Page 60 of Untouchable

She and Ralph walked through the stables, and he dug an old battered ball out of a pile of hay and presented it to her.

The ball was really pretty gross, but she took it outside and tossed it for him, watching him bound toward it, catching it on the second bounce.

“I can’t believe you touched that old thing,” a voice came from behind her.

She turned around to see Caleb, unshaven and clearly unshowered since he wore the trousers he’d had on yesterday evening. “It’s a little worse for wear.”

“That was his first ball. He had it when he came to me as a puppy, and he refuses to relinquish it.” Caleb smiled at his dog as he returned, ball in mouth, and then he threw it again when Ralph dropped it.

Kelly kept her eyes on the animal since Caleb was looking far too attractive—half dressed and domestic the way he was.

“Sentimental.”

“Obsessed and deluded. He’s got this idea that it’s the best ball in existence, and every other ball is just a poor second.” He reached out to take her hand, using it to pull her body against his. “You’re up early.”

Kelly forced herself not to tense up at his proximity and the affectionate gesture. “Yeah. Couldn’t sleep any longer.”

He usually woke up before her—always on weekdays and usually on weekends too.

He slid his hands down to her hips, studying her face. “How are you feeling? After last night.”

She tried to tell herself he was mostly curious—since her behavior had been so strange—but there was concern as well as questions in his expression. “I’m fine. Sorry about all that.” She swallowed hard, trying to think of a reasonable excuse for her behavior.

She’d really screwed up.

Caleb paused before he spoke, as if thinking through his next words. “I’m happy to do anything you want to try in the bedroom,” he said at last, his eyes focused on Ralph and his ball. “But only if you really want it.”

He’d obviously sensed that she hadn’t really wanted it last night, even though he didn’t know the full reasons. It was unnerving that he’d read her so well. It was dangerous.

But his comment had given her a good lead-in to the explanation that finally came to her. “I did want it. I mean, I want to want it. It’s just not always easy, trying something new.”

“Yeah.”

She couldn’t tell at all what he was thinking, and it worried her. She pressed herself against his side, wrapping an arm around him, hoping physical touch might distract him from whatever he was puzzling out about her. “I’ve never been in a relationship before where I was able to… to try things out. I wantto. I want to be able to… to stretch myself that way even if it’s hard.”

Ironically, it was true. It was absolutely true. She’d never once in her life been in this deep with a man. No one had ever been with her sexually the way Caleb was.

He tilted his head down to press a kiss into her hair. “Then we will. Just tell me the truth about what you want, and don’t force yourself to change all at once. I don’t like feeling?—”

When he trailed off, she looked up at him, strangely breathless as she waited for him to continue. “You don’t like feeling what?”

“Like you’re using me to… to hurt yourself.”

She sucked in a breath and ducked her head, hiding her face in his shirt to keep him from seeing her expression.

Because he was right about that too, when she hadn’t even been conscious of it.

Sometimes it felt like she needed to be punished for not hating him enough.

He didn’t press her for a response, just kept an arm around her, and she forced her mind back under control, reminding herself that she needed to act quickly or the situation would spiral even more into chaos than it already had.

So she made herself force down the vulnerability and emotion and instead took the first step in her plan.

“You’re not going to work today, are you?” she asked in a different tone. This one light, feminine, almost flirtatious.

He dropped his arm from around her and shifted his gaze back to meet hers, a different sort of question in his eyes. “Probably later. I always work on Sunday afternoons. Why?”

“I was hoping you wouldn’t. You work all the time.”