I understood what he was saying, and I nodded.
“But God it was supposed to be so fucking different,” he said almost angrily, and he shook his head. He finally smiled again. “Go to sleep.” He leaned forward, kissing me in the middle of the forehead. He reached back and turned the lamp off, and I closed my eyes.
I woke up when his arms tightened around me, and he hummed warmly against the back of my ear. “Do you want coffee?” he asked quietly, his voice hoarse with sleep.
I sat up, looking over Kane’s shoulder at the clock on the nightstand. It was six-thirty. “I better not,” I said as I stretched.
His hand slipped under the back of my shirt, and his palm ran over my skin, gently rubbing as it traveled up to the middle of my back. I sighed as I stretched my neck.
“When Dr. Briggs says she’s calling first thing in the morning, she means first thing in the morning. The woman once called me at seven-fifteen to review my grades. Talk about a rude awakening.” I chuckled as his hand continued to move and graze across my back. I glanced over my shoulder at him. I studied his face, and my cheeks flushed as goosebumps popped over my entire body. His eyebrows shot up as he felt it under his palm.
“What on earth are you thinking about?” he asked with a sly smile.
I didn’t say anything for a moment. “What would it be like if we decided to have a sexual relationship?”
His hand moved some more. “Emotionally or physically?”
My cheeks flushed again. “Physically.”
“I suppose…” he spoke slowly. “My mouth would likely be where my hand is right now. And if you wanted to ride my fucking thigh like you did last night, you wouldn’t feel the need to stop until you’d come all over my leg.” He sat up, still running his hand over my back. He rested his chin on my shoulder and I turned to face forward. “And I guess that kiss would have turned into full on fucking.”
The flush turned into warmth that radiated out through my limbs and then pulled back into my core to settle in my groin. “Emotionally?”
He kissed my shoulder again. “That’s more difficult,” he said.
I turned to look at him. His face was close to mine.
“In what way?” I asked.
He inhaled deeply. “It’s easy to make the physical things happen the way you want them to.”
“Sex, fighting, alcohol,” I said.
He nodded. “Good insight. Yeah. Those things have a very tangible feel to them. There’s a cause and effect. If you do this, you get that. It’s simple. It’s uncomplicated.”
“You’re saying the emotional side of all this is more complicated?”
“Do you see it any other way?” he asked.
I turned my body toward him then, and his hand slipped from underneath my shirt. “No, I don’t,” I said as I shook my head. My eyes drifted away as I contemplated that.
“Hey.” He pulled my face to look at him. When he opened his mouth to speak, he quickly closed it and sighed. But then he opened it again. “Complicated is okay.”
His eyes shifted down to my mouth. He looked vulnerable as though he were afraid of what I was thinking. Odd thing was I felt the same of him. He finally looked back at my eyes.
“If you want to know what it looks like… it’s open, it’s honest, we talk, we listen, we spend time together. The thing is, I told you I want to be close to you. That’s an emotional thing for us whether there’s sex involved or not.”
“Yeah,” I agreed.
He reached for my mouth, cupping my chin and running his thumb over my lower lip. “Don’t kiss me again…” he said quietly.
I gasped, and my eyes dropped to his chest.
“…unless that’s the direction we’re going.”
My pulse spiked, and I had to force myself to make eye contact. I was holding my breath when I did.
“Because I liked it too much. I need to know you’re not going to take that away from me if it happens again.”
My breath left me in a rush, but I nodded. He smiled gently, even seductively, but it was reassuring nonetheless.
I glanced at the clock again. “I really have to go. I’m sorry.”
He stood and pulled me up to my feet, and then he snatched my jeans from the floor. Once I’d put them on quickly, he stuffed my bra into the pocket, smirking down at me. He walked me to the door, and I ran out to my car as he watched from the porch.
I was home within ten minutes—just in time to answer my ringing phone as I ran through the front door. It was finally fall, and I was shivering by the time I got inside.
“Helene, dear, so good to talk with you,” came Dr. Briggs voice.
“Hi, Dr. Briggs. I’m happy to be talking to you too.”