“Come in. We need to talk.”
As her heart did a happy dance for the ages, Ella shook her head. “If you just want to tell me—again—all the reasons this will never happen, I’m good. I got the message the first half-dozen times you explained it to me.”
“That’s not why I want you to come in.”
Go, go, GO, her heart cried. For the love of God and all that’s holy, get out of the car and go into that cozy log cabin where the man of your dreams lives. Ella had always been one to follow her heart, but this time her heart was in deep conflict with the brain that was telling her to run, run, RUN before he could hurt her again.
“Please, Ella?”
Her brain didn’t stand a chance against her heart when he said please in that soft, urgent tone. She reached for the door handle.
They met at the front of her car, him still a little less than steady on his feet, and her certain she was making yet another in a string of huge mistakes where he was concerned. Then he put his hand on the small of her back to guide her up the stairs, and that was her undoing.
Why did he have to be so perfectly imperfect? Why did he have to be everything she’d ever wanted, wrapped up in one devilishly sexy, deeply wounded package? Her feelings for him ran the gamut from unbearable to undeniable to untenable and back again, an endless circle of frustration.
Her heart simply couldn’t take another self-inflicted wound—self-inflicted because she kept going back for more even though he’d repeatedly told her there was no hope for anything between them. She didn’t blame him. At least he’d always been straight with her. She blamed herself for being unwilling to take no for an answer.
So as she climbed the stairs to his front door, she attempted to manage her expectations. Nothing would happen. They would talk. She would stay until she was certain he was okay, and then she’d go home alone the way she always did, this time without a lacerating wound to nurse for the foreseeable future.
From behind her, he reached around to open the door, which wasn’t locked. The brush of his arm against her shoulder sent a tingle of awareness to parts of her that only seemed to stand up and take notice of this man. Only he had the power to activate all her systems with just the slightest contact of his body against hers. It made her wonder what it would be like—
No. Not going there. Under no circumstances are you going there. Well . . . No!
While she should be listening to her better judgment and distancing herself, instead she wanted to purr with the simple pleasure that came from being close to him for however long the moment lasted. She’d never claimed this situation was anything other than pathetic. At least she was remaining true to form in her “relationship,” such as it wasn’t, with Gavin.
She stepped into his home ahead of him. The door closed behind them with a resounding thud, and suddenly this felt like a bad idea. A very bad idea, indeed. The last time she’d been here, after hearing he’d been arrested for fighting in a bar, she’d left work to come check on him and had ended up crying all the way home after he sent her away.
“I, um . . . I should go.”
“I was going to make some coffee. Can I entice you to stay for that long?”
If she drank coffee at this hour, she’d be up all night, but she’d be up all night anyway, analyzing every second of this bizarre evening. “Sure. I guess.”
Gavin got busy making the coffee. The only sign of his slight intoxication was the mess he made pouring the water into the back of the coffeemaker. Aim, shoot, miss. Those three little words were like a metaphor for this entire situation, and the thought nearly made her laugh out loud. Except . . . There was nothing at all funny about unrequited love. It sucked every bit as badly as the songs, books and movies claimed it did.