Page 101 of My All American Girl

43

SARAH

My ears rang, my heart thudded, and my mind spun. Did Dean just say we should quit while we’re ahead?

Was he not in the hotel room last night? Did he not feel the same mind-boggling connection I did? The memory of his touch, the intimacy we shared, it felt too real to be just a fling. But now, doubt crept in. Had I been a fool for falling for him? Was he just using me?

I felt like I was going to puke.

“Sarah,” Dean said, gripping my arms and looking straight into my eyes. “There’s no easy way to navigate this. We both have so much to lose.”

His words hit me like a slap. For a sharp, vulnerable moment, I felt played. Had this all been a ruse to get into my pants? Now that he’d had his fun, was he ready to call it off before we headed back to Columbus?

My chest tightened, anger and hurt welling up inside me. I was always so much smarter than this. I didn’t screw around with a lot of men. I knew what they were after, and I wasn’t interested in just giving myself to anyone.

I let myself be blinded by who he was. I thought I was so cool and special because the great Dean Ryker shone his attention on me. “Never meet your heroes,” I murmured.

“What?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

“I’m not a hero,” he said sternly.

I glared at him, looking for the man that was in my bed last night. The man that carefully wrapped my knuckles after flying across the country to save me.

They were not the same.

“What do you mean, we should quit while we’re ahead?” I demanded, my voice trembling.

Dean shook his head, his face pained. “I don’t want to be the reason your relationship with your father completely falls apart. It’s already strained because of the Air Force. If he finds out about us, I could be the final straw to knock everything over. What if you can’t repair the damage I do?”

“Are you just going to make my decisions for me?” I snapped.

“No,” he said calmly. “I don’t want to make your life more complicated. You and your father have a great relationship. I don’t want to get in the middle.”

“And where do I get a choice in all this?” I asked, my frustration bubbling over. “I’m an adult, Dean. I’m capable of making my own decisions.”

He groaned, rubbing his eyes. “I know, Sarah. I know. But Mo is my friend. Somewhere along the way, I forgot that glaring fact, and now I don’t think I can ignore it anymore. This can’t go anywhere. Your father will never be okay with me and you together. So where does that leave us? We can’t keep ignoring the elephant in the room.”

“You don’t have to ignore it,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. “We can tell my father when the time is right. After I graduate UPT.”

Dean blinked at me, clearly taken aback. “That’s a long way off. I’m not sure I can lie to Mo’s face for all that time.”

“Then you shouldn’t have come here with me,” I snapped. I was holding back tears now, feeling too invested in him for it to end like this. I hated that he let me get this deep with him and now he was telling me, oopsie, never mind, scratch that.

“Are you ending things with me, Dean?” I asked directly. I was going to make him say it. Once he said it, it was done. I was not going to give him another chance.

“I don’t know, Sarah,” he replied. His voice was ragged as though each word pained him as much as it did me. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

It felt like a punch to my stomach, and I recoiled as if it had physically hurt me. “No,” I said tersely, shaking my head. “You don’t get to drag me here to London and let me think there was something real happening and then pull the rug out from underneath me.”

He sighed, dropping his chin to his chest. I stared at him for several long seconds.

“I’m going back to the hotel. Do we leave today?” I asked irritably. “I’m ready to go. I think I’ve already proven I can fly in UK air just as well as American airspace. This whole trip was stupid.”

Dean looked up at me. “You don’t mean that,” he said quietly.

“Oh, I absolutely do,” I retorted with barely suppressed fury. “You treat me like a child, like a possession. You think you can just play with my life and feelings and then discard me the next day? I thought you were different.”