Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
BAYLOR
Throwing my arm over my eyes, I stay there in silence for a moment. I’m not quite sure how to describe what just happened. Not only did I fuck Emily Brown, but I didn’t do it for any other reason than I wanted to.
I wanted her.
It feels like a betrayal of my brother and Maisie. But I have a hard time feeling guilty about it. I know I probably should, but I can’t. Being with Emily feels like a mixture of coming home and coming alive all at the same time.
“Is everything okay?” a soft voice asks next to me.
No, not just a soft voice, a trembling one.
She sounds absolutely terrified. Shifting my arm, I slide it beneath her neck without even looking at her, then I turn onto my side so I’m facing her. She looks at me, her eyes wide, and if I’m not mistaken, she’s on the verge of tears.
Lifting my other hand, I guide my fingertips along her jawline, then search her watery gaze with my own. “It’s really fucking good, which is the problem.”
“The problem?”
Arching a brow, I don’t even bother responding to that. She knows what I’m referring to. I know she does. She closes her eyes slowly, then opens them again, and when those pretty blue eyes meet mine, it fucking hits me in the goddamn dick.
I want her again.
I’m not going to be able to ignore this, her, or us again.
This was supposed to be one night, and I’ve been pining after her for a year. My control has snapped, and there’s no going back now. I don’t want to give her up again, and I have a feeling it’s going to cause some issues with my brother.
“I want you again,” I murmur. “I know I shouldn’t, but I do. I want to be inside you, taste you, feel you.”
“But your brother and Maisie,” she whispers as if she can read my mind. Maybe she can. Or maybe she’s just thinking the exact same thing as me. Because it’s a gigantic fucking elephant in the room.
Then something happens. There is a shift inside her. I see her expression change almost instantly. “We can keep it quiet,” she murmurs. “Nobody has to know.”
Guilt consumes me because the last thing I’d ever want to do is make her feel like a dirty little secret. I don’t give a fuck what her reputation is in town. We’re grown-ass adults, and we’ve both got a past. That doesn’t bother me in the slightest. It’s Beckett. It’s Maisie. It’s my family.
And family means every fucking thing. I don’t have much of it left, so there’s no way in hell I’m going to do something to jeopardize the relationship I have with them. Gliding my thumb along her bottom lip, I suck in some air because I want to kiss that lip again as soon as possible.
“I don’t care if anyone knows.”
“But you care if they do.”
“Yes and no. Until I can talk to them, can we keep things low-key?”
She smiles, but almost as quickly as the smile appears, it turns into a frown. “You’re sure it’s not about my past, maybe because I’ve been with Beckett?”
I almost laugh. We live in a town the size of a postage stamp. The only person Beckett and I haven’t both fucked is probably Maisie.
“Em, it doesn’t matter that you’ve been with Beckett. As long as you’re not fucking him anymore.” I arch a brow at the same time my lips twitch into a smirk.
Her eyes widen, her lips part, and she gasps in shock at my words. “I would never. Not ever. Not only is he happily married, but let me repeat, he’s married. I respect marriage, Maisie, and your whole family too much to ever do anything like that.”
“What about me?” I ask. “Where do I fit in that equation?”
I’m fucking with her, of course, but I do want to know her answer, so maybe I’m fucking with her too much. She wraps her fingers around my wrist as her gaze searches mine. Without a word, she shifts closer to me, her lips touching mine, and then she speaks.
“Depends on where I fit into your equation,” she rasps against my mouth.
“Didn’t I just show you?”
“I need a refresher.”
And that’s exactly what she gets. After the second round, she knows how the fuck we fit, and it’s together. I stay with her the entire night, and when I wake up the next morning, the only regret I have is that I have to leave her to get to work at the ranch.
I’ve officially fallen for Emily Brown.