Chapter 33
"I'm falling for you, Logan… I might even love you," Rory whispered.
Logan wished it'd been a first to hear those words roll over a woman's lips. But he'd heard it more than he would've liked, from people who were eager to win him over, from people who were convinced that they loved him but probably really didn't. Or so he believed.
But it was the roll of film playing in his brain from all those times, that caused him to pause.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to spring that on you. I just - I wanted to say it. Because I do love you. I just wanted to be honest about it. So, I said it. But I don't expect anything. Believe me. I was in a position once where someone said that to me, completely out of the blue, and I was completely thrown. So, don't worry. This doesn't mean I'll become clingy now or that you have to respond. I mean, in fact, you don't have to say anything at all," Rory said, clearly feeling nervous but wanting to smooth things over.
Logan pulled her in to kiss her again, still lacking the words to reply.
"If you wanted me to shut up, you could've just said so," Rory tried to joke as they ran out of air, but had no doubt she enjoyed the intense kiss.
"I've never told someone I love them and really meant it…," Logan declared. It was a sad confession for Rory to hear, and she wondered why that was. Had he truly never met anyone to care about, was he unable to feel such complex emotions altogether or was it just about letting one's guard down.
"Besides the kids, that is," he added, apologetically.
Rory looked down, preparing herself to be rejected on some level. He could miss her but not love her, couldn't he? - she tried to reason with herself.
"But with you… I feel like I almost could… I do have feelings for you. I feel…," Logan began, trying to put this thing he didn't quite understand into words. He wasn't usually tongue tied, but then again, few people in his life, excluding his therapist, had ever urged him to talk about his feelings in such a way that made him genuinely want to make an effort.
"Don't force it," Rory hummed, placing her forehead against his, stopping him from feeling like he needed to say it. His closeness, his presence spoke for something… his honesty too.
"I hate that I'm this emotional cripple, I honestly don't feel like I deserve you," Logan exhaled frustratedly, speaking quietly. It didn't make sense to him - after all they were just words. And it was not like he hadn't said it before. He had - he'd told a lot of girls that he loved them. But he had never really meant it, not in the all-consuming way. Crushes he'd had surely, the feeling of being in love - as well. But had he ever unconditionally loved someone? He doubted that, mostly leaving him thinking that he was too selfish in his character to be able to. He wasn't going to do this to Rory - to pretend or fib his feelings into something bigger or more unconditional than they were. At the very least he wanted to spare her from any heartbreak that he could. But explaining all that wouldn't have come out right.
"Well… would you have anything against it, if I took that and read from your actions - you are here, after all… that I am not being completely rejected?" Rory said, only half seriously, needing to make this light and funny for the sake of self-preservation.
"Yes, absolutely. I never expected to find someone like you. Here - of all places, right here… I keep thinking what would've happened had we met sooner. How much happier my life might've been on many levels…," Logan discussed, despite having agreed that their time apart had been vital for them to form into who they were not. But his mind just kept coming back to it.
"Well, good. Because I feel the same way," Rory replied, tracing her nose against his chin and lips intimately.
"I know I want to be with you, Rory…, I miss you painfully when you're not around," Logan hummed, meaning those things in more ways than one.
That to Rory felt incredibly good, knowing that Logan was hardly the first man to struggle with his emotions or putting them into words. If anything, some caution was better than carelessness - she realized that if thinking rationally.
She wanted him to say those words willingly, on his own time and she wanted him to truly mean them when he did. So, if anything, she could see the good in him holding off. Normally, it might've even taken some effort to convince herself of that, but as his lips were back on hers, his arms holding her tightly against his body, allowing her to feel his need for her… made it a lot easier.
He did want her. Badly.
His palms were pressing against her ass, pulling her firmly against him, causing his member, stuck between them, to throb at the welcome pressure.
It was the little glances, small licks of one's own lips that spoke of the hollowness in Rory's abdomen as she felt him, already desperate to feel him plow into her.
Their lips met again, and from there on it worked like magic between them, each kiss digging them deeper and deeper into their own little bubble, where nothing else mattered. Not even words.
Consumed by passion, layers of clothing were shed, the fact that this was Rory's daughter's bedroom getting forgotten in the process. It was not like they were planning on leaving behind evidence of this.
Logan's lips devoured her skin, tracing it with soft kisses and gentle tugs with his teeth to change things up. Rory's fingers intertwined into his hair and massaged his scalp, neck and back as if that would somehow make him more hers than he already was.
There was little need for foreplay, their kissing and grinding having sufficed. The hunger was just too strong to delay things.
"I need you inside of me, Logan," Rory hummed to his ear with a breath of hot air, speaking urgently.
Logan wasn't used to women he had been with needing him so badly they'd demand to forgo some of his famous cunnilingus, not that he had left Rory without special treatment. It was just that this emotional part of this, this high her presence - taste, scent, feel - gave him, made so many things they did so much more urgent, less logical and more primal.
"Like this?" Logan asked to the sound of her deep gasp as he'd delved deep inside her hot passage.
"Yeah," Rory exhaled, her eyes falling shut as he repeated the motion. Rory ensured he would have easy access, holding her legs bent around his hips. Like this, each thrust reached deep inside, touching her most sensitive spots.
