Page 29 of Anything for You (Veterans of Silver Ridge #7)

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Dove

D orian’s whiskey eyes were pinned on me, and despite the cool breeze rustling leaves and the pine scent drifting from the neat lines of Douglas fir trees, I might’ve spontaneously combusted if he didn’t stop.

“That’s what I want.” His voice was low and sandpapery, gaze still glued to mine.

Did I dare push it? Just a little?

This wouldn’t even be pushing , though, so much as understanding what this meant for him.

Because choosing to be celibate didn’t necessarily mean not dating…

or did it? I didn’t know. And my lack of experience in relationships meant I had little precedent.

So in my true fashion, I just said the words hamster-wheeling through my head.

“Can we talk about what that looks like? What you have in mind?”

Years later, I’d remember this moment as the one when I realized just how close Dorian played his cards.

Until now, I couldn’t have said whether he found me attractive or purely wanted friendship.

Yes, he was overly generous with his food and his notes were adorable and he was kind and thoughtful and sensitive.

He’d demonstrated all of that to me, but he did the same for his friends.

So how would I know whether he thought of me like that?

Except… this pull between us. This connection we had that’d started weaving together with my tears on the porch or maybe even my misguided screams in his bedroom. Ugh, that sounded a bit wrong. Point was, we’d connected in unusual ways, but it hadn’t felt like dating.

I couldn’t say what it felt like, though, because it was certainly worlds apart from the friendships I had with Bruce or Kenny, or even someone single like Ethan Carter.

He was still quiet, and I wondered if the question was too much. “Sorry, maybe that’s pushy? I don’t know how this works.”

I slumped down, letting my back rest against the blanket and shifting my gaze to the puffy clouds above us.

A warm brush against my arm brought my attention to him. He lay on his side now, his head propped in one hand.

“It’s not pushy at all. It makes sense we should talk about it. I’m just not sure of how to answer… Not because I don’t know what I want, but because I don’t know if it’s too much.”

“Maybe you should just tell me what you want. Then I’ll know, and I can tell you the same.”

I was practically breathless, my pulse almost thready at my temple and throat. Lying next to him on the blanket was thrilling enough, but his focus and nearness paired with the conversation was almost dizzying in its influence on me.

He dipped his chin, spearing me with those eyes and sending a flood of awareness from my head down to the soles of my feet.

“I want to spend time with you.”

“Me, too. I mean, I want to spend time with you.” I swallowed, almost wild with anticipation for his words.

“I want to support you—be there for you as often as you’ll let me.”

“Anytime. All the time. You honestly already do,” I said, smiling too wide for my own good.

A half smile pulled at one side of his mouth, and he leaned, somehow much closer.

He was almost over me, body lying alongside mine on the blanket and leaning on one elbow.

This giant of a man made me feel deliciously small and yet there was nothing I could want more than to be at his mercy when he looked at me like this.

“Good. And I want—” His heady gaze dropped to my lips, then slowly drifted back up to my eyes. “—to kiss you.”

“Yes.”

As though nature and all its creatures heard my reply, the sounds and even the breeze seemed to still. Our eyes hooked into one another’s, locked, and then he slowly moved his free hand to my head. He cupped my face in his warm, big palm and brushed his thumb over the apple of my cheek.

“You’re so beautiful, Dove. Your heart, your mind…”

His intensity was searing a hole straight through me and I couldn’t think straight. That must’ve been why I said, “Just the heart and mind, huh?”

One of those heart-piercing smiles broke across his face, and my heart rate jumped again.

“No, not just those things. But I wanted to make sure you know I don’t just want you for your body—I want all of it. ”

He tucked a stray strand of hair behind my ear in the gentlest, most tender gesture that had my breath catching.

He inched closer, a scant inch from my lips. “Make no mistake, though, Dove. I do want you for your body, too.”

My lashes fluttered and I swallowed, chest downright heaving by now, and he still didn’t close the distance.

Impulse took over, and I reached for the front of his shirt and pulled him in, though it didn’t take any force.

