Chapter Nineteen Eleven Years Earlier
Chapter Nineteen
Eleven Years Earlier
‘Wait.’
It was my new least-favourite word in the entire English language, even more so because Josh had to say it twice before it broke through the desire that was coursing through me like molten lava.
‘Lily, please, wait.’
I blinked slowly as though coming out of a trance. My chest, exposed in its lacy strapless bra, was visibly heaving and I was panting. To be fair, we both were.
‘Please, Lily.’ There was a thread of desperation in Josh’s voice that doused the passion like a bucket of ice water. My seeking hand, which had slid beneath the waistband of his jeans, now felt like an unwelcome intruder. I carefully removed it, noting as I did that there were certain parts of Josh’s anatomy that clearly didn’t agree that we should be stopping this at all.
‘We need to think this through. We need to talk,’ Josh said, his voice still ragged with desire.
Talking had been very low down on the agenda only seconds before. It certainly hadn’t been a priority when his mouth had left mine and laid a trail of kisses down my throat, nipping gently at the sensitive skin where my neck met my shoulder. Discussion hadn’t been on anyone’s mind when he’d reached for the fastenings of my halter top and untied them. He’d looked down at me, his eyes glazed with the same emotion I knew was in mine. I’d tugged his t-shirt over his head, and it had fallen on the floor beside my abandoned top. Somehow I’d ended up beneath him on the small sofa, our legs a tangle of denim wound around each other, as though playing a very grown-up, horizontal version of Twister.
I’d known from the pressure behind his zip how much he wanted me, wanted this. Which made it even harder to believe he was now calling it to a halt.
Very gently he put his hands on my shoulders and eased himself away from me, creating a chasm that felt as wide as a canyon.
‘I’m not sure we should be doing this,’ Josh said, sounding as though he was trying to convince himself almost as much as me.
‘Why?’ I said, hearing the sting of rejection in my voice. ‘You wanted to just minutes ago.’
My eyes dropped to his jeans, where the outline of him was still pressing against the fabric. His eyes took the same path as mine. ‘I still do,’ he said with a catch in his throat that I thought had taken him by surprise. ‘You have no idea how much I want to lay you back down on this couch and peel off the rest of your clothes and show you just how much I want you.’
My smile was tentative, as though I was walking on thin ice. ‘Then do it.’ I reached out a hand and laid it on his chest. His heart was thundering beneath my palm.
‘I can’t. Or rather, I won’t.’
There was a resolution in his eyes that I recognised from the past. Whatever I said now wasn’t going to make any difference. His mind was made up.
‘Why not? Surely I at least deserve to know that?’
Josh shifted slightly and my hand fell away. ‘Because it’s you. And because it’s me. It’s us,’ he replied, which told me absolutely nothing, something he seemed to realise because he added in a low voice, ‘And because I don’t think you’ve ever done this before.’
My cheeks flushed. Was I really so bad at sex, he actually thought this was my first time?
‘I’m not a virgin, Josh.’
For a moment his smile returned, but it was tempered with something tender.
‘I didn’t think that you were.’ He bit his lip, and for a second the flame of desire was back again. I saw it and he knew that. ‘What I mean is that I don’t think you do one-night hook-ups. You’re not a one-and-done girl. This—’ He waved a hand between our semi-clothed bodies. ‘This means something to you.’
If he’d produced a dagger and slid it between my ribs, I doubt he could have hurt me more.
‘And it doesn’t to you?’
It was a tit-for-tat assault, and I could tell he hadn’t walked away from my words unscathed.
‘It would mean too much to me. That’s why we can’t do this.’
I shook my head, unable to reconcile the rejection with his words.
‘I’m a twenty-two-year-old bloke with a healthy sex drive and yes, I can have one-night stands and amazing sex with someone I know I’ll probably never see again. But you don’t do that, do you?’
I lifted my chin in a challenge. ‘Who says I don’t?’
His smile was heartbreaking, because within it I could see how much he thought of me.
‘Me. I do. I know you, Lily.’
‘You knew me,’ I corrected, bravely trying to restore the tattered remnants of my pride.
‘I can’t make love to you and then walk away.’
As much as I liked the fact that he’d called it ‘making love’ rather than something more earthy, the ‘walk away’ bit was what broke me.
‘And why would you have to walk away?’
He looked as though someone was tearing him slowly in half, and part of me was glad this wasn’t entirely easy for him.
‘I don’t want to do anything that would make you think this could go anywhere – at least, not right now. I’m leaving in two days, Lily.’
‘Leaving where?’
‘Leaving the country. I’m part of a twelve-month university exchange program. I leave for Asia on Monday. And when I’m done, I plan to go travelling.’
He reached for my hands, and after a brief tussle when I wouldn’t surrender them, he folded them inside his own.
‘This isn’t the right time for us to be starting anything. Finding you again tonight, reconnecting with my old friend, that’s more important to me than a quick—’
‘Fuck,’ I said, not sure if I was completing his sentence or expressing my own disappointment.
‘Exactly,’ he said with a sad nod. ‘I lost our friendship once because I was too careless with something I should have tried much harder to hold on to. I’m not going to ruin it again for a one-night stand.
‘I’m trying to be a good guy here, Lily,’ Josh said, his voice virtually pleading. ‘I don’t want to lead you on, or make you hope for something that we both know I can’t give you.’
‘Which is?’
‘A real relationship.’
He felled me into a silence there was no coming back from, because part of me knew he was right. Josh shied away from close relationships. It was a lingering scar from his past, long after all the physical ones had faded. He’d stopped us from going further because he knew it would hurt me more to have him for one night only and then have to say goodbye. I wanted to be grateful to him for trying to protect me . . . but it hurt too much.
Josh lifted one hand and brought it to my cheek, wiping away a tear I hadn’t even known had escaped.
‘Do you want me to leave?’ he asked, getting to his feet and reaching for the discarded t-shirt on the floor.
‘No,’ I said, shaking my head. ‘Stay here tonight.’
‘That won’t be too weird?’
‘Everything about tonight has been a little bit weird.’
I got to my feet, deliberately not reaching for my halter top. I think part of me still wanted to show him what he was missing. From the way his eyes travelled my body, there was a small measure of satisfaction in realising that he already knew.