11. Josh
JOSH
S leep eluded me, simply because there was absolutely no way I was going back to bed after that encounter with Dove.
I listened to her retreat, the close of her door loud in the stillness of the night as she reached the safety of her room. But I knew she wasn’t running from me.
She was running from what she’d felt.
There was no mistaking the heat that had flared in her eyes, even as they’d widened with shock to find me awake.
I’d woken the moment she’d stirred. Maybe it was wrong of me to feign sleep, but I hadn’t wanted her to leave. I hoped that if she thought I was asleep, she’d lie back down too, and I could steal a few more hours with her by my side. Deceitful, maybe, but harmless.
I hadn’t expected her to sit there, ogling me as if I was a meal she craved, but couldn’t have.
It reminded me of the night of her graduation, the night that had changed everything.
I’d seen the heat in her gaze then too, but it’d been accompanied by the haze of alcohol, and I’d told myself it wasn’t real.
That there was no way what I felt was shared between us, and she was just being a regular, horny, drunk teenager.
But this… this felt different.
The moment our eyes met, desire crackled between us like a brewing lightning storm, heady and electrifying. This was not a teenager’s fleeting curiosity, fueled by alcohol and bad decisions, but a women’s undeniable arousal, so thick it was practically palpable.
When I’d seen her nipples stiffen under her top, I’d barely managed to stifle the groan in my chest by hastily biting at the inside of my cheek, hoping my own arousal wasn’t making itself known.
But I didn’t have to worry—not when, a moment later, Dove was practically running up the steps to escape.
I hadn’t meant for the question to slip out of my mouth, but seeing her reach for me had nearly unraveled me and the secret I kept locked up tight.
As her hand hovered between us, I wanted nothing more than to take it, to tug her in and close the distance.
More than anything, I wanted to know if she wanted it, too.
But I wasn’t sure if this was a new development for her, fueled by seeing me for the first time in years, or if it’d lingered from what I’d believed was transient teenage lust. I knew that, while I looked similar, I was also different in ways only time could influence.
Dove hadn’t escaped the hand of time either.
She wasn’t the same girl I’d left behind three years ago, even if remnants remained.
She was older now, more mature. Gone was the insecure eighteen-year-old, in her place an assertive twenty-one-year-old woman that had grown into herself—just like I knew she would.
The insecurities that plagued her during youth were no longer present, destroyed by acceptance and adulthood, confidence now in its place.
All that, plus the lust darkening her gaze tonight, made me stop and consider the women before me. That perhaps my feelings might just be reciprocated after all.
That maybe they always had been.
I’d spent years away from Dove, convinced I was doing what was best for her. That she would be safer away from me and my illicit, unwelcomed feelings. But there was nothing I’d deny Dove—including myself. If she wanted me, truly wanted me, she could have me.
And if I could finally have her…
I wanted—no— needed to find out.
The house was filled with the aroma of coffee well before the sun came up.
My body may have been sluggish from lack of sleep, but my mind was alive with thoughts I could barely keep up with.
Seated at the kitchen table, sipping my coffee, my mind willing my body to catch up, I watched out the window as the darkened sky bled into a canvas of yellows and pinks as the sun began to wake.
It was only when I was pouring my third cup of coffee, the fatigue clinging to me starting to fade, that I heard the first signs of Dove being awake.
Every muscle in my body tensed before I willed myself to play it cool, to relax, and continued pouring.
Setting my steaming mug aside, I grabbed another from the cabinet and filled it halfway.
As I opened the fridge, I ignored the urge to turn around to watch the stairs.
Instead, I added what I considered way too much cream to the coffee, stirring until it blended together into a pale toffee color.
I needed to see how Dove was going to play this first before doing anything.
Would she confront what had sparked between us last night?
Not likely. Dove could be outspoken and honest when she wanted to be, but somehow, I knew this wouldn’t be one of those times.
It had taken a while for both Dove and I to feel comfortable opening up to one another after we’d met.
Both of us were experts at holding pesky things like feelings close to our chests, locked safely behind steel bars.
No , it was more likely she’d ?—
The stairs creaked as she hurried down them and passed by in a rush, avoiding me and the kitchen entirely in her race for the mudroom.
