“My thoughts exactly.”
I turn and catch his eye, flushing slightly when I realize he’s been watching me. I set my purse down on the desk in the corner and pat at my hair, my artfully undone updo now just undone, with pieces pulled loose from their bobby pins, a casualty of our frantic urgency and his greedy hands. I’m feeling shy all of a sudden, self-conscious . . . or perhaps it’s more like unprepared. Normally I’d plan a night like this down to the tiniest detail, preselecting the perfect aphrodisiacal meal, sultry background music, and lacy lingerie set designed to make him forget his own name.
As usual with Jack, though, nothing goes the way I think it will.
He smiles and holds out a hand. “C’mere.” He always seems to be able to read my mood.
When I take his hand he immediately pulls me into his arms, and I melt into him, resting my head against the shelf of his shoulder.
“Hi,” he says softly, his nose nuzzling a path along my cheekbone, and I hum in response. “What are you thinking about?” His lips tickle my earlobe, sending goosebumps straight to my toes.
“That I wish I wasn’t wearing chicken cutlets.”
His mouth stills in its path. “I’m sorry?”
“You know, the kind of bra you have to wear with a low-back dress? Also known as sticky boobs?” He pulls away, looking perplexed. If this freaks him out, it’s a good thing I’m not wearing one of Betty’s bullet bras. “Never mind. I just meant I don’t have lacy underthings ready to wow you.”
He drops his forehead to my shoulder and laughs into my skin.
“What’s so funny?”
“You are.” He presses a soft kiss to my clavicle before straightening. “Cassie, this whole time I thought you were a virgin.”
What?! I flush with embarrassment, feeling doubly self-conscious now—though I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. With how skittish I’ve been, why wouldn’t he think that? “You did seem extraordinarily patient.”
“I thought you were working up the nerve to tell me. I even practiced acting surprised.”
I chuckle at the thought before a new concern takes its place. “Are you . . . disappointed that I’m not?” I ask hesitantly. It taps into my greatest fear, that he might actually prefer the pure and perfect Betty version of me to the real me.
His eyes search my face. “Are you kidding? Of course not.”
“It’s just that you haven’t seemed to mind taking things slow, so I thought maybe . . . stop laughing!” I swat his chest as he laughs huskily. “Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about, okay? There are plenty of men out there who go for the sweet and innocent type.”
His eyes twinkle with humor. “Hi, were you there the night we met? I don’t think anybody’s mistaking you for ‘sweet and innocent.’?”
I pinch his bicep through his sleeve. “Are you trying to run me out of here?”
He grabs my hand and clasps it to his chest before growing serious. “It was never about fast or slow. Cassie, my only goal was to keep you with me.” He swallows, his other hand flexing on my hip. “From the very beginning I knew something was different about you. Or about us, I guess. I couldn’t explain it. I still can’t explain it, really. I just knew it felt right, to be with you. You felt it too, didn’t you?”
I swallow past the lump in my throat, managing a nod.
“But I also knew that one wrong move on my part would scare you off, so I decided early on I was just going to follow your lead. I’d take whatever you were willing to give and wait as long as it took for you to feel comfortable with me.” He squeezes my hand, his gaze charting a heated course all over my face. “And I think my plan worked out pretty well, don’t you?”
His confession steals the breath from my lungs.
“Do you remember when we were in my kitchen, that first night you came over?” he continues, saving me from having to speak, which is a good thing because I have no idea what to say. Words, normally my currency of choice, have completely deserted me. “You were jumpy and hilarious and just . . . so damn beautiful. I couldn’t stop staring at you. And I remember watching you across the kitchen and thinking, What can I do to make sure she stays? I’d give anything for her to just . . . stay.” He huffs a short breath. “I still think it every time I look at you. I’m in love with you too, you know. I’ve been in love with you.”
My throat is raw with unshed tears as I stare up at him, so steadfast and ardent and handsome, more handsome than any man has the right to be. He’s bathed in moonlight, the planes of his face cast in shadow, the pinprick reflections of the city lights sparkling in his blue-black eyes. It’s unfathomable to me that there are people behind every one of those lit windows, living and breathing and going about their lives while my world is so seismically shifting on its foundations. I’m standing on a fault line, the magnitude of his revelations like an earthquake, upending everything I thought I knew.
It occurs to me that I asked him the wrong question before, about whether he was disappointed—or rather, that the person I should have been asking was myself. I’ve never regretted my past relationships, always believing they existed to help teach me something, but standing before him now as he reveals the depth of his commitment, the extent of his patience—proving his fidelity before I’d truly earned it—I wish I could wipe my slate clean. I wish I had waited for him, that I had seen him in my future, that I could have given him that gift. It’s yet another epiphany for me in all this, and a testament to how profoundly I’ve changed: that once you find your last, you’ll wish they were your only.
His expression turns mischievous, his mouth curving into a deviant smirk. “But if you really want to know the ‘type’ of girl I go for . . .” He tugs me to him by the hips, and I can feel his desire pressing strong and solid against my stomach. “She’s about five foot six. Hazel eyes. The softest skin I’ve ever felt.” His hands skim up my arms, featherlight, and I shiver. “Hair that leans brown or red depending on the time of day.” He pulls one of my bobby pins loose and my hair starts to unravel from its messy knot. He makes a low grunt of approval and removes a few more, the rest of my hair cascading down and brushing my bare shoulders.