Chapter 5 #2
I run a hand over the back of my neck. Talking to Anastasia used to be the easiest thing in the world. And now—I might as well be trying to strike up a conversation with a complete stranger. “Look, can we talk?”
“Isn’t that what we’re doing now?” she asks, still not bothering to look at me.
“Anastasia.”
“No, Sawyer.” She glares up at me now, hurt swimming in her hazel eyes. “I came to you—remember? Six months ago, I poured my heart out and told you how much I missed my friend. Did you want to talk then? No, you threw it in my face.”
“Anastasia, you were with Jack. I wanted to stay out of your way.” How did I mess this up so bad? Truth is, I gained respect for Jack after he helped rescue Katelyn and me. We’d been abducted and were close to death.
After that, making things hard for him and Anastasia felt wrong. So I’d stepped away. Taken a back seat even though I loved the woman he was with. Wasn’t that honorable?
“No. You nearly died. And then I didn’t even get time to cope with the thought of losing you.” Her eyes fill. “Ugh, I do not want to cry anymore.” She looks up at the sky and closes her eyes for a minute.
“Will you please just give me time to explain?” If I can just get her to see. If I can just get her to understand, then maybe we stand a chance at going back to what we were before. Even if that’s all it will ever be.
“I don’t want to hear your explanation.” She lifts a small tub from under the table and places it on top, then starts cramming small paper cups and lids inside. “I don’t care.”
“Did he leave you?”
She stills, her gaze turning furious as she looks at me. “Did he leave me? Sawyer, he asked me to marry him. He wanted to spend the rest of his life with me, and I—”
“And you what?” I press when she trails off.
“No. I’m not having this conversation with you.” She stacks her travel coffee dispenser on top of the bucket and turns to head back toward her shop. But I’m nowhere near done, so I follow.
She starts to juggle the stuff in her hands to open the door, but I rush around and pull it open for her. Which earns a nasty glare from her as she pushes past me and into her dark coffee shop. After setting the tubs down on the table in her employee lounge, she whirls on me, fire in her gaze.
“What is it you want from me, Sawyer?”
“I want—” But what do I want? What am I hoping to accomplish by being here tonight? “Did he leave you?” I ask again. I already suspect it, but I need confirmation.
She closes her eyes. “Yes, Sawyer. Jack and I are done. Happy?”
Yes. “I’m not happy that you’re hurting.”
A tear rolls down her cheek. Knowing I’m the reason cuts me deeper than any blade ever has. “You didn’t seem to care before.”
My breath hitches in my chest, guilt crushing down on top of me. I’d thought I was doing us both a favor, but in reality, I was just protecting myself. Shielding my already broken heart from the very thing that shattered it in the first place.
And whose fault is that? Mine. Because I wasted time. I took too long, and I lost the only thing that really mattered.
“That’s not true,” I counter. “I thought I was doing you a favor.”
“A favor? By taking my friend away?”
“Friend,” I repeat the word, hating it with every fiber of my being.
A friend wouldn’t stare at her lips and wonder what they taste like.
A friend wouldn’t watch her from across the room, wishing he had the courage to just tell her how he felt.
A friend wouldn’t want to pull her into his arms just to feel the softness of her pressed against him.
Friend? I don’t think I’ve ever truly been her friend.
“Yes, Sawyer. You were my best friend, and then you just stopped showing up. You stopped being you.”
“How could I have kept being me when you were with him?” I demand, anger igniting my blood. “I told you how I felt!”
“Told me?” She laughs. “Are you kidding me, Maddox? You told me that I should have seen the way you looked at me. As far as I could tell, it was no different than the way you look at everyone else! You’re always flirting. Always making passes at women.”
“I do not make passes,” I snap.
She rolls her eyes.
“You are different.”
“No, I’m not. I was just another person you toyed with until I became boring.”
How can she not see? “You are the single most important person in the world to me. You have been from the moment we met.”
She laughs. “Sure seems like it. I need to go to bed, Sawyer. I have an early morning, and the absolute last thing I want to do is be anywhere near you.”
I grip her arm as she moves past me, trying to stop her from leaving before I’ve said everything I want to say.
Fight flares in her bright hazel eyes, and she moves in closer.
My pulse hammers as need slams into me. “Fine. You want to keep talking? Then tell me, what is it you want from me, Sawyer?” She stares up at me, and my stomach twists into nervous knots.
“Because it’s been six years, and not once have you given me any indication that you wanted something aside from friendship. ”
But I loved you the moment I first saw you.
How do I explain to her that I kept my distance because I never felt good enough to love her?
Releasing her, I reach back to grip the counter behind me.
My fingers grip the cool stone to keep me from taking everything I want when it’s mere inches in front of me.
I can see it all too clearly.
Me snaking a hand around the back of her neck and pulling her in.
My lips slamming onto hers.
Lifting her into my arms so I can get closer.
But just like I can easily imagine the way it would feel, I can also see the fallout. Things are too volatile between us now. Anything that starts will surely end in flames.
Anastasia’s gaze drops to my mouth, and she leans in even closer, her own lips parting.
Lord, grant me strength.
She presses a hand to my chest, and some of my restraint snaps. I lean into her. Can she feel the way I tremble at her touch?
“Is this what you want?” She stretches up on her tiptoes until her lips are just a breath away from mine, all while I slowly lose the fight within me. Her hot breath fans over my face.
Logic says I need to pull away. No matter how badly I want this, she just got out of a relationship. She’s hurting, and I refuse to be a mistake. She’s too important to me. It’s not worth losing everything we have for a brief taste of the woman in front of me. Not when I’ve got my eyes on forever.
“Is it, Sawyer?” she presses. The scent of coffee and sugar that always clings to her assaults me now, intoxicating me as it invades my senses.
Does she want this, too? Hope pummels me when she doesn’t immediately pull away. It pushes me past the desire and brings me dangerously close to blinding joy. Maybe this is why she wasn’t with Jack, maybe—
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” She rolls her eyes and pats my chest like I’m a puppy she just gave a treat to.
“Always the flirt. Never actually means anything. You just toy with people until you’ve got them right where you want them.
Well, congratulations, Sawyer. I’m alone again.
You’ve got what you want.” She starts to pull away.
This was a test? A game?
Fresh pain slices through me as she drives a dagger straight down into my heart. I walked right into this, though. I let her play me like a fiddle, those delicate fingers toying with each and every one of my strings.
What’s worse? I’d let her do it again in a heartbeat.
Before she gets too far, I grip her arm again, moving in so close I can count the flecks of green and copper in her hazel eyes. “Don’t tease me like that again,” I warn.
Her lips part, pupils dilating. “And why is that?” she demands, bottom lip quivering. “We both know that’s all you’ve been doing with me.”
That sharp jaw of hers is set, her gaze full of fury.
I want to call her bluff. Take her mouth with mine so I can show her just how desperate I am for more.
But right now in this moment, that would be a mistake.
So even as it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done, I restrain myself.
The truth is, what’s between us is far from over. Anastasia just doesn’t realize it yet.
My gaze drops to her mouth a moment before I raise it back to her eyes. “Because you’re playing with a fuse that’s been lit a long time, Knox. And I’m not sure how much longer I can keep it from going off.”