AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I don’t know. You’re asking me to explain something that wasn’t based on reason. It’s not like my decision to leave was a programming function. X produces Y. It was just…”
Pure panic, pure paranoia, pure emotion.
“Will you stay?” he asks. “If I try to be less of a douchebag? It’ll surely be a challenge for me, but I can’t think about you out on the street.”
“What do you think about the crush, though?”
“It doesn’t change anything for me. It’s more what you think that matters.”
“How so?”
“I’m more than twice your age. I’m providing for you financially. If somebody were standing outside this situation, they’d be forgiven for thinking I’m taking advantage of you. Add a crush to that equation…”
“I don’t feel taken advantage of. I think that’s very condescending. I might only be nineteen, but I’ve had to grow up fast. I’m capable of making my own decisions.”
“Then decide to stay,” he growls, “and decide to wake up early tomorrow so I can take you to breakfast.”
“Like a date?” I murmur.
“Not like a date. Exactly a date. I promise I won’t storm off this time.”
“What about the Russians?”
“I’ve been traveling for weeks while they’ve been threatening me. As long as we have a full security detail, we’ll be fine, but that’s a full detail, Jane, not a single guard. It doesn’t mean wandering the streets alone.”
“You really don’t care about the crush?”
The more I say the word, the less power it seems to have. Not that I’ll ever stop crushing on him… but every time I thought about telling him, both before we met and after, I imagined him backing off and getting royally freaked out.
“I don’t care how you felt when you were younger. All I care about is how you feel now.”
I swallow, knowing I might regret this bit.
“I’ve still got a crush on you.”
I’m sure I can hear a smile in his voice. “I think you can stop calling it a crush now that we’re dating.”
“Is that what we’re doing?”
“What did you think?”
“I don’t know. Maybe you did this fairly often. Found a woman you liked, put her up in an apartment, and then… did what you want with her?”
“I’m not dating anybody else,” he says gruffly, “and I’m not providing apartments for other women. You don’t have to worry about that.”
Can I take his word for it? Suddenly, I feel like a complete idiot for telling him about the crush, but it’s too late now. Honestly, it feels anticlimactic. Of all the responses I imagined he’d give, this borderline indifference wasn’t one.
Isn’t that a good thing? It means I don’t have to deal with the consequences. It could also mean he’s locking his private thoughts in his savage mind. He could think I’m the biggest dork in the universe, but he’s too polite to tell me. Then why would he ask me on a date? I wonder if he told the truth about dating other women.
“Tomorrow then,” I say after a way-too-long pause.
“Tomorrow,” he says fiercely.
I could hardly sleep last night, so I should be tired this morning, but the adrenalin keeps me awake. I look borderline shell-shocked as I study myself in the mirror.
I’m wearing a blue designer dress, just one of many in the walk-in closet of various sizes. I’ve picked one with floaty material around the upper thigh, netted azure, with a hint of cleavage but not too much. I’m wearing a push-up bra, too, and I’m not sure if it’s too much or exactly what he wants.
I let myself smile, and you know what? I feel pretty goddamn beautiful. Turning away, I breathe slowly—my first date with my crush. Despite the tension and the craziness of this situation, my smile widens. I’m about to do something I’ve wished for since I was a kid, a scared nobody with my fingers tapping across the keys.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Luke
My virgin has wanted me for a long time. I couldn’t share my reaction with her last night. It’s not the crush, exactly, but more what it means.
She wants me on a deep level, the same thunder that strikes me each time I think about her, but a crush doesn’t mean a life—a family and kids. I could get crushed if I let it all out now. The Russian thing was an excuse.
There’s terror in me, too. What happened to my dad messed me up. I’ve noticed snippets of it: the gruff way I sometimes behave, the distance, never letting anybody get close.
When she told me about her crush, I imagined telling the truth about me, my need, the fullness of it, and I saw her stepping back, hands raised.
“I’m nineteen. You want me to make this decision now?”
She already tried to run once.
I sit in the back of the car, drumming my fingers against my knee, looking out the tinted window, and waiting for my woman to appear. Finally, Christopher walks out, holding the door open, and another security guard marches onto the street.
