The World's Most Eligible Bachelor

Week 7 and Beyond

Harry and I couldn't get to our hotel room fast enough. It was a bit comical when I told my dad I wouldn't be coming back to the hotel where he and Louis were staying; he blushed something fierce. But he had to have been expecting it, right? 

As soon as we were inside our room, Harry pushed me gently against the wall and lowered his mouth to mine. Even though we had kissed about a hundred times already, just in one night, it was still a thrill to taste him again. I savored his lips; his body pressed more heavily against me, trapping me between him and the wall. I had no intention of trying to escape. 

My mind flashed back to the night Harry stole me away in New York, right after the Candle Ceremony, when he kissed me like this. Eagerly. Hungrily. Like he wanted all of me. This time, I knew he did. 

"You look absolutely stunning in this dress," he murmured against my lips. "But it's just going to get in the way. Promise to wear it for me another time." He unzipped the back and with hardly any effort, he slid the straps down my shoulders, causing the entire dress to fall away. 

"I promise," I said with a little chuckle. 

We didn't take our time at all. We rushed straight to what we wanted - each other. Filling and taking each other completely, we expressed our feelings more audibly than we ever had before. 

Afterward, we lay breathing heavily in each other's arms. I asked, "What did the note say?" 

"Hmm?" 

"The note - you asked Claudia who wrote it." 

He got up and fished through his wallet, returning quickly with a folded piece of paper. I read it through and felt like I might cry, thinking of how he must have felt when he first read this.

"Harry, I'm so sorry," I whispered, kissing gently over his cheeks, his chin, his lips.

"No need to be sorry," he sighed. "It wasn't you."

"How did you know?" I asked. I rolled on my side and wrapped my arm around his back. He met me in the middle and slid his arm over me in return, slipping his hand up into my hair.

"At first, I was absolutely crushed. I thought I had been played. I hated to think that-" His wild emotions cut him off.

"It's okay, I get it," I said, rubbing warm circles over his back. 

"I realized pretty quickly, though, that the time frame didn't match up. I had just been with you a few hours before. I didn't think you would turn and run right after a night like that," he said in a low, rumbling laugh, wiggling his eyebrows. "At least I hoped you wouldn't. I just knew that you couldn't have been lying to me all this time. I knew that you loved me and there had to be some other explanation for it. It was Ariana, later that day, who told me it wasn't your handwriting." 

"I love that girl!" I said in relief. "How did she take...everything?"

"She's a champion," Harry marveled. "I do love her, but not in the same way I love you. And I knew she loved me, so I hated that I hurt her. But she told me that she knew I loved you, and she would never want to get in the way of making me happy. Isn't that incredible?"