Meeting her deep brown gaze, I knew that she was being serious. But could I really tell her what was on my mind?It’s now or never I suppose.
Taking a deep breath to steel myself, I let my gaze drop to the floor. “I don’t know, Spencer. Honestly? I’m just so blown away by you. You care so much about your family, about doing right by them. I never thought that I’d think money laundering was a redeemable quality, but you even make that look good.”
Spencer’s laugh rumbled over the pavement and straight through my chest, but I just pursed my lips. “I’m serious. I’m… not sure what the non-shitty way to say this is.”
Letting her smile simmer down to a smirk, she met my gaze. “Try me. I’ve got thick skin.”
Those fucking eyes…Everything about what was happening was destabilizing, but those eyes had a way of keeping me grounded.Just say it.
I took a deep breath. “I just wish I could have found a guy like you instead of wasting all that time with Gabriel.”
On the surface, Gabriel was everything I should have wanted: tall, good job, relatively handsome. Though handsome was a low bar to meet when you had nice clothes and fancy haircuts. But despite my resistance to Maura’s rhetoric, deep down I really believed that should have been enough for me.
“When I was with him, I tried so desperately to be happy with what I got. But even at his best, all I’ve ever been able to muster for Gabe was mild appreciation.”
And at his worst?I couldn’t deny any longer that that boy was rotten down to the core.
I bit my cheek, “But with you…”
With Spencer, I never stopped smiling. She was kind and funny and protective and sweet and I wanted to spend every second with her, even when I was mad. Even after everything I’dseen at The Hollow, The Gauntlet… All of it. And I still, somehow thought she was one of the best people I’d ever met. Shouldn’t that count for something?
I cleared my throat, trying again. “That kiss…” I didn’t let myself think about it often, scared by the seismic tremor it sent through my psyche. “I’m just… lost.”
The smirk on Spencer’s face faded to a worried frown. Her gaze was distant, pensive, but it shot a dagger of panic through my chest as if it was a glare.
Oh fuck, why did I say that?It was one thing to flirt with the straight girl knowing you didn’t have a shot. But comparing Spencer to my shitty ex? Bringing her into the mess I was still sorting out in my mind?I should have waited until I was sure.
I opened my mouth to apologize, but before the words could come out, Spencer let out a deep breath of her own. “Maybe what you’re looking for isn’t aguylike me.”
As her eyes met mine, I could see the hope she was holding down. The merciful thing would be to deny it, to keep the lid on my questions until I had some answers.
But along with hope, there were nerves, too. As cool as she was trying to play it, Spencer was worried that she had pushed things too far with me.
I couldn’t let her think that. Not when it was the farthest thing from the truth. Not when I still dreamed about the feeling of her lips against mine. “I’ve… wondered the same thing.”
That ember of hope in her eyes quickly sparked into a blaze. But I shook my head, trying to contain it before it became a wildfire. “But we can’t. I don’t want to be some asshole straight girl that uses you to experiment. You deserve better than that.”
Spencer grinned devilishly. “What if I was into being your little experiment?”
“Spencer…” I frowned.
“I’m being serious. Teaching you…” She couldn’t hide the blaze of excitement from her eyes at the thought. “I’d be honored to be your first.”
“Besides,” she angled her shoulder closer to mine. “Better you try this out on me than Callahan. Tough as the ol’ Major seems, she’s as tender-hearted as they come. Might not take too kindly to being jerked around, so it’s better you figure out for sure before you go for her.”
I furrowed my brow. “Who said anything about Leo?”
Spencer raised her brow playfully. “Bunny, come on. We’ve all seen how you look at her. Do you not…?”
“Not what we’re talking about.” I shot her a glare, but that fucking grin of hers made it impossible not to smile.
“What are we talking about then?” Her gaze dropped down to my lips, the excitement painted plainly across her face. She wanted me. Bad.
And as I drifted into her magnetic pull, I started to think I might want her just as much.
60
KIERA
