Beckett walked over to stand on the opposite side of the counter from me. He picked up one of Miranda Lockhart’s—Sally’s—books and thumbed through it. I watched the emotions flicker across his face. Finally, he set the book down and looked up at me. He pushed his glasses up on his nose and leveled his eyes on me.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I can’t imagine how I’d feel if I saw you with another man like that. But I know you have friends too. I wouldn’t tell you not to have drinks with Thatcher.”
The mention of my best guy friend raised my hackles. Thatcher might know my favorite drink and flavor of chocolate, but he wouldn’t sit on the same side of the booth with me, sharing a book. We wouldn’t laugh like that, as if we knew all each other’s secrets.
A pang of guilt stabbed me. Would we? Thatcher and I had never been more than friends, but he had trusted me with details about his past he’d never told anyone, and I’d done the same with him.
Beckett had a point. Maybe I was overreacting. I’d let jealousy blind me. I’d been so star-struck and then devastated by Miranda that I had jumped to conclusions.
“I hate that I’ve hurt you,” Beckett said. “I’m sorry.”
The memory of Beckett and Miranda cozied up in a booth reading squeezed my heart like a fist. Tears blurred my vision. “You’ll hurt me again.”Just like Julian.“You’ll keep hurting me.”
Beckett nodded, his expression somber. “And you will hurt me. We will hurt each other.”
He looked like a different version of himself. Gone was the cocky tilt to his head, the arrogant smile, the flashing dimples. This was a man with the weight of a library on his shoulders.
My heart softened as I looked into his green-brown eyes, as shy and vulnerable as I’d ever seen them.
He stepped around the counter into my tiny kitchen. “You’re worth the pain.” He took my hand and threaded our fingers together. “You’re worth every ache.” His eyes searched mine. “Am I worth it to you?”
The anguish in his voice gutted me. A chunk of my heart broke off, forever lost to Beckett. I sucked in a quick breath, bracing for the pain that would accompany the loss. But it didn’t come. Losing a part of myself to Beckett didn’t hurt nearly as bad as I’d thought it would.
Instead of pain, an exhilarated hum spread through my body. It was a lot like turning the page to find a plot twist you hadn’t seen coming. Beckett kept hitting me with surprises, shocking my system. He wasn’t hiding anything from me. It had been a misunderstanding. I breathed a sigh of relief that I’d rescued Miranda’s books from the rain.
His thumb swept over the tender inside of my wrist, and my heart rate spiked, throbbing to meet his touch. He stroked the base of the tattoo on my wrist, brushing his fingers up the thin brown branch that circled my wrist and then wound up my forearm in a bloom of delicate white orchids. Beckett lifted my hand and bent to brush a velvet kiss over the pale petals.
“Gossamer wings open in the dewy light,” Beckett quoted, trailing his lips over my inked skin. “Fragile shells prepare for flight.”
My breath hitched, and I felt dizzy. The flowers tattooed on my arm were a nod to the orchids growing in the gardens of mythical Mooreland. Only a genuine fan could quote the book. Only Beckett would combine my favorite prose with soft kisses.
He pressed his mouth to my palm and then lifted his head to look at me. Glasses slightly crooked over intense green-brown eyes. Long, straight nose. Full, sensual mouth. I drank in his magnificent face, pleasure blooming through me at the sight of all that masculine beauty.
Beckett waited for my answer, his patience as tangible as the smell of rain on his skin. He didn’t mind waiting, because he knew I was going to give in. He knew I couldn’t resist him.
This love was going to hurt us both. Love always did. It was why I liked my boyfriends between the pages, where they were safe. I’d be a fool to believe I could survive an encounter with Beckett unscathed. I was going to end up broken, just like when Julian left me.
Am I worth it?Beckett’s words echoed in my head. Getting hurt was inevitable, but maybe Beckett was worth it. He was everything I’d ever wanted in a hero. I’d never thought I would get this close to a man again. Every time I’d started to get involved, I’d packed up my stuff and moved. It was nothing to me to start over in a new city, make new friends, and find a few jobs to keep my head above water.
But Mossy Oak had been different. From the start, the town had welcomed me. Mossy Oak collected outsiders like me and made us feel welcome. Mossy Oak felt like home. Beckett felt like home.
He was worth the risk.
I linked my arms around his neck and stretched into his kiss. Our bodies rocked together as we strained to get closer.
His shirt was cold and damp, soaking through my dress. I pulled back enough to reach between us and undid the buttons of his shirt without breaking our kiss. Beckett’s hands spread up my back and then tugged at my zipper. A shiver spread along my spine as my dress gaped. I pried his buttons open.
The clang of warning bells in my head dimmed with each button I worked free. By the time I spread the shirt over the mountains of Beckett’s shoulders, the bells were a distant memory, drowned by roar of blood in my ears. His skin was molten lava under the damp chill of his shirt. My touch spread chills over his arms as I pushed the fabric down to catch at his wrists.
We stopped kissing long enough for Beckett to undo the buttons at his wrists and shove his shirt to the floor. My hands immediately found his skin again, pressing flat to the heat over his heart. I felt the frantic beat beneath my hands as our mouths locked on each other’s again.
Kissing Beckett was like reading a favorite passage over and over. I discovered something different every time. The faint tang of whiskey on his tongue. The warm spice of his scent. The sensual caress of his tongue gliding over mine.
He spread my dress over my back, then slid it over my arms and down to my waist. I wiggled my hips, and the dress dropped to the floor to pool around my feet in soft waves.
Beckett’s eyes darkened as he took in my matching lace underwear. When they rose back up to mine, his eyes were heavy, hooded with desire.
“Do you own any underwear that isn’t designed to kill a man?”
