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Jude’s gut clenched. His heart swelled. “Kate.”
“You want to know what you do to me every time you look at me, Jude? Every time you’re close to me? Every time you kiss me, touch me, fuck me? You want to know what you do to me?” she repeated. Her lips whisked over his in a whisper of a kiss before she murmured, “You bring me to life. You give me a life…one that’s mine. One that I don’t have to explain or justify or pretend doesn’t exist in an effort to placate someone else or fit another person’s ideal. With you…I get to be me, Jude. I get to enjoy all the wicked twists and turns of life because you incite them. Because you want to experience them as much as I do.”
“Yes, Kate,” he fervently said.
“And when you’re inside me, Jude… Nothing else registers. Nothing else matters. I just…feel…you.”
He continued to gaze at her. She didn’t look away. Didn’t even flinch.
Jude said, “If we’re so perfect for each other, Kate… Why the hell aren’t we together? Really together?”
Kate had an answer to that actual question.
A reasonable, sensible answer.
One wrapped around hopes and dreams. Aspirations. Legal papers and all those hoops she’d contended she’d jump through in order to join Nikki on her valiant journey.
One wrapped around what she’d just told Jude—that she didn’t have to justify or pretend didn’t exist. Jude wouldn’t hold her back from fulfilling those hopes and dreams.
Perhaps he wouldn’t understand the extreme situation of what she wanted to accomplish, but she believed he would understand how critical this was to her.
At that very moment, Kate wanted to share her plans. Yet if she spontaneously revealed all, it’d likely come out jumbled and inappropriately worded. She needed to rehearse in her mind what she was going to say, not impulsively drop a bombshell.
This discussion ought to be carefully addressed and meticulously timed; not fueled by hot sex and even hotter post-coital talk that was leading to confessions of the heart.
Shit.
Kate sighed. She wasn’t trying to hide confessions of the heart.
She knew Jude wasn’t, either. But after his stalwart openness with Annalise, which had led that relationship into sheer disaster, the man was probably turned upside down as to how he should play this new hand—reveal all his cards or keep them closer to the vest?
Kate realized she had no desire to hold him in limbo, to make him doubt this or that when it came to the two of them.
So she took her own leap of faith and said, “Jude, I want you more than anything I’ve ever known. It’s incredibly wild how much I want you. But to really be together…” She thought that one through a bit more strategically. Then admitted, “I have so much to tell you first.”
“Kate,” he grumbled. “Are you married?”
She swatted at him. “Cut it out. You know I’m not married.”
Jude combed his fingers through her hair, brushing the strands from her face. “So tell me…”
“I have plans, remember?” she said, maintaining the steady eye contact.
“Sure. I’m not asking you to change them. I wouldn’t. Remember?”
“Jude…” She sighed again, with a hint of exasperation. “You don’t know the full extent of these plans. I’ll be traveling a lot. To very…inconvenient…places.”
A monumental understatement.
Jude kissed her. Then said, “Tell me again that you want me, Kate.”
“I want you, Jude.”
“Okay. Screw inconvenient. I can work around inconvenient.”
“Jude—”
Kate slipped to her feet, moved her clothing back into place and took a few moments to try to regroup. They’d unexpectedly broached an incredibly sticky subject. One that gave her significant pause.
