Chapter 123
Bellamy emerged from the bathroom in dark jeans, a nice white shirt, and a black suit jacket. "How do I look?"
"Very studly," Clarke replied as she put her earrings in.
"But do I look fatherly?"
She smiled. "Always."
"But like a DILF, right? Not Dad-bod?"
"Such a DILF." She checked her reflection again in the mirror, then asked, "What about me?" and did a little spin to show off her semi-casual dress. "I'm going for sophisticated and classy."
"You look nice," he told her. Opening up the top dresser drawer, which was basically just full of his crap, he started to search around for a tie, pulling several out and holding them up as if to study them. He kept shaking his head, though, as if none of them were quite right. Bellamy didn't actually own a lot of ties, and she didn't think he needed to wear one. Pike had told them they just needed to show up dressed nicely, which they were. So she went over and took the ties out of his hands and wrapped her arms around his waist, hugging him from behind.
"I can't believe this is finally happening," he said, putting his hands on top of hers.
"I know. It's been a long time coming," she agreed. Today was finally the day, though. Avery was getting adopted.
...
How was there still more paperwork to fill out? Bellamy was starting to wonder if it would ever end. At this point, he didn't even know what he was signing, but he trusted his lawyer. If Pike said he needed to sign something, he signed it.
"Last one," Pike finally told them, pointing to the one remaining open line. "Sign right there."
Bellamy scrawled his signature first, feeling like it was more of a line at this point than anything else, and Clarke wrote hers next, her handwriting still looking neat somehow, even though she was holding Avery at the same time. Their little girl had chosen today of all days to be a little sleepier than normal, but maybe that was a good thing. They didn't need her to be crying during the hearing or anything.
"So is it official yet?" Bellamy asked impatiently.
"It will be in about . . ." Pike checked his watch. ". . . twenty minutes. Just sit tight." He gathered up all their papers and headed into the courtroom, leaving them to wait. Some more. Bellamy was pretty sure they'd already been there for half an hour.
"This feels like my birthday and Christmas morning and the night before a vacation all rolled into one," he said, tapping his feet nervously.
"I know," Clarke said. "I feel like time's ticking by so slowly."
Thank God there wasn't a clock in that room, because he was pretty sure his eyes would have just been glued to it if there had been. Although that might have been better than looking outside, paranoid about possibly seeing a certain car pull up and a certain guy step out of it. "Is it stupid that I'm still worried?" he wondered. "Even now, I'm worried Finn's gonna walk through those doors."
"No, it's not stupid," she assured him, reaching over to rub his leg. "But he's not going to. This is a happy day."
As if to disprove that, Octavia poked her head into the room and said, "Hey, guys? You need to come out here."
Oh, fuck, he thought, shooting Clarke an alarmed look. That son of a bitch really had shown up, hadn't he? After signing that consent form and everything, now he was going to throw a wrench into things at the very last minute.
Bellamy hurried out into the hall, Clarke close behind him, and was greeted with a loud, "Surprise!" from . . . everyone. Literally everyone. It wasn't just family members who were there. Raven, Murphy, Miller, Harper, Monty, Jasper had all shown up. Roan, who he hadn't seen in months now, was there. So was Lexa.
"Whoa," he said, his heartrate slowing as he realized that there was nothing wrong going on. No one was trying to sabotage this day for him. Everyone who was there was there to celebrate it.
"Oh my god," Clarke said. "What're you guys all doing here?"
"I rounded everyone up," Octavia declared proudly.
"Yeah, where else would we be on adoption day and your birthday?" Raven said.
"I'm gonna film everything," Murphy announced, holding up his camera. "High quality."
"And I'm gonna cry," Harper said, raising her hand sheepishly.
"Don't worry, so am I," Clarke's mom assured her.
"You guys, you didn't have to . . ." They'd all gotten dressed up just like he and Clarke had. Plus, he noticed some birthday sacks sitting by their feet and what looked like a tray full of cupcakes next to Abby. "Thanks," he said, "this means a lot." Fuck, he never used to cry, and now here he was feeling all choked up again. He was going to be a blubbering mess by the end of the day.
"Here, let's start getting pictures now while we wait," Abby said, stepping over people in the crowded hallway so she could get closer to them with her phone poised.
"You can hold her," Clarke said, handing Avery over to him.
