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“So you’ve never really given any of them a chance at all.”
“I’ve been around them for weeks.”
“But they think they’re making relationships with you when you weren’t. You were waiting for them to get to this point, for them to realize they all like you and to what... fight it out until there was a winner and let him claim you? Just because you can’t make a decision?” He shook his head, backing up. “No. I don’t buy it, Kayli.”
I turned over in the bed, pulling away from him. I buried my face into the blankets. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“And you don’t get to push me away,” he said. “I’ve seen what you do, Kayli. You wait for me to make a move, because you’re too afraid to do anything yourself. I never thought I’d see you afraid of anything.”
“I’m not afraid,” I said, although it was hard to be sure he heard me with my head stuffed into the pillow and the blanket over my face.
He leaned into my arm and put part of the weight of his upper body against mine, squeezing me into the bed. “You’re afraid of making a bad choice, of making a commitment to someone who will disappoint you, so you don’t choose. Maybe that was what was wrong with your other relationships, sweetheart. You didn’t really choose them, you let them choose you and just let things happen. Did they ever see the real you? What you’re like when you’re really into someone and want to date that person?”
I didn’t move and didn’t answer. I didn’t want to think about old boyfriends.
“What I see,” he said quietly, “is a girl who is alone in the world, trying to survive, getting thrown into situations and relying on other people, something she isn’t used to. And then when those people get a glimpse at the real woman underneath all that fight and bluster, they’re attracted, and Kayli’s too afraid to admit that she’s worth attention and love.”
“Since when did you become a psychologist?”
“You mock, but I’ve studied psychology,” he said. “It helps when dealing with bad guys. Kind of helps when dealing with love, too.”
I shoved the blanket away from my face, needing to breathe again, and rolled over, pushing him off of me. “I screwed up,” I said. “Damage done. Too late to talk about the past right now.”
“You’re right,” he said. “I just wanted the clear picture.” He crawled over me until he was sitting on my hips, his hands on either side of my shoulders to hold himself up. He looked down at me, the gold flecks now brilliant with the light from the room. I glared back at him. “You’re not the only one who’s been through hell, Kayli. You’re never going to make any of this right waiting in the wings for one of them to bully you into a relationship, and then never really committing to that person when the time comes.”
“Again, too late,” I said. “I’ve screwed it up with them. And they might just break up the team because of this.”
“You give yourself too much credit.” He sighed and then dipped his head lower until I was nose to nose with him. “And you’ve forgotten one piece of this puzzle.”
“What?”
“Me,” he said. His eyes dipped down until he looked at my lips and then he refocused on my eyes. “I was chasing you, too.”
I hadn’t forgotten at all. I just assumed he’d hate me now. “And now you’re going to walk out?” I asked. “Now that you know what I’ve done?”
“What a sore attitude,” he said. “Kayli, your fire is what I’m attracted to. Do I need to lie to you again to get that back? You’ve been...mopey. What’s wrong with you?”
“I don’t know,” I said in a long, exasperated moan. I tried to push him off of me again, but he wouldn’t budge and I didn’t have the strength to keep trying. He sat on my hips and backed himself up so he was sitting up and out of reach. I pulled a pillow over my face and moaned into it. “Maybe I am still sick. I keep getting those cramps. And the nausea this morning. Maybe the new stress brought it all back.” I didn’t know what was wrong with me. I’d been a sleepy wreck for so long, and once I was back in the real world, I hadn’t felt like me at all. Marc had called me depressed. The other boys seemed really worried to.
I hadn’t noticed, but then, maybe I should be concerned. Was something wrong with me?
“Let’s take away some of that stress then,” he said. “Did I ask you for a commitment?”
“No.”
“Did you ask me?”
“No.”
“So between you and me, we’re not in a committed relationship yet. Now, I’m not really interested in anyone else at the moment. You take up too much of my time and I’m pretty obsessive once I’ve got my mind set on a person.”
I grunted under the pillow.
He tugged the pillow from me, putting it aside and gazing down at my face. “Hey,” he said. “I know you’re not feeling well, but I want to make sure you’re listening.”
I pouted. I was listening, I just wasn’t sure I wanted to hear any more. I didn’t deserve anyone being nice to me right now.
“I don’t have hard feelings about you flirting with the other guys. And it isn’t right for me to anyway, because we haven’t agreed on an exclusive relationship, and I’m not exactly around you enough to get to that point. What I’m looking for with you, it takes time. That’s part of making a foundation, of building a relationship in the first place.”
“So you don’t hate me?”
“Sweetheart, I hate seeing you sick. I hate that you’re so miserable. I’d kill all those bastards for making you feel like this. I’m seriously wondering if they are real friends if they won’t even admit to each other what’s going on between them.”
I rolled my eyes. “I wasn’t exactly up front, either.”
“Weren’t you?” he asked. “Did you agree to an exclusive relationship? Did you say, ‘Hey, Axel Toma, you and I like each other and I’d like to date you and only you and I’d like for you to date only me. Can we make this agreement?’ Then after, did you inform the others of your exclusive relationship and then continue to flirt? No. You didn’t.”
“That’s not how it works,” I said.
“It’s exactly how it works.” He bent over me, hovering again over my face. “Kayli, if you didn’t ask for a commitment, and they get mad at each other and you over assuming exclusivity even though you’ve never agreed to it, then that’s their issue, not yours. They may be great people, they may be smart and have taken care of you, but they’re human.”
“I know that.”
“So why are you acting like this is all your fault? As far as I can tell, there’s at least two in a rela
tionship. In this case, there’s...what four of them? They are just as guilty.”
“They did want to talk about relationships,” I said. “Axel tried to talk me into it. I might have let him assume he and I were heading that direction. I just avoided saying yes directly; I haven’t really pursued any of them. They all came to me.”
“But you’ve never agreed to be exclusive with any of them,” he said. “Or have you?”
“I don’t think I did.”
“Then you never did,” he said. “If you did, you’d know. And you’d be able to tell me you were dating Axel or Frank or Bob or whoever. Avoiding the topic isn’t making a commitment.”
I blew a long breath out from between my lips. Maybe that was true, but I wasn’t sure Axel would see it that way. I wasn’t sure Marc or Raven or even Brandon would, either. Mostly because I hadn’t said a flat out no to a relationship, and in some cases, I let them make assumptions.
But I was having trouble sorting it out. The muscle relaxer was doing a number on my brain, making it foggy, sleepy. “This is just such a bad time to get in the middle of this.”
“There’s never a good time,” he said. He climbed off me and turned until he was sitting up against the bed, his knees up. He put his arms on his knees, propping them up. “So they’re just going to have to get over themselves, aren’t they? You have the right to say, ‘Guys, I’m not interested in a commitment right now, but I appreciate your company.’ They can be okay with that or they can be not okay and walk away, but they don’t have the right to make assumptions and then act like it’s your fault when they’re wrong.”
Feeling weird with him sitting like that, I pulled myself up until I was sitting up next to him. Because of the bed, I rolled into him a little. Could he be right? “I hadn’t thought of it that way.”
“I don’t want to sound sexist,” he said, tilting his head toward me, “but lots of women have the habit of taking on all the responsibility if a relationship doesn’t go well. You, Kayli Winchester, are a smart girl. You keep your heart closed off a bit, but I think deep down, you want a relationship, with who, I don’t know. I’m going come out and say I just hope it’ll be with me in the end.”
