But then, Jessie wasn’t like anyone else, and she didn’t do things the way anyone else did. She was an anomaly and a contradiction. A woman who seemed so at ease and yet had the deepest part of herself on lockdown.
A woman who acted as if she hated him and yet was drawn to him like a magnet. Just as he was to her. Maybe they were both full of contradictions. Because he was an outlaw. He wasn’t supposed to give a shit. But he did. So much. That was the problem.
If he could hate his family, things would be simpler. And the companion piece to caring, to not hating them, was loving them and wishing they accepted him the way he was.
Because he would’ve accepted them.
He had come into their house open. Wanting to fit in. Wanting to be like them.
It was only years of being pushed away that had created the resentment inside him.
Love was just so much work.
And Jessie knew that same truth. Her family was great in many ways, but her parents looked like a lot of work. They had created a lot of extra work for her.
So had the people in town.
He felt cocooned here. With her. With this woman who defied everything he had ever believed about himself.
About the world.
And so, in the entryway of his house, with trauma still on their lips, he kissed her. Because it was the thing he wanted most of all.
She whimpered, and leaned into him, wrapping her arms around his neck.
How had it taken this many years to do this? To taste her. Touch her. Talk to her. Share a bed with her?
She was extraordinary. Beautiful. Strong.
“I want to see your room now,” she said, her eyes alight. Then it occurred to him for the first time that he had never brought a woman back here. Well, except for her. She had slept in his guest bedroom. But he hadn’t let her into his room.
Tonight would be different.
“It’s not that exciting,” he said, taking her hand and leading her down the hall.
“I imagine we’ll find a few exciting things in it.”
“You,” he said. “It’s going to be you.”
She turned pink, all the way up to the roots of her hair, and he had to admit he liked that. He wouldn’t have thought Jessie Jane Hancock was the blushing type, and the fact that he could make her blush sent an unreasonable thrill surging through his veins.
He hadn’t lied to her—his room was simple. But she moved away from him and began to look around, opening up his closet door and peering inside.
“No interesting secrets, I’m afraid,” he said.
“Can I open your nightstand drawer?”
“Sure,” he said.
He stood back with his arms crossed. When she opened it and found it empty, she frowned.
“There’s nothing there.”
“Did you think maybe the Gideons had put a Bible in there?”
She huffed. “No. But I was expecting condoms. Lube. A couple of sex toys.”
“I don’t bring women back here,” he said.