"Wake up, sleepyhead," he told her. "You're gettin' adopted today." He and Clarke smiled at the camera while Avery yawned, and Abby snapped the first of what promised to be many pictures they would get that day.
It turned out not to be twenty minutes that they had to wait. More like fifteen. Time went by a little faster with so many people there. When it came time to file into the courtroom, Bellamy felt like they were clowns in a clown car. They just kept going, one person after another. He and Clarke went to stand up front behind a desk with Pike, and everyone else had to sit back in the spectator area. They were uncharacteristically silent. Could've heard a pin drop.
The judge came in wearing one of those flowing black robes. Pike had assured Bellamy that it wouldn't be the same judge who had presided over his DUI hearing, but he did look kind of similar. Grey hair, glasses, kind of short. Not the same guy, but definitely another judge who had been doing this for a while. Even though he was old and Bellamy was pretty sure he could have thrown him across the room, he couldn't help but be intimidated by the guy. He was the one who had the final say here. He was the one who was going to make the decision.
Thankfully, the judge actually cracked a smile when he saw how many people were in attendance and said, "Wow. We've got a packed courtroom here."
"Yeah, it's my birthday, so this is kind of our party," Bellamy explained. "Wait, am I not supposed to say anything? I'm sorry, your honor."
"You're fine," the judge assured him. "Bellamy and Clarke Blake, I presume?"
"Yes," Clarke said, at the same time Bellamy replied, "Yep." Yep wasn't professional, though, so he quickly switched to, "Yes."
The judge smiled at Avery, who had woken up after all those pictures and was now squirming around a bit in Bellamy's arms. "And this must be . . ." He checked the papers in front of him. "Avery Octavia Blake."
"Yeah. Yes," Bellamy said. "Maybe you should hold her," he told Clarke, handing her off. "I'm too shaky."
"Relax," Clarke said quietly, taking Avery off his hands. "Breathe."
"Breathing." He couldn't exactly sit down and fucking meditate right then and there, so he had to just keep it together.
Pike started in by saying some things that went right over Bellamy's head – lots of that legal jargon shit again. The judge asked him a few questions, and Pike answered them, but Bellamy knew that their lawyer wasn't going be doing all the talking. Pike had told them to prepare to do some speaking, too, which normally was something he was good at. But right now, his palms were sweaty, and she worried he might get tongue-tied.
"Please proceed," the judge told Pike once they were done talking.
Pike's tone was a lot more informal when he started speaking directly to them. He explained that they were going to verify the details of their petition for adoption and that, if they didn't understand the question, they were to ask him to clarify.
The judge started with Clarke, much to Bellamy's relief, asking her questions ranging from the simple—Was she Avery Blake's biological mother?—to the super-specific—Had she filled out the petition for adoption on November 7th? If she was nervous, Bellamy couldn't tell, because she just looked so at ease and had this happy smile on her face the whole time.
"And Mrs. Blake, do you affirm here in a court of law today that you believe it's in the child's best interest to be adopted by Bellamy Blake?" Pike asked.
"Yes, absolutely," she said, reaching over to squeeze his hand.
"And do you, as the child's biological mother, fully consent to this adoption?"
"Yes."
When it was Bellamy's turn, the judge started out with similar questions about the petition for adoption. Instead of attesting to being her biological father, he attested to being her current stepfather, but . . . any minute now, the step was coming out of that word. He'd never called himself that, and no one else had ever thought of him that way, either.
"And Mr. Blake, do you understand that, by adopting this child, you are assuming legal and financial responsibility for her health and well-being, whenever needs may arise?" Pike asked.
He nodded. "Yep. Yes." He shook his head, and a few of his friends snickered at him back there.
"And are you willing to assume that legal and financial responsibility for the child Avery Blake?"
"Yes." He felt like a record stuck on repeat. It was the same answer to every question. So easy. Why had he been nervous again?
"Do you fully consent to this adoption?"
"Yes." Just in case the judge didn't sense how important this was to him, he added on, "I want this more than anything."
"Thank you," the judge said. "Thank you, counselor Pike. Now Mr. Blake, I'm going to need to ask you a few questions about a case of yours that recently moved through our legal system."
Here we go, he thought, swallowing hard. This didn't come as a surprise. Pike had rehearsed some of these questions with him. All he had to do was be honest.
"Back on September 10th, you were in a car crash that resulted in the issuance of a DUI," the judge said as he looked over his records. "Is that correct?"
