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And maybe I would have been fine with that,if not for what he’d said tonight.
He opened one eye, and I jumped.
“I had the strangest feeling that someonewas staring at me,” he said, his voice sleep-rough.
“Sorry. I couldn’t sleep.”
I couldn’t sleep because I was possiblyhyper-fixating on a single thing that you said. A thing I can’teven ask you about and know the truth, because anyone would choosethe answer that wouldn’t make them sound like a dick.
He blinked and yawned and rolled over to gethis phone off the nightstand. “It’s four-thirty. My alarm is goingto go off in a half hour.”
“I’m sorry.” I couldn’t think of anythingelse to say.
“Don’t apologize. This gives me an extrahalf hour with you.” He pushed himself up. “Unless you want to workout with me? My trainer is awesome, and I’m sure he wouldn’t mindworking with you too.”
“A five a.m. workout? Tempting, but I’llpass.” My voice was light, but my heart was still heavy.
“Okay.” He grinned at me. “We can do somecardio here.”
He pounced on me with a playful growl. Isquealed and pretended to wriggle away, but I didn’t want to. Allthose bad feelings I’d been alone with in the dark vanished themoment his big, hard body covered mine.
And that was dangerous too. His closenessintoxicated me. Hypnotized me into ignoring my gut instincts andcomplicated emotions. That was infatuation. It wouldn’t lastforever.
But I let it take me over, one lasttime.
And maybe it wasn’t fair, as he kissed hisway down my body and spread my thighs, to let him think that thiswasn’t the last time—at least, for now. Maybe I should have stoppedhim before he pushed into my body, before he pinned my hands to themattress and drove into me so deep, I knew no one else would evercompare. When I came, guilt consumed me. When he flopped back onthe pillows, still breathing hard, I stared up at the ceiling,totally numb.
“I’m going back to California.”
“Hmm?” He opened his eyes in the dim gray ofthe lightening room. “Tying up loose ends?”
“Something like that.” Fuck, there were thetears. I tried as hard as I could to disguise them. “I think weneed to…not take a break but…”
He sat up. “Charlotte?”
“I’m sorry.” I swung my legs over the sideof the bed and found my nightgown on the floor. The silky whitechemise felt like armor when I put it on. I needed that spacebetween our skin, a barrier for when he inevitably tried to holdme, or my resolve would crumble.
I wished I had a parka or a wet suit orsomething.
“Wait, wait.” He got up, too, dragging thesheet with him and holding it closed at his waist with the hand heused to lean on his cane. “What’s happening here?”
“We moved really fast.” There was no denyingthat, no matter how much I’d tried.
“We’ve been talking for months, we—”
“Talking. But we weren’t dating. It’s barelybeen a week since we decided to try this out,” I reminded him.“Matt, we went at this thing on warp speed.” Fuck, the nerdwasrubbing off on me. “I think we need some space.”
“Space.” He nodded and rubbed his stubbledchin. “All right. Space but… You’re not breaking up with me, areyou?”
“No. Not yet.” Why did I phrase it that way?“This was a test run of what our life would be like together. Iknow I said it didn’t bother me to come here and completely abandonmy life, but I think—I know—that I need to make sure.”
His sigh of relief cut into my heart. Hebelieved I would be back. I wanted to believe it too. But Icouldn’t guarantee that I would be, and I wasn’t sure he realizedit.
“Is this why you’ve been up all night?” heasked, moving toward me. “You were afraid I was going to be angryor something?”
“No. I was afraid I was going to hurt you.”I put my hand on his chest to stop him from getting too near. “AndI had some things I needed to think about.”
“Which is hard to do when we’re alwaystogether. And always fucking.” He gave me a sad little chuckle.“You’re not my prisoner, Charlotte. And you don’t owe me anything.If you need time to think about us, about how you want thisrelationship to work, I’d rather you take it than let us both burnthis thing we have out.”