“You?”
“Yes, me.”
I let out a small, disbelieving laugh. “Just last night, you said that you wanted me.”
“This has nothing to do with that either.”
“Right,” I said, nodding even though I didn’t understand. “Of course. You said that you wanted me, so that should be enough. Is that it? You think you can behave however you want and I just have to know that you’re going through with this? That we’re actually building something here?”
“It’s not that I?—”
“Is itme?” I cut in, the question slipping out before I could stop it. “Is that what it is? Because if you’ve realized I’m not what you want after all, that’s fine. I’d just prefer you say it instead of doing whatever it is you’ve been doing since we got back.”
His head snapped slightly, like I’d said something offensive. A knot suddenly formed at the back of his jaw. “Yeah. No. That’s not it.”
“Then what?” My voice wavered despite my best efforts to keep it steady. “I can’t keep guessing, Jesse. You’re being so cryptic and I won’t beg you to?—”
“Youarethe problem, Eliza.”
The words landed like a physical blow to my heart. I felt like a knight of old that had taken a lance directly to his chest.
As I felt the color draining from my cheeks, Jesse suddenly spoke again. “Just not in the way you think.”
He took a step closer, then another. Meanwhile, I was reeling, so confused now that I could barely think straight. Underneath it all, the familiar sting of hurt was spreading through my veins.
“You’re under my skin,” he said, quieter now. “You’re constantly in my head. Everything I do, everything I think, it all seems to circle back to you.”
My breath caught and I blinked hard. “I thought you just said?—”
“It’s not supposed to happen. Not like this. Not this fast.” He took another step closer, the expression in those clear blue eyes one of complete, devastating agony as he held my gaze. “I knowI’m not supposed to feel the way I do, so I’m not having second thoughts, Eliza. I’m just struggling with the fact that the biggest problem I’ve got right now is living under my roof.”
Something fragile and hopeful unfurled in my chest like a brand new banner, beautiful but too delicate for the storm it was about to face. Because I could see it in his eyes that he wasn’t going to make this easy for us. For whatever reason, he believed that developing feelings for me was wrong and he wasn’t just going to change his mind.
“I didn’t plan for it either,” I admitted, my voice barely above a whisper. “I had no intention of falling for you. It wasn’t part of our arrangement and yet I feel like I’ve known you all my life. I feel like we were always meant to be. We could be happy, Jesse.”
“You don’t know me,” he said suddenly, his voice laced with a strange, dark kind of poison I didn’t understand. “You have no idea who I am. You might think you do, but you don’t.”
The abrupt shift in him caught me off guard, but it was clear that he believed that fervently. It seemed this man had invisible buttons and I kept inadvertently pushing them.
I lifted my chin, stepping closer to him until my chest was brushing against his on every agitated inhale. “Fine. I can see that I’m not going to get through to you this way, so then show me.”
“Show you what?”
“Show me who you are,” I said, reaching for his face and cupping it between my hands. I searched his gaze. “I’m here and I’m not going anywhere, but I don’twantto be the problem living under your roof. So if you think that I couldn’t possibly return your feelings because I don’t know who you are, then let’s get it out of the way.”
For a second, neither of us moved, but I could feel the tension in his jaw. Sense his hesitation. So I leaned into him, my eyes still locked firmly on his. “Show me, Mr. Westwood. What kindof man are you? Do you fight for what you want or do you get in your own way?”
I pushed up on my tiptoes then, stroking my fingers through his hair and pressing my mouth to his. Perhaps I had grown up in the quiet countryside, but I was no pushover. I wasn’t afraid of working hard for what I wanted, and once I had it, I fought tooth and nail to keep it.
Dear Jesse was about to learn that. No matter what, I was about to have my answer.
When he didn’t move or kiss me back at first, I thought that was it. That whatever was rattling around that mysterious brain of his would prevent him from acting on his desires. I was almost disappointed until his arms suddenly locked around me and he lifted me against him, parting his lips to kiss me back. He carried me down the hall.
There was a wild edge to his kisses tonight, however, a slightly frantic energy that sent my pulse skittering. He dropped me on his bed once more. It wasn’t gentle tonight, though. He pulled his shirt off over his head without going through the torturously slow rigmarole of unbuttoning tonight. His hands seemed a bit unsteady, shaking a little as he dropped his shirt and got to work on his trousers.
It took him less than ten seconds to shed everything he’d had on, standing naked before me only moments later. My lips parted, my gaze dropping without permission to histhrobbing manhood.
Oh, sod it. The contemporary phrasing is so much better anyhow.
