He scrubbed his hands down his face, and she understood that he-of-the-responsible-soul was beginning to second-guess what had just happened between them.
Which caused her own fear to stir. She'd been in no jeopardy of falling very hard for Chaz. But she was in enormous jeopardy of falling very hard for Jude. If she invested her heart in him and things didn't work out, the pain would be crushing. Debilitating.
She was afraid of pain just as Jude was afraid of wrecking his career. Her empathy toward him pricked. Kissing him was dangerous to her emotionally, but it didn't put her career on the line. It didn't put at risk the years of sweat, blood, and tears she'd invested in Perfumes by Gemma Clare.
Jude loved his work just as much if not more than she did. She thought of how he'd shown up for their first meeting at her house. In his suit—all brainy, and formal, and prepared. He was wise and measured. If that hadn't been the case, he wouldn't be Jude and she wouldn't respect him as much as she did.
If she could gather enough courage . . . if he gave her reasons to think that banking on him might pay off . . . then she might be willing to take the plunge with him. But the next step—for her peace of mind and his—wasn't force or pressure. The next step was to give them both room.
The silence grew long. She could’ve jumped off a high platform and executed a dive into that silence, swum down into it, touched bottom, then stroked toward the surface of it.
Like an addict, one dose of the closeness and fire they'd just generated had sealed her fate. She had to squash a greedy urge to yank him back to her.
“That was . . . well . . .” She pulled her hair forward over her shoulder and twisted it once, twice. “That wasfabulous. But we both probably need time to think about . . . things.”
He stared at her, a notch between his eyebrows, his color high.
“You’ll want to ponder the impact that a connection between the two of us might have on your career. Let’s tap the brakes,” she said as lightly as she could manage. “Is that cool with you?”
He nodded once.
“Are you going to confess what just happened between us to Shannon Bailey?”
“No. Scent-sible isn't active, so I’m not obligated to do so.”
“Well, you can certainly count on me not to confess this to anyone. So your job won't take a hit.” She moved toward the door.
“Gemma.”
She stopped, focused on him, and lost herself.I'm trying to be noble here, Jude, but don't start kissing me again or I'll crumble faster than a dry cookie.
“I missed you, too,” he said. “A lot.”
“You did?”
“You are like light . . . to me. Because of you, everything inside me, everything in my life is brighter.”
God, help me!She cleared her throat, curled her fingers in so she wouldn't reach for him. “That sounded a lot like poetry, and I’ve already warned you. I cannot control myself if you quote poetry to me.”
“‘This perpetual jar of earthly wants and aspirations high. Come from the influence of an unseen star. An undiscovered planet in our sky.’”
“You’re playing with dynamite,” she warned.
He gave her an unexpected, whimsical smile. Endearing.
“Moist!” she shouted. It was the equivalent of bursting through an emergency exit. She had to create a quick separation between them so she could zoom off on her scooter and catch her breath. “Jiggle! Scuttle! Congealed! Greasy!”
He gritted his teeth comically.
She ran all the way to her Vespa.
By the time Jude followed her out of his house, her scooter was already spitting gravel. He watched her go, long strands of red hair flapping in the wind below the bottom edge of her helmet.
Somehow, he'd screwed up. He should have taken her in his arms right away after he'd let Mabel out. He should have done a better job explaining to her how much she meant to him. He should have told her that the last weeks had been a wasteland without her. He should have tried to convince her to stay longer.
Because those kisses had changed everything for him. He'd lived thirty-two years and never experienced anything close to it.
Hearing Gemma say that he’d want to ponder the impact that a connection between the two of them might have on his career had been a strange role reversal, as if he was suddenly standing in an alternate universe. It had taken him off guard, made him unsure what to do. So he'd done nothing. Then she'd said she wanted to tap the brakes, at which point he'd had no option other than to accept what she wanted. However, hearing her say she wanted to tap the brakes had made him sure that he did not.