Only the clear invitation, the consent written in the gesture and my very enthusiastic return.

The second our lips finally touched, I slipped my hands into his hair. I shouldn’t have been surprised by this big, quiet, sensitive man kissing in slow, mesmerizing passes, but here he was drugging me with his touch and then retreating all too soon.

My eyes reluctantly opened to find him staring at me with naked wonder on his handsome face.

“Why’d you stop?” I asked, then blushed profusely because I absolutely sounded like a little beggar.

He rewarded me with a light laugh, his gaze tracking where the tips of his fingers traced over the ridge of my collar bone, then slid up to traverse the slope of my shoulder.

Eyes half lidded, his feather-light touch had so much tension coiling in me, I didn’t know where to go with it.

I gripped his shirt again, tempted to tug and see if he’d kiss me again, but then he slipped the strap of my dress back over my shoulder—it must’ve slid down while I’d been lying here.

“We’ve got time. I don’t want to rush anything with you.” But then, he dropped his head and pressed one more kiss so completely gentle and full , it brought tears to my eyes.

Silly though it might’ve sounded, it was like everything this man did had a purpose and that kiss’s was to say, “ You’re precious to me. ”

“Alright?” he asked, pulling away to see me attempt to discreetly brush away a tear.

“Haven’t you figured out I’m a crier?” I asked, rolling my eyes to escape his focus for a breath.

His fingers on my chin guided my face back to his. “I like that you’re not scared to feel.”

I like every single thing about you.

I didn’t say it out loud, but goodness, it was truer with every passing breath.

“You don’t seem like you are either,” I said, a raw, tender sensation flooding my chest.

His head tipped to one side. “Used to be. Years of therapy and making friends with a bunch of people who were also working on emotional honesty and mental health was key.” He chuckled low. “And having Kenny Carmichael as one of my best friends doesn’t hurt either.”

I grinned, loving that he could own all of those things.

Bear barked, a more aggressive bark than I’d heard in a while. Dorian sat up in a jolt, then jumped to his feet far faster than a man that large should move. While I sat up bit by bit, he jogged after Bear, who’d stopped at the edge of the pines.

If there was something out there, he had to be seeing or hearing it with dog vision. I couldn’t see a thing, but Bear was clearly agitated.

Hesitating for a moment, I jogged over to join them right as they turned back toward me.

“See anything?” I asked.

“No. He’s looking toward the property line so maybe someone was wandering around. Could’ve been a coyote or a mountain lion, but he wouldn’t have relaxed so quickly if it had been an animal.”

His hand extended to mine, and our fingers laced, palms pressing together. My pulse absolutely rioted.

“Kind of did that backwards, didn’t we?” he asked, looking down at our hands.

“Did what?”

He released me, and we began packing up the picnic. “Kissed first, and just now held hands for the first time.”

Um, adorable. “Technically, we’ve already held hands. You held my hand that day I cried on you.”

He chuckled. “On me, right. Well, that didn’t count. It wasn’t romantic.”

A sizzly little thrill swept through me. “You want romance?”

He raised his brows. “Only with you.”

I made no attempt to hide my sigh, and we worked on cleaning up. I threw a ball for Bear with a little thrower thing that let me launch it super far and also meant I didn’t have to touch the slobbery thing while Dorian rolled up the blanket and donned the pack filled with our leftovers.

As we walked back, he offered his hand again, and it brought us right back to the conversation.

“So, are you concerned we’ve done things out of order?” I asked, hoping it didn’t actually bother him, but completely unsure.

He squeezed my hand a little tighter, a reassuring pulse. “No, not at all. I think it just means we need to hold hands and kiss as often as possible.”

I laughed, delighted. “Oh, is that what it means?”

He stopped right there in the middle of the trail with trees arching over us, their leaves fluttering a chorus. He kept our clasped hands linked and slipped the other to my lower back, drawing me a touch closer. “Yes. That’s definitely what it means.”

And then, he kissed me again.