Thank You, Next (The Kathryn Freeman Romcom Collection #9)

Chapter 23

Molly saw Ben’s expression tighten, and heard his heavy sigh. Turning to see what he was looking at, her heart sank.

She didn’t mind talking to Natalie, to the cameras. She didn’t mind talking. But right now she felt horribly vulnerable. Duncan’s admission about the video had made her question her judgement all over again. Had encouraging her to exercise and watch her diet been his way of showing her he loved her? The video a way to demonstrate his pride in what she’d achieved?

Or had he never really cared for her as much as he cared for his career?

‘Oh dear, you guys don’t look like you’re enjoying your scavenger hunt,’ Natalie exclaimed as she neared them. Today’s outfit, a bold blue and white striped flowing dress, was surely chosen precisely because it looked like a deckchair. ‘What’s happened? Are you coming unstuck working together as a couple, like you did in the Escape room?’

Molly saw Ben having some silent brother-to-sister communication with Rachel. If she had to guess, he was telling her to leave them alone. Rachel gave him a sharp shake of the head, which she didn’t need to be a sibling to work out meant this was her job. Suck it up.

‘We’re working together just fine,’ Ben replied, his jaw tight.

‘We bumped into Duncan and Jasmine,’ Molly told Natalie. ‘And I found out Duncan was making a before and after video of me to show my improved fitness. He says it was because he was proud of me, but he did it without consulting me, which makes me wonder if anything with him was real.’ She twisted her hands together. ‘And that in turn makes me realise how bad I am at reading guys.’ People, she amended silently, remembering her mum.

Beside her, Ben exhaled loudly.

Natalie turned to him. ‘Do you have anything to add, Ben?’

‘She should be blaming the guys. Not herself.’ He nodded towards the end of the pier. ‘Now please excuse us. We have the delight of the dodgems to look forward to.’

Despite her misery, Molly found herself spluttering with laughter. ‘He hates them,’ she explained to Natalie. ‘I remember this one day when we were dating before, and I said I wanted to go to the fair. Ben told me he could think of a hundred better things to do.’ Her belly fluttered at the memory. He hadn’t quite managed a hundred, but it had been one heck of a valiant attempt.

‘And I was right,’ he cut in quietly.

The husk in his voice ensured everyone knew exactly what his suggestions had involved and she felt herself blush.

‘How many more items have you got to do on your list?’ Natalie asked, thankfully shifting the conversation along.

Molly glanced down. ‘We need to find seaweed, a heart-shaped rock and partake in a water sport.’

‘What?’

At Ben’s worried look, she giggled. ‘I’ve got a great idea for that. Something that will really show how well we work in a team.’

He narrowed his eyes. ‘As long as I’m the one in the boat and you’re the one on the water skis.’

Natalie laughed and waved them away. ‘We’ll get the cameras ready, good luck.’

They started to walk away but Ben stilled and turned round. ‘How are the other couples doing?’

Natalie gave him a knowing smile. ‘One couple only have two more items to tick off.’

He muttered something that sounded a lot like fucking typical, under his breath, but as they walked towards the fair at the end of the pier, and away from the camera, his body lost some of its tension.

She glanced sideways at him. ‘Why are we heading to the dodgems?’

‘I thought you wanted to go on them?’

‘I want to beat the other couples more,’ she countered, taking his hand and steering him instead towards the beach. ‘Did you mean what you said back there?’

‘About that fact you should blame me and Duncan rather than yourself? You know I do.’

She nodded, eyes out towards the sea. ‘Sometimes I think it is my fault though.’ Her voice faltered. No, she wasn’t going to cry.

His hand squeezed round hers. ‘Your fault, how?’

The concern in his eyes made her heart trip. ‘There are people who must be easy to love, like … the purple chocolate in the Quality Street box. You know, the one filled with hazelnut and caramel. Everyone loves them. And then there are the people who are more difficult to love, like the toffee.’

He halted, turning to face her, his brow crinkled. ‘You think you’re the toffee?’

‘Maybe? And I’m not saying that to get you to feel sorry for me, because just like the toffee, there will be people who love me, like my parents, well, my adopted ones. They love me.’

‘You’re adopted?’

Damn, why had she mentioned the word adopted?

‘Molly?’

She took a step away. ‘Sure, I’m adopted, but so what, loads of kids are, and my new mum and dad love me, so it’s all good.’ Making sure he didn’t ask any further questions, she threaded her hand through his arm. ‘Come on, we need to get those items crossed off.’

He resisted a moment, eyes searching her face, and she was afraid he saw more than she wanted him to. ‘For the record, the toffee is my favourite.’

Her heart gave a joyful jump. ‘You’re kidding me.’

His eyes never wavered from hers. ‘I never kid about Quality Street.’

‘Umm, you said that about business,’ she reminded him. ‘When we were at that fete.’

‘I’m allowed two things I don’t joke about.’

‘Sure, because you’re such a laugh a minute about everything else.’ But inside a little bubble of happiness floated in her chest.

