Page 31 of Now That It’s You (The Can’t Have Hearts Club #5)

As Bindi crunched into it, Meg looked back at Kyle. “Sorry, did you want one?”

“Nope, but I’ll take another piece of cake.”

“I can do that. You want a glass of wine with it?”

“Wine and cake? Don’t mind if I do.”

“Go make yourself comfy on the couch. I’ll bring it out in a sec.”

Meg headed back to the kitchen and sliced off another piece of cake.

Still aching from her run, she skipped the cake for herself and poured an extra glass of wine from a Sunridge Vineyards Pinot she’d opened the other night.

She carried the whole thing into the living room where Kyle had parked himself in the middle of the sofa.

He scooted over to make room for her, so Meg sat down beside him.

Her knee bumped his, and she drew it back, feeling the heat creep into her cheeks. Then she felt ridiculous.

You’ve slept with the guy , she reminded herself. It’s probably okay if your knees touch.

God, that was always going to be there, wasn’t it? They’d been chatting all evening like old friends, swapping work stories and knife tips while they worked together in her kitchen. But the whole time, Meg’s brain kept wandering back to that same old thought.

You were naked together. You had him inside you, hot and hard and ? —

“Okay, what are you smiling about?”

“What?” Meg asked, taking a sip of wine. “I didn’t go near my ear.”

“Just because you’re not tugging your ear doesn’t mean I can’t tell you’re thinking something you don’t want to say out loud.”

Meg rolled her eyes. “And what part of me not wanting to say it out loud isn’t registering for you?”

“Confession number one,” Kyle said, forking up a bite of cake.

“Wait, this isn’t how the game goes. There was no ear tugging.”

“My game, my rules, which means I can change them anytime I want.” He swallowed a bite of cake and forked up another. “Confession number one—I lied to my mother this morning when she asked what I was doing tonight.”

His tone was light, but Meg felt her fingers tighten around the stem of the wineglass. “So you’re ashamed to have her know you’re spending time with me?”

“Confession number two: yes.”

“Yes?” She’d expected the answer, but still, it still smarted a bit.

“ Ashamed might not be the right word. I just don’t want to have to explain things.”

“How would you explain it?”

Kyle quirked an eyebrow at her. “Did you miss the part about me not wanting to have to explain it?”

“Yep, just like you missed the part about me not wanting to tell you what I was thinking.”

“Which you still haven’t done.” He grinned and took another bite.

“You haven’t given me your third confession yet.”

“I’m getting there.”

“You can count this as one of your confessions,” she said, taking another sip of wine. “I really want to know how you’d explain it. Not to your mom, necessarily, but someone else.”

“How would I explain what I’m doing here tonight?”

“Yes. To a friend or an acquaintance or—or Cara . How would you explain to your former live-in girlfriend how you ended up here at my house this evening?”

He sighed and set his fork down. “Well, I guess Cara isn’t going to buy it that I’m just here because I really like your cake. Not that it isn’t amazing cake.”

“Thank you,” she said, hoping he didn’t stop there.

“I guess I’d say that my whole life, you’ve been off-limits. Either because I was dating someone or you were dating—well, more than just someone .”

“Ain’t that the truth.” The grip on her wineglass got a little tighter.

“And even though those two things have changed, the fact that you’re locked in a major financial dispute with my family is a pretty big obstacle.” Kyle glanced at his cake, then back at her. “Which doesn’t mean I don’t want to tear your clothes off right now and make love to you on this sofa.”

“The sofa?” Meg’s voice was high and tight, and she felt a little dizzy.

“Or your bed.”

“The bed’s nice,” Meg agreed weakly, her pulse thudding in her ears.

“Or the kitchen counter. Really, I’m not picky.”

Meg took a shaky breath. “We can’t do this, Kyle.”

“I know.” He set his cake plate on the coffee table and folded his hands in his lap. “Believe me, I get it.”

“So we’re just going to make ourselves crazy talking about it.”

“Let’s talk about something else.” Kyle took a sip from his wineglass. “I have something I want to give you.”

“Isn’t that what we just agreed not to talk about?”

He laughed and set his glass down, then stood up and headed for the door.

Meg wasn’t sure if she was supposed to follow him, so she sat tight on the couch and waited.

