Page 99 of Damaged Desires

“Ah. The catch,” Georgie said, but she was still saying it all with a tease.

“Georgie, be serious.”

“I am being serious. If you think him looking out for Tristan would stop him from being with you, then you’ve clearly been looking through stupid-tinted lenses.”

I couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped. “Stupid-tinted lenses?”

I could see Georgie’s smile and wondered what color lenses she had in.

“That’s better,” she said. “I needed to make sure you could still laugh before I called on the Honor Guard to go save you.”

“You can’t tell Mac. I’m sorry to say that to you, but you can’t,” I told her.

“I won’t tell Mac until you do, but you realize he’s going to figure it out on his own, right?”

Mac was far from dumb. His intuition had kept him alive and on the right track since we were kids. Plus, he knew me like he knew his own hand. If he saw Nash and me in the same room together, he’d smell it on us even if we hadn’t just climbed out of bed.

“What’s really the problem?” she asked.

“He’s…romantic. And charming. And gentle. So many things I never expected him to be.”

“So, you wanted a friends-with-benefits sort of arrangement, and it’s become something more? You’re afraid of losing your independence and your ability to do whatever the hell Dani wants without having to worry about how it will impact someone else.”

Her words hit home. “I’m not that cold.”

Her voice softened. “No, you aren’t. You’ve just lived twelve years on Capitol Hill, having to hide every single emotion and every single thought while pushing forward agendas that you believed in but others did not. You’re used to getting your way by bargain and debate without giving away one iota of how important it all is to you. Plus, the last relationship you had was kept a secret, and then you had to pretend it didn’t tear you apart when he left you for his ex on the one night you needed him most.”

Each word sent pinpricks to my heart and soul, and yet I couldn’t deny one word of it. Just like I hadn’t been able to deny the reality of me loving Nash.

“Russell and I were never serious,” I said, trying not to let the thought of that night scramble my nerves. Trying not to hate him for standing me up and leaving me to the wolf.

“You had clothes at his place, Dani. That’s not nothing.”

Russell and I had never agreed to be exclusive. We’d never even named what we did. We’d been stand-in dates for events we had to attend. We’d been the satisfying relief of sex afterward. If anything, it had been the friends-with-benefits that Georgie had just named. It certainly had never been the ground-shaking, world-shattering sensations I felt when I was with Nash.

“It’s not Nash you’re afraid of,” Georgie said. “It’s you. It’s the thought of loving someone and opening up to them in a way that risks a broken heart.”

“What if neither of us can do it?”

“Then, it wasn’t meant to be, and you can enjoy the sex while it lasts.”

I sighed. “You’ve been no help at all.”

“That’s because you thought I’d be shocked and fill you with reasons to run fast and hard away from him.”

Maybe. Maybe I had called her to talk me down from the out of control feelings I had. Maybe I’d looked for her to be the ledge to grab on to before I took an even bigger tumble. Before I fell and shattered in a million pieces. Before I was unable to ever be with another man without comparing it to these dreamlike, honey-and-lemon-scented days with Nash.

Nash

WHAT ABOUT NOW

“This broken heart can still survive,

With a touch of your grace.

Shadows fade into the light,

I am by your side.”