“And I’m getting used to the words you started this conversation with,” I said, feeling lighter than I had in a very long time.
He gazed at me. The sincerity in his gorgeous green eyes was unmistakable. “Will it take you long to believe me?” he asked.
“That depends on you… and me,” I answered truthfully. Although, if it was up to my girlie parts, the process wouldn't take long at all.
Zach laced his fingers in mine. Our connection made my wreath glow and sparkle. He touched one of the flowers with reverence and smiled.
“I’ll do whatever it takes,” he promised.
My heart pounded a wild happy beat in my chest. Pure and simple. And it was all I could do not to climb up Zach's trunk and shake his leaves until we were one. But I knew that sex would complicate everything. While my body disagreed vehemently, I let my brain take the wheel. I wanted Zach forever, not just right now. But first... “Can you learn to love yourself?”
His fingers tightened on mine. “Shit,” he muttered, looking bewildered. “Is that a requirement?”
“It is,” I said softly.
Zach’s expression turned wary and pained. His fingers slid out of mine. “It’s something I’ve never done,” he admitted.
I wanted to hold Zach tight and tell him it would be all right, but his healing process was up to him. “I think there are a few people here who would be happy to help.”
Zach sighed and ran his hands through his hair. It stuck straight up on his head. He looked so much like Fabio it was striking. His lips compressed and his jaw worked a mile a minute. I could almost hear the chaotic shouting match in his mind. I was asking him to undo a lifetime of hurt and self-hatred.
It was not a small request, but it was the only way to make it work. And even if we didn’t work, I would be happy if he could love himself and find real happiness.
“I can try,” Zach said, slowly. “I can’t guarantee success, but if it means I’ll be worthy of you, I promise to try.”
He needed to do it for himself, but we’d get to that—one magical baby step at a time.
Chapter Seven
“I will break you down to nothing and remold you in my image, you lowly pieces of talentless crap,” Mae Blockinschlokinberg screamed in an octave that should have attracted stray dogs from hundreds of miles away.
She clearly hadn’t looked in a mirror during the break. The bushy beige unibrow was still front and center on her forehead. Her buddies sucked in the friend department. Friends told friends if they were sporting a unibrow.
Rehearsal wasn’t going well. The icky little block of a woman paced the back of the hall and barked orders at Bob while slinging profanities and insults at everyone. Her ghastly dressed minions sat in the back row and said nothing. Although, they clapped wildly and took pictures each time she pointed at them. Honestly, I was only half paying attention. Every time I glanced over at Zach, he was staring right back at me with a huge grin on his face. His words from earlier still danced in my brain.
The situation we were currently in was hellish, but the company—excluding Mae Blockinschlokinberg and her sandal-wearing posse—was divine.
“Holy shit,” Sassy muttered. “I’d rather be human than look like her. If this fucking play didn’t mean so much to Bob and the reputation of Assjacket, I’d wax that noxious turd so fast she wouldn’t even see me coming. That's Japanese for dehairing a gaping thunder hole.”
“Are you sure that was Japanese, guurrlfriend?” Zorro asked with a chuckle. He sat in a kiddie pool he’d acquired during the break in order to find his inner-shark wearing his pink assless chaps.
“Might have been Canadian,” Sassy conceded, giggling.
In the short time we’d been at it, Bob had already removed half of his new unibrow as he wrote and rewrote the script according to Mae Blockinschlokinberg’s bizarre and offensive visions. Zorro splashed around in six inches of water and gnashed his teeth like a shark. When Zach wasn’t smiling at me, he looked like he wanted to tear Mae Blockinschlokinberg’s head from her squishy shoulders, and Roger continued to plunk out songs about massive teeth biting tasty bottoms. If it wasn’t my reali-tree, I would have laughed.
“You. Dryad,” Mae Blockinschlokinberg shouted at me. “You’re dreadful. I want you to get bitten by the shark in the pink pants then do an interpretive dance about death and sharp teeth embedded in your ass. Everyone else do deep knee bends and grunt. The ensemble will represent the blood and innards of the victim. Make sure your grunts sound like kidneys and bowels.”
“Seriously?” I asked, sucking my bottom lip into my mouth so I didn’t call her a gaping jackhole. The strange and uncomfortable sensations I'd felt earlier returned. I tried to shake them, but the more she focused her putrid attention on me, the more they intensified.
“Do I sound like I’m joking?” she demanded.
“You sound like you’re missing a few screws,” I muttered under my breath. Goddess, how I loathed this woman.
“I’ll do it,” Sassy said, saving me from the humiliation. “I’m excellent with interpretive death dances. It’s one of my foreplay moves with my mate Jeeves. Zorro, bite my butt—not really hard, but make it look good. I’ll scream and shimmy a little. Also, I’ll roll my head so my hair will be featured since it’s fabulous and blonde. I’m going for a tragic yet really hot vibe. Roger, you sing the part about the bloody detached fingers and the fact that we’re destroying the oceans with prophylactics like condoms.”
“Umm… it’s plastics—not prophylactics,” Roger corrected her.
“Whoops, my bad,” Sassy said as she stretched a bit to warm up for her dance. “I must have misunderstood because I was thinking in British and you were speaking French. Happens all the time.”
Amazingly, Sassy was even able to
