Chapter 10 #3
“Shit, your back.” He comes over to me and stands behind me, replacing my hands with his own.
His thumbs massage gentle but firm circles into my back, and I fight the urge to purr into his touch.
We stand in silence as the minutes pass by, me leaning against the counter again, only this time he’s working on easing the ache from my back, driving me into a different kind of delirium.
This feels far more intimate than the sex we were having less than ten minutes ago.
My brain starts picturing what it would be like to wake up and make breakfast with this man.
Is he the type that stays over? Would we be the type that dance around the kitchen, forgetting the eggs are burning on the stove as we lose ourselves in each other / lip synch into our wooden spoons?
“Paige?” Shayne asks, popping the perfect future bubble I was forming for us in my mind.
“Yes?”
“We’re friends, right?”
My stomach drops to my toes. You’ve got to be kidding me. It’s my fever dreams made flesh.
How do I answer this? He was just inside me. I was just dreaming about our eventual cohabitation. “Yeah. Why?”
“I realize I should have checked in before but, with me only being in town a short while—you’re good to keep things between us casual, right?
” He’s still massaging my back as he gives me the old ‘let’s be friends’ chat, which makes it worse somehow.
A different kind of heat starts in my toes and travels up my body.
Step aside, Rage Paige has entered the scene.
“Hold up, cowboy,” I say, spinning to face him. My blood is set to boiling. His eyes widen slightly as they meet mine.
“You show up at my house in a horrible mood—which I’m still owed an explanation about by the way. We have incredible sex. And then you have the audacity to say, ‘let’s be friends’?? Who do you think you are?”
“Whoa, wait a second. I didn’t mean—”
“You didn’t mean to what? Fuck me? Little late for that.”
“Just give me a second—”
“No, you’re not getting any seconds. You can walk that ass of yours right out the door. I appreciate the orgasms, but next time we see each other let’s pretend we don’t.”
Shayne is looking at me, exasperated. How did he expect me to respond? You do not have the let’s be friends conversation two seconds after swapping bodily fluids.
“You’re right. I should have gone about this a different way, and you deserve an explanation,” Shayne says, scrubbing his hands over his face.
The motion highlights the bulge of his arm muscles, and I hate that I’m noticing that right now.
I especially hate that all I want to do is stare at him until every single line of his body is etched permanently into my memory.
Focus, you’re angry at him. He’s being a shit.
You do NOT need to deal with another shithead.
“You affect me in ways I’m not great with. I don’t want to drag you into my shit, Paige. There’s a lot about me you don’t know.”
“Well obviously, we’ve only known each other a week. There’s a lot about me you don’t know either.”
“And I’m enjoying getting to know you. Especially when we’re both naked,” he adds with a smirk.
“Don’t try to flatter me out of this. You suck.”
Shayne chuckles. “I just want to protect you from being disappointed if I leave suddenly.”
That gets my hackles up. Leave suddenly? Jo said his contract was through the foaling season and maybe beyond.
“Why would you leave suddenly? I know you’re here short term, but that’s still months away.”
Shayne looks at me for a while, his eyes travel over my face, and I can see he’s weighing how much to tell me.
“Why were you so upset tonight?” I ask.
His eyes go dark again, and he starts pacing around the kitchen. The size of him, coupled with the smallness of my kitchen, makes me feel like I’m in an Indiana Jones movie, and the boulder is about to crush me flat. The next time he comes close to me, I put my hand out on his chest to stop him.
“Shayne, seriously, what is going on?”
“Fuck, Paige. Just leave it. I shouldn’t have said anything. This is only going to end badly.”
“What are you so afraid of telling me? What could you possibly have to hide that would affect me so much? Unless of course you are a murderer. I knew it!”
Shayne gives me a rye chuckle, putting his hand over mine. “Still not a murderer. Unless you’re talking about how I just murdered—”
“Don’t. Don’t be that guy.” He’s using humor to try and get me off the scent. Not gonna work, buddy. I push him away, but he tightens his grip on my hand so I fall onto his chest.
“Paige, I like you,” Shayne says, stroking my hair, “but I also know starting anything with you is a very, very stupid choice.”
“Yeah, you keep saying that. Paige, let’s be friends.
Paige, I like you but it’s stupid that I like you.
What, are we in the fifth grade? If you can’t be honest with me then let’s just forget the whole thing.
This is already too confusing.” It hurts me to say this more than it should. I don’t know him. But I want to.
Shayne is silent for a while, his hand still idly stroking my hair. “You’re right.” He dips his head down and kisses the top of my head, then releases me and walks towards the door. The sound of it shutting behind him echoes in the otherwise silent cabin.
I don’t know what to do, so I stay standing in the kitchen, arms crossed over my chest.
Too much has happened tonight, today, this week. It’s all too much. I’ve either been brilliantly manipulated into giving him a free pass, or Shayne is actually hiding something dangerous. I don’t know what to believe.