Logan could see the effects of his thrust on her face - the woman had the most expressive look about her as she was in the throes of passion, not a hint of fakeness in her. If he were to be honest, half the thrill was the innocent look she had about her. Like corrupting the good girl.
Logan thrust his hips forward yet again, each move filling his mind with an overwhelming sense of euphoria. Time really lost all meaning.
Neither of them could've answered the question whether they'd been at it for ten minutes or for an hour, as Rory's reddened cheeks moved to open her mouth wide as she let out a deep and loud moan as her climax hit her. Seeing her cum was the greatest performance to watch.
"Oh, fuck… that was good," Rory commented, pantingly.
And now the goody-good girl was cursing, causing Logan to get turned on even more.
At that, Logan picked up his pace again, determined to thrust her into another wave of pleasure as he searched for his own high.
"Om…," Rory barely managed, her physical self was feeling too much for her to comprehend.
The following orgasm was the real magic, joining them in their climax, leaving Rory's labia all puffy and tingly, as her pulse throbbed through her entire body, and Logan almost senseless. He managed to pull out in time, not wanting her stressing over odd chances.
"You're incredible," Logan murmured as he rolled off of her, needing time to gather himself.
"I know I might've exceeded my clinginess limit for the night…," Rory began after laying there in Corinne's bed in Logan's arms for a good ten minutes in silence, just taking everything - both the physical and the emotional - in.
"You haven't," Logan interrupted her, not wanting her to put herself down just because he was unable to declare his love towards her in such words.
"Still...," Rory argued, pushing herself onto her elbow to look at him more directly. "I just thought, maybe you'd want to know that one of the reasons I declined your invitation to come to the party was because I had a little freakout. I had another one after sending you that text…I might add," Rory shared. She didn't quite understand why she wanted to get everything off her chest tonight, it was almost as if she was in need of letting everything out.
"You did? You should've… could've told me," Logan replied with surprise in his tone. "I was the one to spring some big family thing on you… I just assumed you'd appreciate something like that," he explained.
"To me it was just so much of a 'meet the parents' type of thing, even if technically I wouldn't have been meeting any parents. But just - a family gathering, and every person there would be making assumptions about us, expecting us to put a label on us… asking what would happen come fall. And I wasn't sure we were ready to answer those questions," Rory explained.
"It wouldn't have been like that," Logan defended himself, even though thinking back he probably would've skipped the whole invite had he known how it had made her panic.
"It would've been a little like that," Rory argued.
Logan wanted to argue by going into more detail, but only really made a face, letting her have this one.
"So, I guess it would be good for us to have some answers to questions like that," Rory added, hesitantly.
"Like what we are? We're seeing each-other, aren't we?" Logan replied, finding this part of the matter as a non-issue.
"Yes, but it's not like we're technically dating," Rory chimed.
"Yeah, but that wouldn't be anyone's business what we're technically doing," Logan replied.
"You make it sound so easy…," Rory replied, shaking her head, finding it so like him from the little she knew of him.
"It is easy," Logan argued.
"So, what are we?" Rory challenged him.
"We're together, boyfriend and girlfriend, we're going steady, we're intimate," Logan added, changing the tone on the latter, not minding one bit that at this minute her nipples were brushing against his chest as she looked at him.
Rory was slightly taken aback by how easy it had indeed sounded. She'd been the one fretting in her head how all of this looked, sounded like, feeling old and somehow responsible to give other people explanations about who they were to each-other. But the truth was, things were already clear to the kids, whatever the label. It was just that it had been a while since she'd felt this way about anyone, and been internally both fighting and craving having a label with. It was silly, but it was her.
"Okay," Rory exhaled with relief.
"And as for fall… the honest answer is - I don't know what's going to happen. For now, I'm in limbo here until the schools start accepting students again, then I can look into getting Theo and Eléa enrolled. Right now, I wouldn't mind staying right here. But at the end of the day, we're not fixed to one place. They've moved before - they are resilient in that sense," Logan explained.
"Yes, but I don't think we'd be anywhere ready for changing around the lives of our children based on a relationship that's just months long. And I'm sorry - I get that it isn't particularly sexy of me to be worrying about something like that. I've worked for years trying to become more confident and less panicky… Ugh… but the thing is that with all these emotions… so much of it has just resurfaced," Rory explained, apologetically.
Logan caressed her back, finding her adorable in her vulnerable state.
"And I like you regardless, Rory…, don't worry. All I mean is that we'll figure things out in good time. If we realize that this is something worthy of sacrifices, whether that is a longer than usual commute time or having to make do with texts and videos, I just think that if we have anything in our age then it's patience, right?" Logan discussed.
"So, you don't want this to be just a summer thing…," Rory inquired.
"We don't know what we'll want at the end of the summer. But for what it's worth now - then 'no', I don't want this to end - 'no'," Logan assured.
"Okay," Rory exhaled, having needed that too.
"So, we're good?" Logan asked.
"Uh-huh," Rory said, finding there was nothing to disagree with. "I told my dad about you today," she confessed a few moments later.
"Ah, so I'm the one who should be worrying about eventually meeting a parent," Logan chuckled.