Page 62 of Love Me Again

“Aren’t you coming in?” she asked him, as if it made no sense to her that he wasn’t. As if she hadn’t told him not to kiss her or be here or bother her.

He studied her, though she didn’t know how he’d see her out here in the dark. But she could feel his gaze on hers like she was in some kind of spotlight.

Then he cut the engine and moved off the UTV with his awkward gait. He moved toward the path and so she moved for the door, Boone at her heels.

She unlocked the door. Inside the cabin was dark, warmer than outside but not warm by any means.

“Why don’t you start a fire?” she suggested to him.

Again, he studied her before responding. He didn’t respond in words. Just moved over to the fireplace and set about getting a fire started.

As the room warmed, she shed her coat and her scarf. She took off her sweater, so she was only wearing the thin, long-sleeved t-shirt underneath. Boone was still studying the fire, but he’d look at her eventually.

There were no nerves. There were no doubts. Tomorrow would be a crushing pain, but the pain would be a reminder.

She wanted to be safe. She wanted her own roots.

Boone did not fit into those wants. Not tomorrow.

But tonight was another story altogether.

He stood now from where he’d crouched by the fire. She saw the little wince of pain cross his face, but he quickly schooled it away. She wondered how much he did that on any given day.

But next week he would get his surgery, and sometime next year he would be mostly fine. Day to day fine, he’d said.

He’d announced that surgery to his family tonight to prove something to her, she was pretty sure. Because she’d told him love was letting people take care of him, he’d announced it. Like that made everything all right.

A complicated thought. Because it didn’t make anything right, but it was a gesture, nonetheless. An attempt to show her something, and she still knew him well enough to know that had taken work. Courage.

And wasn’t she doing the opposite of letting anyone take care by walking away tomorrow?

For a moment, that thought stabbed through her like a physical wound. She shied away from it. She didn’t want it. She didn’t want to be conflicted. She hadn’t invited him in to be conflicted. To entertain complicated thoughts.

She’d made her decision, just like he’d made his once upon a time.

She moved across the space between them, keeping her gaze locked to his. There was a wariness in his expression but also heat. Hunger. That was what she would use. That was what she would sink into.

For goodbye. The end.

He didn’t move when she put her hands on his chest. She wasn’t even sure he breathed. She did, her heart beating in a steady rhythm, but suddenly loud in her ears.

Eventually, he reached out, put his hands over hers, then with gentle pressure pushed her hands up so her arms looped around his neck. His hands smoothed down over her arms, her shoulders, then carefully wrapped around her, pulling her flush to his body.

She sighed, a strange relaxation settling over her, untying all sorts of knots. Just like the other night when he’d simply held her, because she said she’d leave if he kissed her. So he hadn’t. Because he thought he wanted her here.

She wished she could believe it.

She tilted her head up now. Rose to her toes. Pressed her mouth to his. She didn’t want to think or believe tonight.

She just wanted to feel. Give into all the conflict. For tonight, just tonight, and then leave it all behind. A true goodbye.

He shuddered under her hands, even as his arms banded tight around her. So tight she could scarcely catch a breath, but the way his mouth moved over hers, suddenly desperate and deep and wanting, she wouldn’t have been able to breathe anyway.

God, she’d missed this. Missed him. Belonging to someone, body and soul. The way heat and need could cloud over all the stress and bad, so that for a little while, life was just about pleasure.

She let all the sensations wrap around her, burrow deep inside of her. She let the heat build, the need. Gave herself over to it completely, like she used to do.

“This isn’t goodbye, Jo.” He said it against her mouth fervently. Desperately. He held her just the same.