He closed his eyes and leaned his head back. She felt a small shudder pass through him, and her heart twisted.
“Tonight sucked,” he said in a low voice.
“Sounds like it. I’m so sorry.” She squeezed his arm, then slid her hand down to lace her fingers with his. “I wish I could do something to help.”
He rolled his head toward her. “You would?”
She grunted and gaped at him in dismay. “What? Why would you ask that? I care about people!”
Arching an eyebrow, he scoffed. “And yet with me you’re the sarcasm queen.”
“I’m not that bad!” But even as she defended herself, compunction gnawed at her conscience.
When she opened her mouth to justify her sarcasm, the corner of his mouth twitched, and he leaned in to kiss her. “There she is, the woman I love to spar with.”
“So you don’t really think I’m…a grump?”
His grin spread. “Well, I might not go that far.”
“Ugh!” She frowned and play swatted at him, thankful that his mood had lifted enough to tease with her.
“What I would say is—” he grew serious again, and his fingers plowed into her hair to cradle the back of her head “—I’m learning more and more that your crusty shell protects a soft heart, a kind and caring soul that I find very attractive.”
Her pulse fluttered as his attention dropped to her mouth, his pupils expanding like a cat’s when it spied prey. This time, she leaned in to kiss him rather than wait for him to make the move. She heard the swoosh of blood past her ears as her head grew muzzy and light. The fevered spike in her pulse fed her, encouraged her, shouted down the persistent squawk in her mind that warned her not to get tangled up with a man, not to risk the heartache.
Cal’s kiss deepened, and she felt the tension in his body as she held him. Was his ardor rooted in desire for her or just a release of the stress that had haunted him tonight? And did it matter? He’d supported her through scary times in recent days. She could return the favor. Especially if the favor meant she could scratch an itch without investing too much of herself.
The hotter the kisses grew, the louder the justifications shouted in her brain. A hunger roared to life inside her that only Cal could satisfy. Finally, she rose long enough to kneel on the couch, straddling his lap. Capturing his face between her palms, she pushed him back against the pillows and lost herself in his kiss.
His arms circled her, and he drew her closer, a small moan slipping from his throat as he drew on her mouth.
Amid the rush of sensation, the heady swirl of pleasure that heated her blood, Jules became aware of a wholly different feeling that swelled in her core and demanded attention.
Kissing Cal Colton didn’t just feel good, it felt…right. Being held by him, sinking into him, being the one to console him at the end of a terrible day…fit. As if she’d been waiting her whole life for a missing piece of her soul, Cal was comfortable, familiar. The electron she needed to fill her valence shell.
Wow. That was…awful.A laugh tripped from her that sounded more like a cough. She was in deep if she was creatingtortured chemistry analogies like that. Clearly she was no poet with the gift of romantic words.
“Oh, man,” he said, his brow knitting as he pulled away. “I forgot about your head injury. Are you all right?”
She wrinkled her nose. “I’m fine. I wish I could blame my head injury for what I just thought.”
“Care to share?”
“No. I’d like to preserve what little respect you have for me.”
He tugged her close again. “Oh, but I have quite a bit of respect for you, beautiful. Respect and desire. Which is my way of saying I want to make love to you, but the decision is yours.”
Chapter 28
His wording stopped her for a moment. Love? Was that what this was for him? An admission of love? Was that what he thought it was for her?
Her rational brain told her what they had couldn’t possibly be love. They hadn’t known each other long enough. He was only being polite. A gentleman didn’t ask for sex using crude terms, and Cal was kind and thoughtful at his core.
This explanation was enough to quiet the blare of sirens that had been triggered by his phrasing. Not love, then. Just a gentlemanly request for no-strings sex.
So why did framing things that way chafe her at her core? She’d never been a no-strings kinda girl. She was an avoid-all-forms-of-attachment, don’t-risk-any-pain-or-betrayal kind of girl. Didn’t sex imply trust? Didn’t the act mean allowing herself to be at least a little vulnerable?
“Huh.” Cal’s brow furrowed as he sat up, easing her off his lap. “I think your hesitation speaks for itself. Anything you have to think that hard about isn’t—”
