Chapter Nine
B rady
Goddamn, Brady had really done it now.
It had been bad enough that he’d given in at the brewery—that he’d begged her to let him stay the night. But to show up at Serenity Now like a man possessed? Because he couldn’t stay away, couldn’t get her out of his head?
This was his ultimate low. He might as well stand in front of Rex and flip him off.
This couldn’t keep happening. He had to stop. Taylor had been right. He was a dead man walking.
He pulled out of Jane and took a step back, dragging a hand down his face.
“Fuck.” He squeezed his eyes shut. No condom. No condom . That never happened. Ever. But he’d been so swept up in the moment. In her .
And now? Fuck, he was completely screwed.
“What?” Jane spun around and leaned her back against the lockers.
He opened his eyes and looked at her.
Her flushed skin glistened with a sheen of sweat.
A smile softened her lips. Her blonde hair lay tousled over her shoulders.
Her breasts pushed over her pulled down sports bra and her yoga pants clung to mid-thighs.
She looked like a Playboy centerfold. How could he ever let her go to be with anyone else?
It would break him into a million pieces.
He shook his head. “I didn’t use a condom.”
Her eyes widened and she glanced down at his semi erection covered in her juices and bare as the day he was born. She lifted her gaze to his.
“I’m sorry,” he grunted. Could he fuck this up any more than he already had?
“I’m on the pill.” Her words came out with confidence.
The tightness in his chest eased a little. That was something. Explaining to Rex that Jane was pregnant with his baby would have been more than awkward since he’d promised to stay clear of her.
“I’m clean.” He needed to say it. He didn’t want her to worry that he carried some sort of disease from his revolving door of women.
“I can’t imagine you’d ever have sex with me, condom or not, if you weren’t.” She offered him a small smile.
Her faith in him always knocked the wind out of him. The way she trusted him—it wrecked him. Tears burned at the back of his eyes, but he refused to let them fall. He turned his face away, jaw clenched tight.
So few people had ever shown him the type of kindness Jane offered so freely. His circle was small—Rex, Taylor, Jane. Their families, maybe. Everyone else? They could go to hell.
But he didn’t belong in that circle. He wasn’t good. He wasn’t safe. He’d only end up hurting her. It was in his blood, wired into his DNA like a curse he couldn’t shake. No amount of love could unmake a man like him.
“I’m sorry.” He tucked himself in his boxer briefs and zipped up his pants.
He’d never had sex without a condom. His seed had never been inside of a woman.
It was intentional. He’d make a lousy dad.
All one had to do was look at the example set by his own father—the drunken abusive asshole—who used him as a punching bag when life hadn’t gone his way.
Love? He didn’t know what that looked like, what it really was.
He wasn’t empathetic. He was selfish, usually. He took what he wanted.
“Hey.” She touched his cheek. Her soft fingers danced over his stubbled jaw.
He glanced down. His release slid slowly down the inside of her thigh.
A guttural sound caught in his throat—he bit it back, barely.
The sight of it shouldn’t have turned him on.
But it did. Something primal twisted inside him.
He had the urge to drag his finger through it—push it back inside her—like he belonged there.
Like he belonged to her. He swallowed hard, but his throat was tight, the weight of desire and consequence tangled.
“Hey. Look at me.”
He met her gaze, her green eyes sparkling. His heart thudded. His chest tightened. He struggled to take a breath. What the fuck?
“Brady?” She pulled her pants up and adjusted her bra. “Are you okay?”
He couldn’t breathe. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t pull in any air. He wheezed.
She grabbed his arms and backed him up until a bench hit the back of his knees. “Sit.”
He crouched onto the bench and lowered his head between his knees.
A panic attack. Never in his life had he had one.
He didn’t panic. He was calm, cool and collected.
If he kept his emotions out of things, if he didn’t feel anything, nothing could faze him.
But he did fucking feel something for her, with her.
He practically combusted from the feelings.
She sat next to him on the bench, rubbing his back. “It’s okay, baby. Deep breaths.” Her soothing voice and touch allowed him to bring some air into his lungs.
