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“What stuff?”
“Girls. You. Saying the right thing. Having you here. I mean, I’m glad you’re here, really glad—”
Judging from the past few moments of tenderness, she’d kinda got that idea.
“—but I just don’t know.”
He didn’t know? Didn’t know what? Hadn’t that been attraction pulsing between them not fifteen seconds earlier?
He backed away, crossing his arms, as if protecting himself from her. She couldn’t help but notice his biceps bulged. “I know I keep messing up. I probably shouldn’t have touched you like that. I don’t know what came over me.”
She drew her toiletries bag and her day’s clothes to cover her chest, wishing she had a way to cover her throat that wouldn’t look obvious.
“I guess it’s the fact I finally saw your scar properly and realized that whatever happened must have been so traumatic. And I made that stupid comment about it the other day. Anyway, I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”
Her pulse thundered in her ears. “It’s okay.”
“Is it?”
His gaze searched hers, a kind of desperation in the dark depths until she finally nodded.
His features relaxed. “I know I’m probably the last person you ever want to talk to about things, but if ever you’d like to talk, well, I can be a listening ear.”
Somehow she found herself wanting to tell him. The words burned in her chest, but a noise in the hall drew attention to Ellie, who was staring at them like she was watching a magic show.
“Ellie!” Lexi tried to move back, but she’d pretty much be pushing a hole through the wall. And from what she’d seen of this place, that might not be too difficult. Ellie had said the realtor had suggested the place needed new paint and carpet. Lexi was pretty sure it needed way more attention than that.
“What are you two doing?”
“Nothing,” Jackson said from his side of the hall.
“Talking,” Lexi said.
“Uh huh.” Ellie glanced between them, her upraised brows suggesting she wasn’t buying. “Sure didn’t look like that.”
Lexi swallowed, perversely pleased to see by his dipped Adam’s apple that Jackson was affected too. “I don’t know what you think you saw, but I’m going to bed.”
“Hmm. And Jackson’s going to have a cold shower. Am I right?”
“You’re annoying, that’s what you are,” he said.
Lexi bit back a smile, offered the siblings a goodnight, and finally moved past Jackson, taking care to not look at him at all. But when she went to close her door, she couldn’t help but notice he was still there in the hallway, his gaze on her door. Her mouth didn’t obey her brain, and she flashed him a smile.
He grinned back.
Her heart soared, the lightest it had been all week.
For all his denials and protests, she got the feeling that maybe, just maybe, Jackson Reilly might like her a little bit after all.
* * *
Jackson claspedhis hands behind his head as he stared up into darkness. He shouldn’t have touched her. He had to get away. But even lying here in the bunkhouse, putting a quarter mile’s worth of distance between them, wasn’t far enough. He couldn’t stop thinking about her, her lips, her curves, her scar. The unexpected joy of seeing her had filled him with a greedy rush of pleasure, something that had been happening more and more lately, his senses straining for her, hungry for her presence, her voice, her smile, her scent. And then to see her last night in his house, makeup free, hair damp, looking oddly vulnerable with nothing hiding that awful scar, he’d had the weirdest sense of wanting to kiss it better.
And now, after Ellie had busted them in that dangerous encounter in the hallway, he knew he couldn’t stay in the house too. Lexi’s reputation would never survive. So he’d put distance between them. Not that he’d ever be inclined to do anything ungentlemanly, but this way nobody could accuse him of such things.
So after Lexi had smiled at him from the door of Mitchell’s old room, and he’d done his best to explain to his sister that he hadn’t been trying to kiss Lexi—which was probably a lie, but he couldn’t explain his behavior himself—he’d grabbed a sleeping bag and his pillow and headed outside to the bunkhouse where he could be safe.
Except he wasn’t. For he couldn’t stop thinking about her. Wishing …
