Page 59 of This Time Around
“I’m not sure I’m following what you’re trying to say, Rebecca.”
I gave her a moment, her face paling and her hand trembling as she reached for her water.What in the hell?
“Last night,” she said, after inhaling a deep breath.“Last night you said we could be the kind of friends who kissed.”
“Yeah…”
Dark eyes landed on me and froze me to my spot.“What if we were friends who did more than just kiss?”
Only an idiot would say no to that proposition, but as the thought settled in my head, it turned to shit and smelled worse.Leaning forward, I rested my forearms on the edge of the kitchen table.“Are you saying, that while I’m here this summer, you want us to be fuck buddies?”
She flinched and that bottom lip settled in her teeth again.
Fuck me sideways.That was exactly what she meant.And goddamn had I read this wrong.Incredibly wrong.
“I wouldn’t use those words exactly.”
“Of course you wouldn’t.”I pushed away from the table.I needed space before I actually said something to hurt her.Like ‘fuck no,’ or ‘what in the hell are you thinking?’Or…nothing.
For the first time since I met Rebecca, I didn’t have a single nice thing to say to her.
“Cooper.”Her footsteps followed me, but I headed straight for the fridge where I grabbed a beer and slammed the door.
“What?”Twisting off the top, I flicked it toward the garbage can.It missed and pinged on the floor.I swallowed half the beer while staring at the metal cap like it was the thing currently pissing me off.
“I didn’t mean to make you mad.”Her hands wrung together in front of her, she moved them to her hips before letting them fall to her sides.“I thought you’d like it.”
Worry etched a line on her forehead.
I took another large drink and wiped my mouth with my hand holding the beer.“You thought I’d like being your fuck buddy?”
“Stop putting it like that.It sounds so—”
“Emotionless?”She flinched at the word, rocking back like I’d physically slapped her.“That’s it, isn’t it?I said I liked you, I said I wanted to get to know you, so you figure, you’ll get back in the saddle with men and usemeto do that for you.”
Her chin was trembling and her eyes grew wet.And fuck me if she didn’t look so damn adorable, so sexy.She was beautiful even while pain tightened her jaw and confusion wrinkled her brow.“I wasn’t trying to upset you.”
“I get that.”I chugged the rest of my beer, tossed it into the garbage can.Goddamn this hurt.Deep inside in my gut.
“Cooper.”Rebecca’s strained voice made me close my eyes.She’d been so sweet earlier, so brave.
I’m trying.
Her earlier words slammed against my skull with the weight of a hammer.She was trying to move on.
Would it be so bad to be used?Not if it got me into her body.But I was tired of being used by women for my body.
“What?”
“You’re leaving, you know.Whatever this is between us, is temporary.At the end of the summer, you’ll still leave me.”
I knew that.Of course I knew that.I’d just been the dick who hadn’t really considered what that’d do to her despite Jordan and Kelly’s warnings.
“So you admit there’s something between us.”
“It’s temporary.”Her little hands curled into fists like she was trying to be brave—trying to keep me out.And suddenly I got it.She did like me, she was just scared to.That, I understood.
My lip curled.“We’ll see.”