"Unfortunately, yes," he admitted.
"Can you talk to me about your drinking habits since that incident?"
"Well . . . they're non-existent," he declared proudly. "I haven't had one drink since that night. That was rock bottom for me, but I went to rehab in Baltimore, stayed there for three weeks, did a lot of intensive therapy. I've been home for a while now, and I'm still going to therapy twice a week right here in Arkadia. I've, uh . . . I've got an ignition-interlock device in my car that'll be there for a year, and I haven't any issues with the program. I've paid off my fines, and . . . I'm in recovery." He motioned behind himself and said, "Luckily, I've got a lot of people here, as you can see, who support me, so that helps a lot. And these two standing next to me help more than anything, so . . ."
"Yeah, if I could just say something about that, too," Clarke jumped in. "I'm so proud of my husband. He's come so far, and I know it wasn't easy. I really admire him. He's the strongest, bravest person I know, and I think that going through all of this together has actually just made us a lot stronger as a couple, too."
"Thank you, Mrs. Blake," the judge said. For someone with that job title, he didn't actually look too judgmental, which was nice. Bellamy felt like they'd handled every questioned well, like they couldn't have done any better. He cast a quick glance back at his mom, who had her hands pressed together in a prayer position over her mouth, and Octavia, who had her fingers crossed and looked like she wanted to jump out of her seat.
"Well, Mr. Blake, I have a lot of letters of support from your family and friends here," the judge said. "I read through them all, and the sense I get is that everyone who knows you and knows this little girl seems to think that you've been her father for her whole life."
"I have been," he said. It extended back before even the first ultrasound, because he was even the first person Clarke had told about her pregnancy. They'd been doing this together the whole time. The whole time.
"And everyone says you're an excellent father and that you love her very much," the judge said warmly. "If she was older, I'd talk to her, ask her how she feels about this whole thing, but obviously she's too young."
As if to dispute that, Avery made a loud sound suddenly, reached out her arms to him, and said, "Da-da."
Everyone laughed, including the judge. "But not too young to tell us what she wants," he said. "Mr. Blake, I'm going to ask you one more time to state your desire to adopt your stepchild."
He cleared his throat, feeling as confident about this speech as he ever had about one before. "I wanna adopt my stepdaughter," he said, "because she's already my daughter in every way but the legal one. I wanna adopt her because she's the most important thing in the world to me, and I wanna be there for her no matter what. For the rest of her life. Whenever she needs me. I love her so much." He heard the waterworks start up behind him after he said all that.
The judge picked up his pen and said, "As I sign off on this, I want to wish you two good luck with everything in your family and in your future. It's quite obvious to me that you're providing a nurturing and loving environment for the child, and she's very lucky to have you—both of you . . ." He paused as he jotted down his signature. ". . . as her legal parents. Congratulations."
"That's it?" Bellamy said, on the verge of letting all his emotions out. He wanted to make sure they were done first, though.
"That's it," the judge confirmed.
It was a strange thing that he started to do, smiling and laughing and crying all at the same time. Clarke pretty much did the same thing, and when they hugged, carefully because Avery was in between them, everyone else started to clap. Out of the corner of his eye, Bellamy could see that they were all standing up and hugging each other, but he just couldn't look away from Clarke and Avery. She handed their daughter—their daughter—over to him, and he lifted her in the air and got a big giggle out of her.
"You can all feel free to stay in here for the next twenty or so minutes and take as many pictures as you'd like," the judge told them.
"Thank you," Clarke said as he began to exit. As if to convey just how much this all meant to them, she said it again, more fervently. "Thank you."
"Yeah, thank you so much," Bellamy told him.
"You're welcome," the judge said, waving at Avery last as he left the courtroom.
Bellamy hugged Avery to his chest and just allowed himself to let out some grateful sobs while Clarke hugged him from the side. Finally, he thought. It was official. It was legal. He was her dad in every sense of the word now, and that was the way it was gonna be for the rest of his life.
"Congratulations," Pike said, extending his hand towards Clarke. She hugged him instead and cried, "Thank you," over and over to him. Bellamy went ahead and opted for the handshake, but he made sure to tell him, "This means everything to us. We can't thank you enough."
"It's my pleasure," Pike said. "I'll leave you guys alone with your fan club here."
