He waved his hand between them. “I never meant for this to happen. I got carried away, and I?—”
Distantly, she registered the creak of floorboards, the scuff of footsteps beyond the door. Panic cut through Ada, bringing her back to the moment.
"Jonny," she hissed, pushing him away. "Someone's coming."
He froze, his breath ragged against her kiss-swollen lips. For a moment, his distress still seemed to overwhelm him, and Ada didn’t know if she should be insulted or infuriated. Then the fog cleared, awareness and alarm snapping into place.
Hurriedly, they disentangled themselves, straightening rumpled clothes with shaking hands. Ada finger-combed her mussed hair while Jonny rubbed a hand over his stubbled jaw, both of them carefully avoiding each other's gaze. Her heart still raced, her body humming, aching yet sated. What had she been thinking, letting things get so out of control?
A knock sounded at the door, making them both jump. Jonny shot her a loaded glance before striding over to answer it, his shoulders tense. Ada held her breath, expecting the worst – her father, or David, although what he would be doing here, she had no idea.
“Miss? Is everything all right in there?”
Jonny shot a glance over to Ada.
“The coach driver,” she said, slapping a palm to her forehead. “He and my maid are waiting. I had to bring someone…” She lifted her hands in the air, smoothing them over her hair one more time. The driver might have suspicions, but she couldn’t see him saying anything to her father without proof. “I best be going.”
“Ada—”
“Goodbye, Jonny,” she said, walking out of the door, head held high.
She had no idea what had just happened. She stared out the window at the nondescript door as they drove away. It had been the most confusing moments of her life.
And also the most glorious.
But she had to forget it. Nothing could come of this. She would catch feelings for him — not that she hadn’t already, but she could at least try to ignore them — and he would leave her, looking out for himself, as he always did.
She had promised to help him avoid jail. She had done this.
Now this had to end. And it had to end now. Before she lost everything.
Chapter Seventeen
“Thanks, Ma,” Jonny said, accepting the plate his mother placed in front of him as he sat at the worn dining table in the middle of her kitchen. It was now his sister’s house as much as it was his mother’s, for Maggie and her husband had moved in to take care of their mother, but it would always be his childhood home.
It was a place full of memories. Some good. Some not so good. But all had made him into the man he was today.
A man who would take a woman, likely for her first time, not take any precautions, and then let her walk out the door.
He was an ass.
He had always known that, but somehow, it felt so much worse now that it had been with Ada.
"What’s wrong with you, Jonny?” his sister asked as she bustled into the room, moving quickly as she always did, never stilling, putting away plates while she kept her one-year-old out of trouble.
“Nothing,” he grumbled.
“No?” she said, turning to face him. “You look just like Will did when he was here last.”
“I do not want to talk about Will. You know that,” he muttered.
His mother reached over and placed her hand over Jonny’s. “You are both my sons,” she said. “You arebothwelcome here, and I wish there wasn’t this rift between you.”
Jonny just nodded, his eyes cast down on the table. He had so much to say about Will, but he would never say it to his mother. She loved both of them equally, had never shown any favoritism, and he wasn’t about to try to sway her one way or the other.
“Maybe someday, Ma.”
She patted his hand, and he was reminded of how she had always shown them so much love when they were children, no matter what was happening with his father or Blackwood or how they began to follow in their father’s footsteps. He knew she had hated it, but she had just kept on being her, showing that she would always be there, stable, giving, no matter what path they chose.
