“Kay-Kay, why do I still think you’re holding back a secret you want to tell someone?”
“I don’t,” I said defensively, wrapping my arms around my middle.
A second passed and I felt stupid. Here I was, in his room, telling him I didn’t want him to kiss me, but the fact that I wasn’t leaving kind of told its own story.
“You going to come over here or what?” he said.
“No,” I immediately replied. “I’ve said what I wanted to say and now I’m going to go back to my room. I just wanted to make sure we were clear on what didn’t happen in the kitchen earlier.”
“Yeah, I thought I was clear about it too. Doesn’t make sense for us to start something when you’re headed back to New York. Next time you come home for a visit, I hope I’m dating, if not engaged to, the future Mrs. McCleer.”
Why that piece of information landed like a blow to the gut I wasn’t sure.
“You think you can be cool with her?” he asked me.
“With who?”
“The future Mrs. McCleer.”
I shook my head. “Wait a minute, you’re asking me if you think I can be cool with some unknown woman in the future who you haven’t met yet?”
“That’s what I’m asking.”
I did some mental calculations. I’m pretty sure kissing was at stake here.
“Yeah, I think I can be totally cool with her. I’ll probably even like her. We’ll get to know each other. Have lunches and spa days together. It will be fun.”
He sat up then, his legs falling off the side of the bed, spreading just wide enough for a person of my size to fit in between.
“That’s good to know. Come here.”
I hesitated, but then that whole being honest with myself kicked in again. I wanted this. I’d come here for this. He had concerns, too, which made sense. Neither one of us had any room on our plates for mild flirtation.
But everything was going so wrong. My life, my dad, my brothers, the family inn. All of it was a struggle and I just wanted…a break.
I stepped between his legs, and even though I was standing and he was still sitting on the bed, it felt like he dwarfed me. His hands came to my hips, but I still wasn’t sure what to do with my hands, so I wrapped them around my stomach again.
“We’re not going to fuck.”
The way he said it, deep and low, made the bottom of my stomach immediately drop, and now all I could feel was a surge of wet between my legs.
“I wouldn’t do that to your dad. It’s not respectful in his home, under his roof,” he continued. “Beyond that, we both know that this, whatever this is, is temporary. If we don’t take it too far…if we keep things light…then it will be easier to walk away.”
“I agree,” I said softly. “I wasn’t even thinking about that. You know. Fucking.”
It never sounded as hot when I said it. Probably because I always felt like I was tripping over the word. I blame my mother and her insistence that swearing was forotherpeople, which she’d drilled into us as kids.
“Okay,” he said, reaching up to brush my bottom lip with his thumb. “Then let’s make out.”
He guided me until I was sitting on one of his thighs. The bulk of it underneath my butt was truly impressive. I wiggled a bit and could feel the outline of his muscles.
“I have a bony ass,” I admitted. I don’t know why, I just felt like I had to apologize for my lack of cushion in that area.
“Bony ass, huh?”
“That’s what they used to call me behind my back, actually. Bony Ass Boss Lady. Sometimes Bitch Lady, but the gist was the same.”
“Who called you that?”