‘So what’s this idea about the water sport?’ he asked when they stepped onto the beach.

She grinned and ran down to the sea. There she pulled off her socks and trainers and rolled up her jeans. ‘Come on. We’re going to paddle. Nothing says water sport like two people paddling.’

He looked unconvinced. ‘Where does the sport come in?’

‘Come in and find out.’

She waited until he’d waded in, then took out her phone and snapped a photo of him a second after she gave him a gentle shove.

* * *

Dinner, cooked by Chloe and her new partner Liam, who was so ridiculously full on he made Molly seem quiet, had been average. Having food prepared by people who didn’t know their way around a kitchen, then eating it with people he didn’t particularly want to spend time with … Ben added it to the long list of things he would not miss about this place when he left.

Sitting beside him at the table, Molly gave him a little smile, like she knew what he was thinking.

‘What?’

She leaned in, and his Molly-awareness radar pinged into hypersensitive mode – she smells so good, look at those awesome breasts, the curve of that bum. Even being dunked in the sea wasn’t enough to quell it. ‘You can’t wait to disappear to your room.’

‘Not true.’ It wasn’t his room he wanted to go to. At least not by himself.

She gave him a shrewd look. ‘You’re up for the darts tournament?’

‘If you’re staying, I’m staying.’

‘What brought this on? You normally disappear.’

‘I’m not risking you being swopped to someone else.’ The thought of Duncan getting a day with her, maybe the rest of the show with her, filled him with fear. From the way the man kept glancing at her, Ben knew Duncan would use every opportunity he could to persuade Molly that he was still the same good guy she’d fallen in love with. The one she’d come on the show to marry.

There was that word again. Ben had spent two weeks convincing himself Duncan was the arsehole, but was he, really? Wasn’t the real arsehole the man who’d convinced Molly to give him another chance, yet still hadn’t told her why he wasn’t a good bet? And who was utterly petrified by the thought of standing with her in front of an altar in two weeks’ time?

Glad of the distraction, even if it was darts, Ben took Molly’s hand as they walked with the others to the games room.

Molly, it turned out, was awful at darts, yet nobody would have guessed from watching her. Her face lit up every time she managed to hit the board.

‘You’re aiming for inside the circle,’ he murmured when she leapt up and down after another enthusiastic effort.

‘I know that, but first I have to get it on the board, and I just did that so go me.’

He couldn’t argue with the logic.

When it came to Molly’s next turn, it wasn’t logic he wanted to argue with, it was James. The man suddenly appeared behind her, and by behind, he meant right behind, his body wrapped around her, her bum tucked against his groin. ‘Here, Molly, you need to angle your shoulder, elbow and hand so it’s at ninety degrees.’

Before he knew it, Ben had shot out of his seat. ‘I’ll show her.’

James laughed. ‘Woah, feeling a bit possessive, are we?’

‘Yes.’

His voice must have held an edge, because the room fell silent, all eyes on them. Included the blasted cameras.

James cleared his throat and stepped back. ‘No worries. I just wanted to help.’

Ben took his place, slotting himself around her curves, and slowly felt his blood cool from the raging jealousy into a more manageable, heated desire. ‘Sorry,’ he whispered into the shell of her ear.

‘What for?’

‘I think I caused a scene.’

Her hair feathered against his chin as she nodded. ‘It’s okay. I’d rather have you show me how to do it.’

‘Confession time,’ he told her as he tried to straighten her elbow as James had shown her. ‘I don’t play darts.’

He felt her body vibrate with laughter as she took the shot, which predictably missed the board. As did the next one. And the one after that.

‘You need a better teacher,’ James yelled over.

Molly smiled. ‘Or maybe the teacher needs a better pupil.’

‘Nah, you need to be guided by someone with the right technique.’ James waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

‘She’s never had an issue with my technique,’ Ben countered, unreasonably irritated. James was being James, trying to provoke him. So why couldn’t he let it slide?

‘She just has an issue with how you play with her emotions, eh Moll?’ Darts in hand, Duncan sauntered up to the throwing line. ‘How you lead her on when you’ve no intention of having a real relationship with her.’ He pinned Ben with his gaze. ‘No intention of marrying her.’

For the second time that evening, the room went quiet.

You’re a fine one to talk about leading her on, he wanted to fire back, but the truth of Duncan’s last few words gnawed away at him, leaving a raw, angry wound. He wanted the relationship, desperately, but marriage? He was kidding himself and lying to Molly if he thought he could go through with that.

‘I don’t need you to fight my battles,’ Molly told Duncan stiffly. ‘You lost that right when you decided that being on this show was more important than being with me.’

Duncan looked put out. ‘Come on, that’s not how it went down.’

‘It’s exactly how it went down.’ She turned to Ben. ‘I’m going to call it a night. I’m feeling really tired.’

‘I’ll walk you up.’

‘Maybe you were right and we should have disappeared to our rooms straight after dinner,’ she said as they climbed the stairs.

