“I know exactly what I’m saying.” I reached up and touched his face, running my thumb along his jawline. “I know you thinkI’m some naive city girl who doesn’t know what she wants. But I’m thirty years old, Nate. I know what I want.”
“And what’s that?”
“You,” I said simply. “I want you.”
For a moment, he looked like he might argue. Like he might list all the reasons why this was a bad idea. But then his thumb traced along my lower lip, and his expression went dark and hungry.
“You don’t make anything easy, do you?” he muttered.
“Spoiler alert,” I said, leaning just a little closer, “I’m not easy either. But I’m worth it.”
This time, when he kissed me, I was ready for it. Ready for the way he pulled me to him, letting me feel how his body was reacting to mine , ready for the way his hands tangled in my hair, ready for the way my entire world narrowed down to the feeling of his mouth on mine and the knowledge that I was finally, finally doing something bold.
Something that would definitely be worth blushing over.
CHAPTER FOUR
Nate
Sleep eluded me last night, as it always did, but this time it was for a different reason then haunted dreams of my past.
It was her.
I couldn’t stop thinking about the way Ellie had felt in my arms, the taste of her mouth, the sound she’d made when I’d kissed her, water surging around our legs. Couldn’t stop replaying the moment she’d looked me straight in the eye and said she wanted me.
Like she’d been thinking about it just as much as I had.
Like it was that simple.
Like wanting something was enough.
I’d learned the hard way that it wasn’t.
By the time dawn rolled around, I’d already been up for two hours, pacing my cabin like a caged animal and reminding myself of all the reasons this was a spectacular bad idea. She was a client. She was leaving in four days. She was soft and sweet and deserved better than a broken-down ex-soldier who couldn’t even trust himself to stick around when things got hard.
But when she showed up at the river with a backpack slung over her shoulder and that shy smile that hit me like a punch to the gut, every rational thought I’d had evaporated.
“Morning,” she said, like she hadn’t turned my entire world upside down the day before. Like she hadn’t kissed me senseless and made me want things I’d sworn off.
“Morning. Ready to fish?” My words were more grunts than syllables.
“You’re early,” she said with a teasing smile.
“I could say the same about you.”
She stood there wearing cutoffs that hugged her thighs and a soft, clingy t-shirt that did dangerous things to my self-control. And then she smiled again—bright, easy—and that’s when I knew I was screwed. There was more here than simple fishing lessons. Much more. “I guess we better get started then.”
The look she gave me told me she saw through my tough act. That I was already building a wall between us. And damn if it didn’t hurt—how sad and accepting she looked.
I knew what she wanted. Hell, I wanted it too. But I couldn’t destroy that innocence that was as much a part of her as her curves. She didn’t just want a fling—all though her shy flirting was telling me that. No, she wanted to feel something. To matter. And I’d never trusted myself not to ruin anything that pure.
We fished for a while or at least pretended to. She cast better than she had the day before, her line flew straighter, her form tighter. Those soft curses still left her pouty mouth when she messed up and she still bit her lip when she concentrated. That damn lip had been haunting me in my sleep.
She’d kissed me yesterday, and I hadn’t stopped her.
Hell, I’d kissed her back like a drowning man.
Now everything between us was sharper. Vibrating with things left said. Every time she brushed against me or looked at me a second too long, I felt it. Like a wire pulled tight, ready to snap.
