Page 7 of Almost

“I would try to offer help, but this is out of my depth,” I say, rubbing her shoulders reassuringly.

“I have study group later, but I appreciate the thought. Oh, before I forget, you need to schedule your fitting for your suit. The seamstress called me and asked, but I wasn’t sure of your availability.”

I nod and spin the chair she’s in around to where I can see her face. “As much fun as calling her back sounds right now, I can think of a lot of other things I’d much rather be doing,” I tease and her pale cheeks flush red.

“Seb, come on. I’m studying,” she protests weakly.

“Take a break, you said yourself that you have study group later, and it’s frying your brain.”

I cup her cheek and kiss Kiera gently as she leans into me, curling her fingers around the neck of my shirt.

Kiera pulls away, shaking her head. “I have to tell you something I’ve been thinking about.”

“Okay?” I say hesitantly, moving to lean against the desk as she spins in the chair again.

“What do you think about not having sex again until we’re married?”

Wow, okay, really wasn’t expecting that. I try to compose myself quickly, but based on her amused expression, I didn’t do it fast enough. That’s three months.

“I knew you’d be against it, but I didn’t mean to render you speechless.” She giggles softly and I open my mouth, but I still don’t quite have the right words.

I think she broke my brain. It’s not that I need sex, I just happen to like having it with Kiera. It’s like when you decide you can’t have ice cream anymore, but then all you want is to eat ice cream.

Kiera is watching me carefully and I exhale, trying to wrap my brain around this. It’s only three months. “Okay,” I agree slowly. It might be a long three months, but I’ll survive.

“Seriously?” she asks, surprised. If this is something she genuinely wants to do, of course I would agree.

“I think I’m going to need some ground rules. Are we talking like no sex completely, or is oral still on the table?” I ask, watching her face turn red again as she gets flustered.

“Nope. Completely cold turkey. Just think about how much more excited we’ll be for the wedding.”

I look at her skeptically. “I’m already excited for the wedding, but you think I’ll be more excited if sex is on the line?” I mean, she does have some logic there, but all I see in my future for the next three months is a lot of agonizing cold showers and dates with my hand. “If this is something you want to do, then we absolutely can.”

“I promise it’ll be worth it. We’ll have our entire honeymoon to get reacquainted.”

“I predict us not leaving our room.”

I back away from her to sit in one of the chairs on the other side of the desk as Zeus licks my leg to get my attention. He can probably taste the salt from my sweat.

“How was the gym?” Kiera redirects the conversation, as if we didn’t just discuss how we’re going from having a very active sex life to an extinct one for a while. But at the mention of the gym, I’m reminded of how angry Owen was and what he said.

We hardly ever fight. I think the last time was when Thalia and I broke up.

I once again am too slow to hide how I actually feel as her eyebrows scrunch in scrutinization. “Seb, what happened?”

“It’s nothing. I just got into it with Owen today.”

“About what? You guys never fight.”

I don’t want to make her feel worse about wanting Thalia as our photographer since I already made it happen. As far as she knows, it shouldn’t be a big deal. It’s my fault for not telling her more about my history with Thalia, but I hate to relive it. If Kiera knew that Owen thought having Thalia was a bad idea, she’d back off in a second. I love her, but I know one of her fears is that Owen and Blake will change their minds about her because Thalia is my ex. It doesn’t matter how many times I try to tell her that they love her, Kiera can be insecure at times. I do my best to reassure her, but I can’t erase those feelings completely.

“It was stupid guy stuff. Don’t worry about it,” I try to play it off, as I lean back in the chair to watch her study.

“Are you sure? If you want to talk about it, I’m here to listen.”

“Thanks, but it’ll blow over. I’m not worried.”

Kiera frowns, but doesn’t press it anymore thankfully as she starts reading her textbook again.