"Alright," Clarke said, laughing. She motioned everyone else to come on up to the front, and they practically pounced. The women weren't the only ones crying. Jasper's whole face was soaked, and Murphy, although he was trying to act all tough, kept having to make the excuse of, "There's something in my eye."
Bellamy and Clarke took Avery up next to the judge's stand and took pictures for . . . a while. Some were just candid ones where they were talking to Avery. Others were the kind where they got Avery to look at the camera and then quickly did so themselves so it looked like it was posed. There were a lot of phones to look at, so they did one at a time.
After that, they took photos with her parents, first all of them together, then Jake/Alyssa and Abby/Kane separately. Then it was time for his mom to get in there with them, then Octavia. Then Raven and Murphy, being her godparents and all. They probably could have taken pictures for at least another hour, but they hit their twenty minute mark and had to leave. Someone else had a case that needed to be handled. But their case . . . finally done. Finally over. And now they could move on to whatever came next.
...
Bending down, leaning into the crib, Bellamy touched Avery's little hands, and she immediately gripped onto his finger. She tried to open her eyes, but she couldn't quite do it.
"Are you tired?" he asked her. "Yeah, me, too. I didn't sleep much last night." He looked around that nursery, already pondering ideas for her inevitable 'big girl room.' He'd have to ask Roan for help again, but when the time came and she outgrew that crib someday, he was going to build her a bed. Maybe even a canopy bed. Real fancy.
"Hey, guess what?" he said to her. "I'm officially your dad now."
Despite the fact that she was falling asleep, she made a little noise as if to acknowledge that she'd heard that.
"Yep, officially your dad," he said, smiling to himself. "You, me, and your mom . . . we were all just meant to be."
...
From what Bellamy could tell, the house hadn't changed much. His mom had definitely done a few fixer-upper things over the years, but nothing major. She was busy with work, and . . . well, he hadn't been there to help her with anything. It was alright, though. Actually, it was better than alright. In fact, it was nice to come home to something so familiar.
"Oh, it's so good to have you back, Bellamy," his mom said after they'd finished dinner that night.
Octavia snorted. "And what am I, chopped liver?"
"You've been in a dorm five miles away. I've been on another continent," he reminded her. Besides, they both knew he was the favorite kid.
"It's nice to have both of you here," his mom said. "I was getting awfully lonely."
"Well, now that Bellamy's back, you have a roommate," Octavia said. "So no dragging Stan from accounting home after work."
"Who's Stan from accounting?" Bellamy asked.
"There is no Stan. I'm not seeing anyone."
"You should, Mom," Octavia suggested. "I mean, if you meet the right person, why not? I'm getting a boyfriend this year. Someone older."
"Yeah, but now I'm home to scare him off." Bellamy cackled.
"Good luck with that," Octavia told him.
"I have a beard now. I'm very intimidating."
"You look like a lumberjack."
Their mother sighed as she got up from the table with plates in hand. "Oh, yes, this is very different than living alone."
"Here, Mom, let me help you with that," he said, picking up some of the dishes himself.
"Oh, no, don't even bother," she said. "I'm just gonna do these dishes really quick, and then maybe we can see some of your Europe pictures or something."
"Yeah . . ." He cringed, thinking of all the photos of topless women he had on his phone. "I don't think you're gonna wanna see all of those."
"Old photo albums then," she said.
"That's the probably the safer bet." He hadn't actually done a whole lot of sight-seeing. He'd gone to a few places, of course, but he'd already sent them pictures of the more notable stuff.
"I need to go submit something really quick for one of my stupid classes," Octavia said, dragging herself into her bedroom. "But I'll be back out."
"You sure you don't want help?" Bellamy asked his mom. He felt bad coming home and just having her wait on him.
"I'm fine. Why don't you just go unpack?" she suggested as she began filling up the sink.
He felt like she was pushing him to unpack because she was worried that this would end up just being another short visit, like when he'd come home from UCF for the holidays. Those were the last times he'd been home. After that, she and his sister had always come to visit him. "I'll unpack later tonight," he told her, wanting to assure her—without actually saying it—that he was home for good this time. Thank God she'd left his room as his room, because he was going to need to freeload off of her for a while. "I think I might go try to call Miller, let him know I'm back," he said.
"Oh, yeah, I bet he'll love hearing from you."
