But then he slides his hand up under my skirt, and I’m not laughing anymore.
My breath catches.
The seat stops because I’ve lost control of my fingers.
All I can do is part my thighs wider while his hand explores my ass, teasing it lightly and then kneading it and then sneaking beneath my panties to touch my clit with his knuckle.
“Wait,” I make myself say.
He freezes.
I gulp in air and drop my head to his chest. We’re half-reclined and he has his hand inside my underwear and I don’twanthim to stop.
But Ineedhim to.
Just for a minute. “I don’t want the café.”
“Sabrina—”
I shift again, my eyes crossing as I brush my clit against his still hand, and I make myself look him straight in the eye. “No.No. Listen to me. I can sleep with you, or I can fight you for Bean & Nugget, but Icannotdo both and still live with myself. I want you. I wantyou. Home isn’t a building. Home isn’t the past. Home is wherever you’re loved. That—this—it matters more. To me.”
He still has my pussy in his hand, still frozen.
“Iwill nothurt one more person in my life the way I hurt Emma,” I whisper, and my voice cracks.
I mean it.
The café is his. I’ll stand by his side and help him turn it into whatever he wants. He’s trying to break free of all of the things in his past that hurt him, while I’m trying to cling to everything in my own past that brought me joy without challenging myself to reach deeper beyond what’s always come easy.
“I believe you.”
“Why?”
“Because I’ve watched you. I’ve studied you. I’ve tried tonotlike you, tonotwant you, but no matter what you do, no matter what you’ve done from the very first moment we met, I can’t help but have the utmost respect for you.”
“You’re supposed to tell me I’m an asshole and you know I’m using sex to try to get my café.”
“It’ll take more than sex to convince me to give you back your café.”
“I don’t want it.”
He smiles.
The grumpy jerksmiles. “May I please move my hand now?”
“To do good or bad things with it?”
“Both?”
My vagina clenches again. “Can you do the good first?”
He crooks a finger between my thighs, sliding it from my clit to my vagina, and my eyes cross.
I whimper when he slips his finger inside me, rocking against his hand.
“This kind of good?” he murmurs while he fists my hair in his other hand and pulls me closer to lick my earlobe.
“More,” is all I can say.
