“You think I’d do for anybody else what I do for you?” he asked, reminding me that he’d always been able to readmymind.
I was no match. Maybe it made me naïve that I wanted to believe he cared about me so much, but I didn’t care. I didn’t. I didn’t need to think about the way he was with me to know itwasreal.
Because I knew what it was like when it wasn’t real, and this wasn’t it. Not even close. It was as far from being fake as youcouldget.
Because this wasAaron.
“You’re sure?” Iwhispered.
His “hmm” was rumbled intomyhair.
“For sure-forsure?”
He chuckled into my hair, roughly. “Forsure.”
“I need to make sure I’m not misunderstanding this, okay?” I asked, almost croaking, and he laughed again, all low and sexy and almost confident, nodding. “Don’t laugh. I’m beingserious.”
“Okay.” He still chuckled, his hands flexing at my waist. “I’m sorry for not telling you things, RC. I really am. You’re the only person I’ve ever wanted to tell things to.” Aaron pulled away from me just enough so he could look down and I could look up at him. “I know I told you I don’t know about marriage and all that, but…” His Adam’s apple bobbed. “The idea of you being with somebody else… even just texting them… him… even before I saw your face or heard your voice, Rube… I don’t want you with anybody else. You’re my Ruby, and you have been for alongtime.”
There was no doubt in my mind I swooned. Hard. My sister Tali would have smacked me in the face, and Jasmine would have told me to grow up. Maybe I should have questioned this more. Maybe I should have thought about this more, but I wasn’t going to. I knew what I felt. I could sense what Aaron felt. What more didIneed?
Nothing. Absolutelynothing.
“Does that mean you want to kiss me?” I just went andblurtedout.
He didn’t vocally laugh, but I could sense the vibrations coming from his chest before he said, grinning down at me, “Uh-huh.”
He wanted to kiss me. Aaron wanted tokissme.
“Not as a friend?” Iclarified.
“Not as a friend,” he confirmed, amusement tingeing hiswords.
“Are you telling me this because you know I’m not avirginnow?”
There was a pause. He froze again. And then the next thing I knew, Aaron had dipped his face into my neck, over my hair. And he was laughing,laughing, as he kissed where my throat would be, and everything in me just wentnuts. “No,” I thought he said. “I was going to tell you at some point. Tomorrow I think. You’re just alwaysrushingme.”
I snorted even as I felt like I was falling into quicksand, into this place I didn’t know what todoin.
Aaron liked me? Aaron.Liked.Me?
I guess the signs had beenthere.
And still… “What are we supposed todonow?”
His chuckle was soothing, his palm going to the small of my back as those brown eyes stared into mine with more love and affection than I knew what to do with. “Whatever you want, RC. Keep doing what we’ve been doing. We’ll figureitout.”
Chapter22
Aaron likedmewas the first thought I wokeupto.
The possibility that Aaron might love me was the verysecondone.
I’d stayed up for over an hour after I’d made it to my room the night before, going over everything that had gone down on the restaurant dance floor, and it still hadn’t been enough time. But I understood what my heart thought, what it sensed. And that was that Aaron Tanner Hall loved me. Maybe he hadn’t used the words, but he hadn’t needed to. All I needed to do was think about what he thought about me, how he treated me, and compared it to how every guy my friends had dated had treated them, and I felt pretty confidentaboutit.
After all, hadn’t I kind of sneaked in me loving him in there and he hadn’tcommented?
Maybe someone would tell me I was jumping the gun and coming to a conclusion that wasn’t at all reality, but my gut thought differently. I didn’t think I was imagining anything. Then again, if he was this wonderful and he didn’t love me, I could live with it forever. What was love if it wasn’t just a single word people used to try and describe something that wasn’t easily explained or grown in one action ordeclaration?
