban these thoughts from her mind for the time being and ordered two cups of coffee to go, glad that the cashier seemed fluent enough to understand her without looking like a startled doe. She thanked the woman and paid for the beverages and was about to head back outside when her eyes fell on a row of newspapers and she came to an abrupt halt.

For a moment Clara was hardly able to believe her eyes, so she blinked just to be sure her mind wasn't playing a trick on her, but no matter how long she stared at the cover page the view just wouldn't change. There, on the front page of one of the newspapers, was a photo of John. Not someone who looked like him. John. She recognized the wonderful silver curls that she had run her fingers through just an hour ago, she recognized the mouth she had kissed before she had stepped outside the motorhome, she recognized the lines on his face that she had caressed just last night. The man in the photo was John without a doubt.

Clara grabbed the newspaper and turned back around to the cashier who seemed more than a little confused that Clara had decided to stick around even after paying for her coffee.

"Sorry to bother you," she said to the cashier. "But I need you to translate this article for me. Can you do that?"

The woman stared blankly at her.

"Please," Clara almost begged, "I need to know what it says."

Finally the cashier nodded and lowered her gaze to the newspaper while Clara waited impatiently to finally receive an answer to the question she had been asking herself for two weeks.