I sigh a little. “That’s not really an answer.”
He takes in a deep breath, and I feel his chest press against my back. I wait for the next breath, and the next. I could keep waiting for breaths for the rest of my life, lying just like this, and be perfectly happy.
Well—eventually I’d want to roll over and do something else to his sexy, muscled body. But right now….
My heart beats a little harder. I’m careening from utter contentment to a strange fluttering in my chest that makes the back of my neck feel cold even with Ace’s hot breath, his soft lips, against it. My shiver prompts him to answer.
“This kind of….” His voice trails off, and for a split second I think he might say “love.” “This kind of infatuation always ends in heartbreak.” Ace’s voice is a little odd as he says this, not curled so tightly into his happiness. Does he really believe what he’s saying?
I turn in his arms so I can look into his eyes, but they’re still closed, so I settle for running a finger down the sharp line of his jaw. “Infatuation?” I say softly.
I don’t want him to tell me that he’s in love with me. I don’t want to tell him that I’m in love with him. That’s not what I’m going for, even if it’s—even if it might be true, on some level.
Ace opens his eyes and looks into mine, and I’m swept right up into them, for the first time noticing a green ring like lightning around his pupils.
“You’re not obsessed with me?” He flashes a half-smile that sends electricity running through my fingertips.
I suck in a breath. “A little bit.”
“But?”
“But it’s…it’s….”
“It’s more than that, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
This is as close as I’m going to come to admitting my feelings for him right now, because here it comes—another wave of unease. If this is going to grow any deeper, I need to know what the hell is going on with him. I’m not sure I’m going to like what I find out
Ace doesn’t agree with me out loud, but he does lean in and kiss me, softly, slowly, unlike any other kiss we’ve shared before. When he pulls back, I ask the first question out of the many that are roiling in my mind.
“Where did you go, Ace?”
He raises one eyebrow. “I’m still right here.”
“I mean, before you were here. Before you…came back to New York City.”
His expression goes a little harder. I feel sick. I don’t want to have this conversation, but I have to. Who the hell knows? This could be the end of it all, right now, if he reacts the way he did last Saturday. One week ago. How can I possibly feel so intense about things after one week?
Because it’s him, says the voice in the back of my mind.
“I was in Italy.”
“Italy?”
“Yes.”
Italy is not one of the places that’s been mentioned on Rainflower Blue. People have suggested everywhere from Seattle to the Middle East, but never Italy.
“Why were you there?”
I keep my tone soothing and soft, not wanting to put the pressure on but wanting him to answer me so we can leave this charged, uncomfortable moment behind.
I have one hand just above Ace’s hip, on the hard muscles of his waist, and I feel his body tense.
“Business.”
It’s a lie, and we both know it. If not a full lie, then a half-truth. The way his face has frozen tells me that it was more than business. Much more.
The voice comes again. That doesn’t make him a murderer.
I have a sense that I’m up against some boundary, and if I touch it, this idyllic afternoon will come to a grinding halt.
And maybe it’s stupid, maybe it’s naive, maybe it’s even dangerous…but I can’t let it go.
Not yet.
Chapter 22
Ace
The instant Carolyn asks me where I was before I came back to New York, my heart clenches within my chest and my hands and feet go cold.
I don’t want to talk about this.
I have to bite back the urge to get up and leave. It’s almost as strong as the urge to wrap her even more tightly in my arms.
The conversation has already been heading in a direction that makes my heart hammer against my rib cage, even though I’m doing my damn best to stay calm and relaxed in the cocoon of blankets with Carolyn.
Please, I think. Don’t do this now.
“I’m still right here,” I say, arching an eyebrow and throwing myself into the performance of flirting…which turns out to only be half-false.
She swallows.
“I mean, before you were here. Before you…came back to New York City.”
I have a few options. I can choose not to answer. I can choose to do something else with her—to her—right now. I can get up and leave.
Or I can just tell her the truth.
What is it about her that makes me want to tell her the truth more than I want to protect myself? There’s going to be hell to pay for this eventually. Why do I have to start now?
Because if I lie to her in this moment, I’ll never be able to stop myself. It’ll be too fucking easy.
“I was in Italy.”
Her eyes go wide for a split second while she searches my face.