Chapter Twenty #3
It hadn’t even been a blip in his mind she would rise from her bed and demand that he kiss her. That she wanted him to was, well it was, surprising was the only word that would come.
No, that wasn’t right. It was amazing.
He’d been fighting this attraction because he respected the heck out of her and didn’t want her to think he regarded her as just another woman to bed. Another proverbial notch on his belt, as she’d referred to it.
But with everything that had happened lately with his mother, Charity employing Liv Joyner, even the jerk she’d gone out with, he’d come to realize how much he wanted her in his life. And yes, his bed was included in that, but it wasn’t the sole factor as it had been with every woman before her.
A heartbeat later, he opened his eyes. The expectation on her face, those damn kissable lips swollen from making love to them, almost made him pull back the words he said next.
“Kissing you is one thing,” he said, “taking you to bed, quite another. The last thing I want with you is a simple hookup, Charity.”
Her eyes lost some of the luster and he could hear the self-doubt crawling through her brain.
Taking her hands in both of his, he brought them to his lips and kissed them. “There’s nothing simple about what I want with you.”
“What do you mean?”
“If we have sex, it’s not going to be a one-time thing for me.”
“Why not? I mean, it’s always that way for you.”
The shame that pounded through him at the truth of her words had him biting back a curse.
“I can’t deny that, but with you it’d be different. If we give in to this, it’s going to change everything between us.”
“It doesn’t have to,” she said. He knew she realized how wrong that sounded when she bit down on her bottom lip and averted her eyes. “I mean.” She shrugged, then sighed. “I don’t know what I mean. I’m having a hard time fighting my feelings for you.”
He gave voice to a question that had been burning in him for days, something his ego told him he needed clarification about. “Is that the real reason you didn’t want to see Thad anymore?”
Slatting her eyes at him and pursing the lips he wanted to kiss again had him shifting on the chair as he grew even harder.
Why was teasing her such a turn-on?
“You do that to get a response; don’t think I don’t know it. You know his name.”
“Guilty,” he admitted. “On both counts. But did you?”
Another exhale. He released his grip on her hands, wound them around her back and repositioned her so her head rested against his chest. The degree of comfort that sailed through him was immeasurable.
“No. The real reason was because there was no, well, spark, I guess is the right word, between us. When he kissed me, it felt like I was kissing one of my brothers. When I say that out loud, it sounds creepier than the backwoods at the end of my granny's property back home.”
His fingers drew tiny circles up and down her back. “I can’t tell you how happy that makes me.”
She tilted her head to look up at him. “Why?”
He rubbed his nose against hers. “Because I know when I kiss you, your brothers are the last thing on your mind.”
“Well, that’s true.”
She pulled back to a sitting position, and he immediately felt like he’d lost something vital.
“What are you thinking about?” He smoothed her wrinkled brow with the tip of his finger, then took her hands in his.
“Nothing. Everything.” She looked down at their joined hands. “I’m just...confused.”
“About this? Us?”
She nodded. “You’re not the kind of guy I should be thinking about, and yet I can’t stop myself. I know I’m not the type of girl you go for—”
“Why do you say that? Can’t you tell by my response that I want you?”
“I’m not talking about physical desire. Yes, I know now that you feel that way, and the Lord knows I’ve been having my own lusty dreams about you for a long while.” Her neck flushed.
Talk about an ego boost. He felt like puffing out his chest and preening.
“What are you confused about?”
“Wanting you so much when I know it can’t go anywhere between us.
We want such different things for our futures.
I don’t live in the moment like you do, wanting to stay single and enjoy life as it is.
I want kids, Sunday family dinners and carpooling; family vacations, and nighttime bath routines.
” She looked up at him again, the light gone from her eyes, sadness now coating them.
“I want a man who’ll be my partner in every sense of the word, and yet someone I can depend on and who can lean on me when he needs to. I want a forever someone. You...don’t.”
Her gaze was so intense on his, as if she wanted him to negate her words, declare he did want all those things, desperately, and with her. Like she was waiting for him to admit he wanted to give up his devil may care, live in the moment lifestyle for one that was more settled.
But the words wouldn’t form. How could they when he knew his life would never be truly settled, never be truly his own while his mother was the way she was? She needed to come before any thoughts of what a future happiness would look like to him.
When he didn’t answer, the sad look in her eyes turned to acceptance.
“Charity, I’m—”
“Don’t apologize for who you are." She slid from his lap. “I’m the one who’s sorry for putting you, putting us, in this position.
I should never have asked you to kiss me.
” Her hands flew to her red cheeks as she closed her eyes.
“It was...I was...I guess, feeling a little...depressed about everything. Me and Tom. Where my life is right now as opposed to where I want it to be. I’m. ..sorry.”
She backed away from him, her hands now clasped in front of her, her gaze drifting away from his face.
“With all the worry about your mama and what’s happening with her, I shouldn’t have added to your stress by, well.” She flipped a hand in the air.
“You haven’t.”
The look of sadness on her face made him want to haul her back to him, kiss her until she begged to come up for air, and never let go of her.
He wanted to strip them both bare, explore and worship her body until he had every line and plane memorized, and then lose himself inside her, bringing them both to the brink again and again.
Give her the future she dreamed about, and much, much more.
Be that partner for life, that special someone who’d always be by her side.
What he wanted to do and what he had to do slugged it out within him until he knew it was time to surrender to reality.
He pushed up from the chair and slung his hands into his pockets to prevent them from touching her again.
She never looked at him as he stopped at the doorway.
“I respect the hell out of you, Charity. I really do. Both personally and professionally. You’re the best person I know, and you deserve to get everything you want in life.”
I just wish I could give it to you.
“I’m not sorry about kissing you and I don’t want you to be, either. And I don’t want us walking around on eggshells with one another because of this. Okay? Can we just put it behind us? Forget about it and go on as usual?”
Who was he kidding? There was no way he was ever going to forget the way she tasted; how she felt against him; how she made him feel alive.
Without looking up at him, she nodded.
“Okay, good. Good. I’ll let you be, then. ‘Night.”
The door closed with a quiet snick behind him.
In the safety of his own room, he fell on his back onto his bed and pressed a hand against his chest, his heart shattering beneath it.