“You have to admit that you do kind of just move me from place to place with you.”
He sighed and held my shoulders, forcing me to make eye contact with him. “Listen to me, Honey. You can’t keep saying things like that. I let it go last weekend when you said you were baggage to a successful best friend. The very last thing you are is baggage. This best friend is successful because of you. You center me and keep me on the right path so I don’t stray from the plan and think with the wrong head. When it comes to our relationship, the opposite is true, and I’ve been letting the wrong head control me for too long. That’s the conclusion I came to over the last year, and over the last week as I stood there watching you sleep every night, wishing I could crawl into bed next to you. You would offer me the comfort my soul craved if only I could stop thinking so much.”
We were inches apart when I spoke. “Apparently that didn’t happen.”
The shake of his head was so minute I almost missed it. “No, because thinking with the right head is what protects me.”
I gazed up at him, his eyes so enlivened I expected sparks of light to shoot from them any second. “To be honest, I’m not sure I want you thinking with the other head when it comes to me. That sounds like an excellent way to get my heart broken and leave nothing but shards of what I used to be.”
“Maybe, in this case, it’s not the two heads as much as it’s the head and the heart,” he whispered, biting his lower lip as he glanced up at the sky. “I’ve let my head rule my heart when it comes to you. I’ve done what’s safe. I’ve done what’s expected. I’ve done what I was told to do. I’ve never done what I’ve wanted to do.”
“What have you wanted to do?”
“This,” he whispered, his eyelids hooded as his lips found mine. He held my face, his hands smooth against my skin, the same way his lips were smooth against mine. He pressed deeper, keeping the kiss close-lipped and tender, but he vibrated with the energy it took to hold himself back. I wrapped my arms around the back of his neck, needing to hold onto him to keep from spinning off into a void of wonderment and pain. Awe at how mind-blowing it was to have his lips on mine, and the pain of knowing it would never last, swirled inside me. He moaned low in his throat, and the sound made my head spin with confusion and ecstasy.
I had dreamed of kissing my best friend for as long as I could remember. Now, here I was in the middle of the most romantic place in Plentiful, his lips pressed to mine and my heart pounding in my chest. Who was this man? Why was he kissing me? How had I missed how much he’d changed over the last year? Was my Mattie finely going to rise up and take control? I sighed again.
Mattie was kissing me.
Finally, my soul was connected with what it had needed for twenty years. Its mate.
His lips left mine slowly, and I waited. I waited to open my eyes and find out all of this was a dream. Instead, I opened them to the lake blue of his. I dropped my arms from around his neck and brought one hand to my lips in a haze of shock and lust.
“Why—why did you do that?” My voice shook from the array of emotions coursing through me. I was drowning in the love that swelled inside my heart for this man. I couldn’t catch my breath, and I wasn’t sure I ever would again.
He ran his thumb over my lips with tenderness and wonder. “Because I’ve been pretending that I haven’t wanted to for years.”
“And now you’re done pretending?” I was unsure of myself when I spoke, and I didn’t want to say too much before letting him explain.
“No,” he said with a dazed head shake. “Now I had to know if I was crazy.”
“You had to kiss me to know if you were crazy?” The thrumming of my heart paused in my chest while I waited for his answer.
His gaze darted away from mine while he put his thoughts together. The expression on his face and the stiffness of his spine told me he was looking for the right way to describe what he was feeling. “I guess curiosity is a better word.”
Anger filled me and overpowered the love I’d found just moments ago. I pushed myself up off the bench with purpose. “I’m thrilled to have appeased your curiosity then.” My voice and body shook from the soul-shattering pain of betrayal. “Don’t mistake me for one of your playthings, Mathias Jørgensen. You don’t get to use me to relieve an itch or as a gauge of how well you’re doing in the morality department.”
He opened his mouth, but I held up my hand. “I can’t, Mathias. No, you know what? You can’t. You can’t do this to me when you know how I feel about you. It’s not fair,” I whispered right before I disappeared into the trees, tears on my face and my life with him over.
I almost collapsed to one knee at the thought. Tears fell down my cheeks, and I wiped them away as I plowed on into a new life. I didn’t know where I was going to go or what I was going to do, but I did know it would no longer be with him. I might need someone to watch over me but allowing Mathias to be that someone was no longer possible. Not after that kiss. It was more than I’d ever dreamed it could be, and now the memory of it would break my heart over and over for the rest of my days.
CHAPTER 8
I tossed clothes haphazardly onto the bed, going back and forth between the closet and the cheap duffel bag that sat open there. I swiped at my cheek with my shoulder, angry at the tears that continued to fall.Why was I crying over him again?It’s not like I didn’t know he was a shallow jerk. I’d learned that a long time ago.
I sat on the bed on a breath when the thought struck me. The tears weren’t for him. They were for me. They were for the death of the last vestige of a dream I’d had for so many years that one day we could be together. I thought I’d let that dream go over a year ago when he’d read my letter, but apparently my heart held on to a piece of hope without my permission. Maybe my heart thought he’d changed over the last year when he was present more. Not just physically present either. He was emotionally present. When we were together over the last few months, he listened. He engaged. He cared about what I had to say and the suggestions I made. In hindsight I’d let that lull me into thinking he cared. That he’d changed. That Mattie was coming back to me.
“Whatever,” I hissed, standing and dumping my bras into the bag.
I was going to have to rent a room at the local motel. I didn’t have much choice now that I couldn’t go back to my apartment. I could stay with Birgitte and Theo, but then they’d know there was a problem. I couldn’t put that much stress on them as they faced such a major surgery for Birgitte. At least I had my car here. Maybe I’d get in it and drive. Just drive until I’d driven Mathias from my heart and my mind. A sarcastic laugh fell from my lips. I could drive around this entire country twice, and he would still haunt me the way he had since I was eight. Those blue eyes would be the only thing I saw no matter where I was.
The door slammed downstairs, and I gritted my teeth with frustration. I’d cut through the apple orchard and run headlong back to the house to grab my stuff, hoping to get out before he got back. I thought he’d be angry enough that he’d avoid the house for a few extra minutes, but it appeared I was wrong. Damn it, why couldn’t he just leave me alone?
I tried to zip the bag, but it wouldn’t budge. It was stuffed to the brim, and I laid over on it, begging the zipper to close. I grasped several pieces of clothes to take ou—
I was spun around at a dizzying speed and pushed backward until my thighs hit the bed. “Hey!” I shouted, pushing on his chest, but the intensity of his gaze was mesmerizing if not a touch scary.
He grabbed the back of my head, and before I could even blink, his lips were on mine again. He didn’t hold back with the kiss this time. He owned it, and me, one hundred percent. His hands tugged on my hair until I tipped my head in the direction he wanted; then he kissed me harder and deeper.