‘I don’t think so.’

She darted him a confused look. ‘You enjoyed the darts?’

‘I enjoyed teaching you darts.’

‘But you didn’t; you don’t know how to play … oh.’

They came to a halt outside her room and immediately the air turned thick with sexual tension. Standing in the way of the camera, Ben stared down at her, feeling his heart crash against his ribs. The top she wore was cut low enough he could see the curve of her breasts, and immediately his head filled with erotic images of what he wanted to do with those breasts. What he had done with them, before he’d thrown away that right. With a huge effort he dragged his gaze upwards, but that wasn’t helpful because it landed on her mouth, on the lips he knew would be soft and yielding beneath his.

Angling his head, he bent to kiss her. A light, testing, press.

She moaned, or had it come from him?

‘Fuck.’ He dragged in a ragged breath. ‘I don’t know if I can walk away.’ His eyes raked hers, seeing the same war going on in her. She wanted him, yet she was also scared. And damn if she wasn’t right to be scared. ‘Tell me to go.’

Her teeth settled into her lower lip. ‘I’m not sure I can.’

This time he knew the groan came from him. ‘I shouldn’t be here, thinking what I’m thinking.’

‘What are you thinking?’

There was a breathless rasp to her voice that tied him in knots. ‘I’m thinking of all the ways I want to take you.’

‘But?’ She whispered, as if she sensed his internal battle.

‘But I fucking hate that Duncan might be right. That I’ll start something I’m not capable of finishing.’

‘I’ve never had a problem finishing with you.’

The reminder only served to harden him further. ‘That’s not what I meant.’

She gave him a sad smile. ‘I know.’

He should walk away. She needed to trust him not to let her down, and yet here he was, rapidly heading towards doing exactly that.

But. His legs wouldn’t work. Instead of moving him away, they took a step closer, so he was pressed against her. ‘Just one kiss,’ he whispered, making a promise he wasn’t convinced he could deliver on.

Her tongue darted out, wetting her lips. Then she nodded, and it was game over.

Years of abstinence, two weeks of simmering sexual frustration, being around Molly and not being able to touch her like he wanted to, surged to the surface and his mouth crashed down on hers, tongue seeking her heat as if it had never left, tasting, remembering, tasting again.

‘Fuck,’ he whispered hoarsely. ‘I’d forgotten how sweet you taste.’

It was like coming home, yet experiencing the most thrilling night of his life, all rolled into one. Achingly familiar, but also his most erotic fantasy played out for real. With practised ease his thigh slotted between her legs, hands drifting from her face to smooth down her arms and then lower, to curve round her bum and pull her more tightly against him.

More. He needed more friction against his throbbing erection, more of her curves in his hands, the touch of her skin against his.

You can’t do this. Not until you’ve been honest with her.

But his blood was too hot, his need too great and he dropped his hips, getting the friction he needed, feeling her heat through the fabric of his jeans.

Are you really going to blindside her again?

Damn it, he did not need his conscience interfering right now. With an anguished groan he drew away, breath coming out in shallow pants as he tried to get his libido under control.

Her husky whimper didn’t help dampen the fire, nor did her look of disappointment. Before she could read anything else into his action, he took her face in his hands. ‘I didn’t want to stop.’

Her gaze jumped to his. ‘Me neither.’ She released a slow, choppy sounding breath. ‘But it’s good that you did. Really good,’ she added, and it sounded liked she was trying to convince herself. ‘You and me having sex would not be a wise idea.’

‘Not what my body is telling me right now.’

She let out a strangled laugh. ‘Nor mine. But my oxytocin levels thank you.’ He frowned and she gave him a wry smile. ‘I read it somewhere that women release nearly eight times more oxytocin than men after sex, and that makes us trust too quickly. At least that’s what the article said, and that’s not really helpful for me, so…’

‘I get it.’ More than she knew. With a heavy heart he traced a finger along her jaw, and around the sweet curve of her mouth before giving her a gentle kiss. ‘Goodnight.’

As he walked back to his room, the ache in his body was nothing to the ache in his chest. Molly was so forgiving, so warm and open … but she was vulnerable, too. All that crap about the toffee. She thought she was hard to love, when in reality falling in love with her would be the easiest thing in the world.

And God, he was already halfway there, but she’d been right in the coach. They were coming at this from two hugely different perspectives. He wanted a chance at a relationship with her. She wanted a man who would be prepared to marry her, turn himself over to her. Tie himself to her legally. If he had no intention of doing that, he had to back off, now, or he’d be repeating all of his past mistakes.

Dating you was just a giant guessing game.

We’re left in limbo land, trying to use his actions as clues. Which can result in wrong assumptions.

So far, his actions had put him on a path to meeting her at the altar.

Bleakly he realised there was only one real option left to him. He had to talk to her. Rip apart the darkest, tightly stitched up parts of him and open them up for her judgement.

The thought sent his stomach rolling.