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“I did. I don’t regret that—that’s a line that should never be crossed. But you waited until you were old enough that no one back home would have batted an eye and gave me another chance, and I blew that one too. I wanted you so badly, but I convinced myself I shouldn’t go there, that I’d somehow be taking advantage of you because you couldn’t realize what you were really getting into.”
As I stared at him in stunned silence, he hung his head. “That’s what I’m sorry about. I rejected you even though you were everything I could possibly want because I was arrogant enough to think you couldn’t know whatyoureally wanted, and now—now I’ve obviously lost my chance. I probably shouldn’t even be telling you this, but I wanted you to know that you weren’t wrong. It was my screw-up.”
I swallowed thickly, so much emotion welling up inside me that I could barely breathe.
Rafael had been my first crush and therefore my longest. I’d always wanted him more than any other man I’d met, even after he’d made it clear nothing was going to happen between us.
Well, until I’d blown into Hobb Creek and met Niko and Jasper.
I paused on that thought. Was that why he assumed he’d lost his chance?
But all those old feelings still thrummed through my body, propelling me toward the man I’d loved for so long. I walked around the table, hardly feeling the floor beneath my feet.
“Rafael, I fell for you all the way back when I was thirteen years old. Because youareeverything I could imagine wanting. Just because I’m falling for other men too doesn’t mean those feelings have vanished.”
He lifted his hand only to leave it hovering in the air between us, not quite reaching all the way to me. I wrapped my own much smaller hands around it, his solid palm engulfing my fingers.
The warmth of his skin sparked a headier heat right up my arm. But I knew I had to make one other thing clear.
“Iamfalling for Niko and Jasper,” I said, keeping my voice steady but soft. “There are other things I want in my life—need in my life—that I never realized before, that I’ve found with them. I’m not going to give them up.”
Rafael’s voice came out gruff, but I thought I saw a glint of hope in his burgundy eyes. “I wouldn’t expect you to.”
I smiled up at him. “And that’s exactly why I still need you too, however you’re willing to be a part of my life. That’s what it comes down to, really. You haven’t lost your shot. It’s just a question of whether you can handle sharing me with them.”
His jaw worked as he considered his answer. “I don’t know. A lot of me wants to whisk you away from everything and claim you all for myself. But you’re not a woman who can be claimed. I realize that. I’d like—I’d like to see what we could be even with them in the mix, if you want that too.”
I grinned up at him with a rush of joy. “Oh, believe me, I do.”
I bobbed up on my toes, and thankfully Rafael knew exactly what I was aiming for. He wrapped one brawny arm around me and leaned in to meet my kiss.
His searing heat washed over my body. I sighed into the kiss and tilted my head to angle it even deeper.
For all the hardness of his muscular frame, Rafael’s lips were soft as velvet. His tongue slid like a flame against my own.
With each kiss that followed the first, my head spun faster. His fingers trailed over my hair, sparking jolts of pleasure through my scalp.
I matched his passion with my own blazing desire, wanting him more and more with each passing moment. Wanting to savor every bit of the connection I’d believed I was never going to get.
My hands teased up under his shirt to stroke his sculpted back skin to skin. Rafael groaned and kissed me even harder—
And a loudthumpfiltered through the wall from outside in the front yard.
I jumped with a flinch of my nerves, my head jerking toward the door. The passion that’d been flowing through my limbs ebbed with a pang of apprehension. “What was that?”
Rafael’s eyes had turned even darker. He strode toward the door, and I dashed after him, my hands balling into fists.
We stormed down the front steps, scanning the yard for any sign of an intruder. In the thickening darkness of the evening, I didn’t make out any movement.
Then my gaze caught on a furry form slumped on the hood of the Grand Marquis.
Rafael saw it in the same moment. He held out his hand to ward me off. “Maybe you should go inside.”
I shot him a pointed look. “Didn’t you just get done saying how I’m a strong woman who can handle myself?”
I marched over, my gut twisting as I made out the details of the tableau that’d been arranged on the hood.
It was a raccoon. Limp and lifeless, its beady eyes glazed, its severed neck leaking blood across the pale blue steel.