He headed into his room, shut the door, and stepped over all his luggage on his way to the bed. When he sat down on it, he couldn't help but smile, because it was so much more comfortable than what he'd slept on in his Venice apartment. And he had that computer in his room. Maybe it still worked. He could see if all his porn sites were still bookmarked from back in the day.
Up on a shelf in the corner were his football trophies, ranging from the ones he'd earned back as a kid and the ones he'd gotten in high school. The team trophies were up in Arkadia's trophy case, but these were just his. He wasn't sure if he'd end up holding onto them. His mom probably liked them more than he did at this point. When he looked at those trophies, all he saw was a failure.
Taking out his phone, he took a moment to delete some contacts he'd never call again. Basically anyone's name who sounded Italian. Hesitantly, he scrolled past Clarke's name all the way down to Miller. Hopefully he still had the same phone number, otherwise he was going to end up talking to someone he didn't even know.
He waited and waited for his one-time best friend to pick up that call, and just when he was sure the voicemail was about to kick on, he heard an astounded, "What the fuck, man? You're still alive?"
He laughed. "Hey, what's up?"
"Nothing much. What's up with you?" Miller asked. "Aren't you in Europe or something?"
"No, not anymore. Actually, I'm back home now," he revealed.
"What?"
"Yeah, I just flew in today. Ate dinner with my mom and O. It was pretty nice."
"Holy shit," Miller swore. "Well, how long are you staying?"
"I'm . . . home." There wasn't a time limit to put on anymore. "I'm not leaving this time."
"Wait, you're . . . you actually moved back?" Miller asked. "After . . . shit, how many years has it been?"
"Five." Half a fucking decade. He'd really been gone a long time. Even though this house he'd grown up in hadn't changed much, a lot of other things might have.
"Five fuckin' years," Miler said. "Dude, we gotta hang out or something."
"Yeah, definitely. I gotta spend a little more time with my family first, though," he said.
"Oh, yeah, of course."
"But maybe tomorrow or this weekend or something."
"Yeah, for sure." He could practically hear Miller shaking his head in astonishment. "Wow. This is crazy. I didn't think you were ever coming back here."
"Neither did I." He'd been living his life pretty impulsively for a while, though, and he'd made it through. So when the impulse had struck him to come back home, he couldn't ignore it.
"What brought you back?" Miller questioned.
As much as it was true that he missed his mom and his sister and wanted to be around now that Octavia had started college, it wasn't their faces that flashed through his mind. "I just decided it was time," he said. He really wanted to know how she was doing, though, if that face he'd just pictured was even what she still looked like. What if she'd dyed her hair or something? He could walk by her on the street and not even recognize her. "So how's everything been around here?" he asked, trying to keep it vague. "How's everyone?"
"Uh . . . good. Good, yeah," Miller said. "Zeke's off doin' his own thing now. His whole family moved, so nobody's really kept in touch with him. A lot of the people in our class are still around, though. They're gonna be stoked to hear you're back."
He didn't care about any of those people, though. He cared about . . .
"Hey, isn't your sister in college now?" Miller asked him.
"Yeah, she is."
"Wow," his friend said again. "I can't believe it's been so long."
"I know." Maybe it'd been too long. What if she had another boyfriend? Or a girlfriend? Had she even ever come out? How much had he missed out on? Was he too late? "How's, uh . . ." He knew he couldn't beat around the bush any longer, so he went ahead and mumbled, "How's Clarke? You heard anything about her?"
"Well, I know she's goin' to Arkadia," Miller said. "I see her around campus sometimes."
Bellamy wasn't a mathematician by any means, but she was probably a senior now. He didn't even know what she was studying. Hopefully art or music. She was so good at those things, so hopefully she hadn't let her mom convince her to study something she wasn't really passionate about.
"You talked to her yet?" Miller asked.
"No." It was weird, because he'd never had a problem talking to any girl. Stacey 1, Courtney, Stacey 2, Canadian Carla, Maria from Mexico, Stacey 3, Stacey 4 . . . none of them had been a challenge for him. None of them had intimidated him at all. But the thought of reaching out to Clarke Griffin again after all these years . . .
"Are you going to?" Miller pressed him.
The last two times he'd been home, she'd been gone. So he'd just assumed that that was a sign they weren't supposed to get back together. But if Clarke really was still in Arkadia, hadn't gone on to med school or something yet . . . maybe that was a sign, too. "Hey, man, I gotta go," he said, needing to give himself some time to think about things before he talked about them. "My mom's pullin' out the old photo albums. But it was good to talk to you again."