Bindi looked up from the rug in front of the fireplace where she’d curled up with Floyd.

She gave Meg a questioning look, but Meg just shrugged.

“I’m sure he’ll be right back.”

Bindi put her head down and began licking Floyd’s ear.

Floyd growled and rolled over. The door opened again and Meg looked up to see Kyle walking through the front door with a small box in one hand.

It was maybe eight inches long and less than two inches wide, and Meg tried to figure out what was inside.

Kyle moved around the couch and sat down beside her again. “I probably should have given this to you earlier, but I didn’t want you to feel like you had to make a big production of using it tonight.”

Meg eyed the box with renewed interest. “You’re not doing anything to dispel my theory that there’s something sex-related in there.”

“Open it.”

She set her wine down on the coffee table and held out her hand, and Kyle placed the box in her palm. She pulled off the top, more nervous than she expected to be. For a few beats, she stared down at it, trying to figure out what she was seeing. It was gorgeous and shiny and very, very sharp.

“You got me a knife?”

“I didn’t get it for you. I made it. Out of your engagement ring. Well, your engagement ring and a few other hunks of metal.”

Meg’s breath caught in her throat. Her eyes filled with tears, and she picked up the small paring knife and turned it over in her palm.

It was the most beautiful kitchen tool she’d ever seen, with swirls of metal on the blade and a sleek, polished wooden handle.

A small, clear stone winked at her from the hilt of it, and it took her a few beats to recognize the stone from her ring.

Holy crap, he’d really made this for her?

Kyle leaned back against the sofa and watched her. “I probably wouldn’t have messed with it if it had been a real diamond or if the metal was gold or platinum, but once you told me that story about having the band redone in steel, I knew I could forge it into something different.”

“It’s beautiful, Kyle,” she said, tears slipping down her cheeks for real now. “How did you do this swirly thing with the metal on the blade?”

“It’s called Damascus steel,” he said. “I’ve only done it a few times before, but this seemed like a good project to try it on.”

“Damascus steel,” she repeated, touching the swirls of metal along the blade.

“Yeah. You use two types of steel with different carbon levels—that darker one there is ten eighty-five. Most people choose something blended with nickel for the second one, since that adds brightness, but I didn’t do that with yours.”

“You remembered my allergy.”

“Yep. So that’s why yours has a subtler pattern. The blade should be nice and sharp.”

Meg turned the knife over in her hand again, amazed that he’d managed to create something so beautiful from something she’d dreaded seeing in the back of her jewelry box for the last two years.

“Most of the materials came from steel bars I already had in the shop,” he said. “It’s a little tougher to forge with steel that’s already been turned into a ring, but you can see this vein of it running right through here,” he said, trailing a finger along the edge.

“My God, Kyle... I can’t believe you made this. It’s incredible. Thank you.”

She sat there staring at it, completely undone by the thoughtfulness of the gift and the talent that had gone into creating it. He’d taken an object of hers and turned it into something new and special and entirely different.

That’s what Matt did with your cookbook. But you knew that already.

Meg pushed aside the twinge of guilt and looked up at Kyle. “It’s amazing,” she said. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.”

She put the knife back in the box and set it on the coffee table, then turned back to face him. She hesitated, then put her arms around him. It was supposed to be a platonic hug, a thank you for the gift he’d made her.

But something happened when her body touched his. Something sparked inside her, flaring her whole body to light. The warmth spread through her like a rush of mercury, and Meg felt herself getting dizzy as she molded her body against his.

It could have stopped there with a hug that felt a little too tight, her breasts pressed to his chest in the heat of her living room. But she drew back then, and looked up at him.

Kyle’s eyes were wild and a little unfocused, and she could tell from the flush in his cheeks that he felt it, too.

“We can’t,” she murmured, her mouth already too close to his.

Then she did it anyway, craving the sparks that arced between them the instant her lips touched his. He kissed her hard, his hands already tunneling under the back of her T-shirt to stroke her bare skin.

Her heart thudded so hard in her head that she thought it might explode—her heart, her brain, whatever.

The pounding was so fierce that it took her a moment to realize it wasn’t coming from inside her body.

“Honey?” The knocking echoed from Meg’s front door. “It’s your mom. Open up right now, it’s an emergency!”