— ignore me.
“Dove.”
I heard her fussing with her boots hastily, cursing the worn laces under her breath.
This was the exact reason why I always untied my boots and put them back properly when I came in—unlike Dove who pulled them off and chucked them, making them a problem for later.
You never knew when you might need them handy in a quick getaway.
Her bad habit worked in my favor today, keeping her from slipping out the door before I could even get a “good morning” out.
I sighed, leaning against the doorframe of the mudroom. Her gaze didn’t so much as flicker to me, too busy untying her shoes, her hands a flurry of movement.
“Here.” I held the coffee out between us like a peace offering. “I made you coffee, figured you’d be tired this morning.”
Her head whipped up, her tired eyes narrowing. “Why?”
I fought to keep the edges of my smile down. “I’m assuming you didn’t sleep great since you said the couch was uncomfortable, and we spent most of the night sleeping on it.” Sleeping on me , I didn’t say. “I figured coffee would be welcomed.”
Her eyes were still wary, as if she was expecting me to start addressing the elephant in the room.
And while I wanted nothing more than to do that, I knew it would only make her retreat further.
One thing I wholeheartedly knew about Dove was that she was stubborn, and if it wasn’t her idea, forget about it.
I would have to ease her into talking about this.
Figure out where her feelings, if any, laid.
I’d spent years accepting my feelings for Dove, resigned to them.
If what she felt was new for her, she was likely frightened by it—and by my reaction to it.
That's how it had been for me in the beginning, when I’d realized what the ache in my chest meant whenever I was around her.
So… baby steps.
I could do baby steps.
When her hands finally curled around the mug, taking it from my hands, it was the smallest victory.
When she took a small sip and gave a pleased hum, it felt like a prize.
“Just how you like it.”
Her eyes met mine over the rim of the mug. At least she was looking at me.
“I have to go into town to pick up that feed order I placed with Dell last night,” I reminded her. Here goes nothing… “Want to come with?”
The silence after my question seemed years long, and nerves twisted in my stomach as if I was some teenage boy asking a girl to prom.
There was no denying what I’d felt last night, but what if I was projecting? What if Dove didn’t feel even an ounce of what I did simmering between us?
It’d been years since I’d seen her, and maybe that’s all this was: sudden proximity and my unrequited lust influencing me into thinking there was something between us when there really wasn’t. Perhaps all she saw when she looked at me was Joshua, her absent, jerk of a stepbrother.
Unease filled me, and I rubbed awkwardly at the back of my neck, uncertainty making me falter.
I’d always been sure Dove held nothing but sisterly feelings for me, not the fiery inferno of lust I carried for her .
This new grey area was… unsettling. I’d lost Dove once before; I didn’t want to lose her again.
In the week I’d been back, I realized if all I could have her as was my stepsister, I could live with that.
It would be agonizing, but it was better than living a life without her in it at all.
I didn’t want to push her away over something I was beginning to doubt she even experienced.
“Or if you’d rather not…” I suggested, giving her a way out if I was making her uncomfortable, which was the last thing I wanted to do.
The muscles along my back tensed as my father’s reproachful voice suddenly echoed in my ears, drawing up memories I’d spent years attempting to forget.
I’d done none of the accusations he’d flung at me that night, and I was nothing like the monster he’d tried to paint me as. My leaving had proven that, hadn’t it?
“I have a lot to do today,” she hedged. I heard it for the excuse it was.
I willed the disappointment from my face, and gave a single, understanding nod.
“But,” she offered a moment later, and my heart gave a pathetic, hopeful leap, “if we both work on getting the animals taken care of, the rest can wait.”
She turned from me, setting the coffee on the washer as she slipped her feet into her boots.
I stood there, watching, waiting to see if she’d retract her agreement. And maybe to stare covertly, just a little, as she bent over to tie her laces.
“You better change.” Her abrupt order startled me, my eyes finding somewhere to be other than the tempting curve of her ass, but she wasn’t looking at me, focus still on her boots. I swore I could hear the hint of a smile in her voice as she warned, “I’m not waiting around for you.”
Yes, ma’am.