"Yeah, you, too," Miller said. "Hey, I won't tell Clarke you're back."
"Thanks," he said. His plan was to keep a low profile until he was able to work up the nerve to reach out to her.
"Call her, though," Miller suggested before he hung up.
Bellamy looked down at his screen again, scrolling back up to Clarke's name. All he had to do was press it, and then he'd have options. A call might be too awkward if neither one of them ended up being able to say anything. Maybe a text was the better approach. One way or another, he was going to contact her again. Not tonight, but tomorrow, when he'd had a little more of a chance to settle back in. She was, after all, the main reason why he'd come home.
...
"Are you ever coming to bed?" Clarke asked him.
"Yeah." He still couldn't take his eyes off his daughter, though. His daughter. "I just don't want this day to end."
She swayed into the nursery, wrapped her arms around his waist just like she had that morning, and asked, "Did you have a good birthday?"
"The fucking best." Twenty-five already felt like it was going to be a great year for him. He tore his eyes away from Avery, mentally berating himself for swearing in front of her—now that she was picking up on words, he was really going to have to get a handle on that—and turned around, wrapping his arms around Clarke's waist. She was wearing a cream-colored silky robe that he desperately wanted to untie, but . . . not in that room.
"It was such a good day," she agreed, leaning into him. "Probably the third best day of my life."
"Mine, too," he said. "'cause the day she was born and then our wedding day . . ."
"Yeah, those are the top two," she agreed. "But this one's definitely right up there." She leaned back, grabbed his hands, and pulled him towards the door. "Come on, you gotta let her sleep, though."
"Okay," he groaned reluctantly, turning the light off on his way out.
"You know what?" she said as they crossed the hallway into their bedroom. "Even though this day has to end, just think about it: When you wake up tomorrow, that's gonna be the first morning where no one can dispute that you're her dad."
"Yeah." When she put it like that, the day ending didn't seem like such a bad thing. "We'll have to get things changed on her birth certificate."
"Mmm-hmm. Get you listed as her father," she said. "I'm glad we don't have change her last name, though. She's always been a Blake. Longer than I have."
He peeled his shirt off, noticing the way her eyes immediately fixated on his chest, and asked, "Do you like being a Blake?"
"Oh, I love it," she purred, sliding her hands up over his abs. "I love you."
He untied that robe, opened it up, and just as he'd expected . . . nothing underneath. "Ooh."
She shrugged the robe off her shoulders and said, "If you're up for it."
"You know I am." Tired or not, he wasn't turning down an offer to make love to his crazy hot, beautiful wife. They were, after all, celebrating two things at once today. So hell, he could go all night if she wanted to.
Since he'd already undressed for bed, the only thing left to remove was his underwear. He made a pit-stop at the nightstand, though, to grab a condom while she peeled back the covers and got into bed. He crawled underneath the blankets with her, situating himself on top of her small frame, and kissed her slowly, letting his cock harden all on its own as it brushed against her inner thighs and her pussy.
"Mmm," she moaned, rubbing his arms and his shoulders. "Let me ask you something: Back when we first did this, did you ever think-"
"No," he cut her off. Didn't even have to hear the question, because no, he'd never thought it would amount to all of this.
"Me, neither," she said. "But now look at us. Here we are. You're my husband, the love of my life, my daughter's father."
He kissed her again.
"I'm so lucky to love you," she murmured against his lips.
"You got it backwards." He nuzzled his nose against hers, then lowered his head to suck on her neck a bit. "Clarke," he whispered between kisses.
"Hmm?"
He lifted his head, gazing down into her eyes, feeling like he just needed to say something, even though he usually wasn't quite this slow about getting to the foreplay. "Even when we weren't together, even when we were really, really far away from each other . . . I always loved you," he told her. "I couldn't ignore that feeling. I tried to, but I couldn't. Even if I tried not to think about it or move on from it, it was always just there." He touched her face, tracing his thumb over her cheek and lips, whispering, "It's what brought me back here and brought me to Avery."
She wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him closer even though he hadn't put the condom on yet. "I know the feeling," she said. "It never stopped."
"It never will," he promised her, seeking out her lips again. Some things were just meant to last forever, and against all odds, his and Clarke's love story was one of them.