When he finally caught his breath, he lifted his head and looked at her. She was the most beautiful person he’d ever laid eyes on. Had been since the day he’d met her.
“Brady, everything will be okay.”
“I wish I believed that.” He closed his eyes.
“Nothing bad is going to happen here.”
“We just had sex without protection.” He scoffed. “Your brother will kill me.”
“First, he doesn’t have to know about that.” She touched his forearm, rubbing her thumb over his skin. “Second, he won’t kill you.”
He shook his head. “You know one time he caught me gawking at you. You were nineteen—home from college for the summer. You were sprawled out on a lounger by your parents’ pool.
You had on this hot pink bikini, tied in the back.
I remember it clear as day. I stood at the sliding glass door in your living room just staring.
You were so fucking beautiful. So alive.
Carefree. Laughing at something one of your friends had said.
I can remember it like it was yesterday because it was the first time I looked at you and thought—mine. ”
Her cheeks pinkened at his declaration.
“Rex came up behind me and realized I was staring at you. He told me I was to stay the fuck away from you and wipe the lusty look off my face. He said he’d kill me if I looked at you like that again.” He cleared his throat. “You were completely, irrefutably off limits.”
“I think I decide if I’m off limits.”
“Your brother took me in as part of your family. He’s treated me as nothing less than a brother. He made one request. I owe it to him.” He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair.
“You don’t owe Rex for treating you like a brother. That’s what best friends do—treat each other like family.”
“I don’t have family.” His voice cracked, raw and low. “And now I’ve gone and slept with you after he explicitly told me to stay away.”
“But I asked you to.” Her voice was steady, pleading. “I want to be with you, Brady.”
He stood abruptly, pacing a short circle before turning back to her.
“It doesn’t matter. He’s not going to care who started it.
” He raked a hand through his hair again.
“I’ve dropped myself straight into the center of hell.
And before all this,” he gestured between them, “all I had was my imagination. That was safer.”
A heartbeat. His voice dropped.
“But now I know. I know what you taste like. What you feel like. And every time I look at you now, I’m...” His voice trailed off, broken.
She stood. “Why are you talking like this?” Her voice raised. “Rex may be mad but he loves us both. He’ll eventually get over it.”
“Will he?” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I’ve gone and done the one thing he asked me not to do. He won’t trust me ever again.”
“I think you’re being a little dramatic.” She tucked a few loose strands of hair behind her ear.
“He made me promise I wouldn’t sleep with you. That I’d never do anything with you that would hurt you and jeopardize my friendship with him.”
“You haven’t hurt me. Yet .” Heat entered her tone. “Everything that has happened between us has been with my full consent. I knew what I was doing when I came on to you New Year’s Eve.”
He pursed his lips. New Year’s Eve—the end of it all. He wanted to scream. To throw something. “I’ve fucked things up royally just like my father always did.”
“Brady.” She moved toward him again.
He put his hands up to keep her at bay. If she touched him again, he’d cave. “Please don’t. Or I will give in again.”
“So the wall goes back up?” She shook her head and flailed her hands in the air.
“It has to.”
“I can’t keep doing this, Brady.” Her voice trembled, thick with unshed tears.
“Yes, I started this. I wanted this—want this. I want us. I want to see what this could be if we actually gave it a chance.” A tear slid down her cheek.
She didn’t brush it away. “I think we could be something great. But not like this. Not if you’re always one foot out the door, waiting for the sky to fall or my brother to kill you. ”
“You say that now, but I’ll destroy you. I’m no good.” His stomach hardened. He knew he was destroying everything, but he had to.
“Stop saying that.”
“It’s true.”
“You told me we couldn’t do it and yet, you keep coming back, having sex with me then leaving. That will hurt me. It is hurting me.”
“I know.” He marched toward the door and grabbed the handle. “That’s why I have to walk away. I will hurt you even if it’s the last thing I want to do.” He yanked the door open and stormed out. She’d be wounded but he’d be devastated.