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I opened my mouth, about to tell him that he needed to leave, but my mouth snapped closed, my eyes soaking him all in as he pulled items out of my grocery bags and placed them on the small dining table in here. He did it so effortlessly, the muscles in his forearms tensing with each movement, the tattoos dancing over his skin.
Why was it that every time I saw Rafael, I always had groceries with me?
“You don’t have to do that,” I told him, my voice sounding off.
“No biggie.” He grinned, the kind of grin someone who was up to no good would give you. “I used to help Mom all the time when I got the groceries.”
“When you got the groceries?” I asked, confused by the way he’d said that.
Raf paused, a darkness exploding over his face that made me want to take ten leaps backward so that I was away from him, but my body stayed put, my gut knowing that it wasn’t because of me as to why he was looking like that.
“Yeah. Mom…she…never got out much.” He shook his head, blinking rapidly, then looked down, pulling the last item out of one of the bags. He opened a cupboard, searching inside, most probably trying to figure out where everything went, and I…I didn’t stop him.
It was both comical watching him but also comforting. From the first moment I’d met Raf, there was just…something, about him. Something that made me feel…safe.
Safe.
I felt my chest cave at the word pinging around in my brain. I hadn’t truly felt safe in a very long time, not since it had been just me and my big brother.
“Peyton? Peyton?” I snapped my head up. “Where do these go?”
Raf held up a box of cereal in the air, waving it like a soldier would a white flag when he was surrendering.
“I got it.” I leaped forward, taking it from his hand, then reaching around him. He didn’t move though, just stayed put as I had to push against him to get to the right cupboard. Raising a brow, I turned to face him, sliding the cereal box onto the correct shelf. “You could move you know.”
His lips lifted into a smirk, that knowing look on his face. “Why would I want to do that?” His tongue came out and swiped along his bottom lip. “Do you have any idea how beautiful you are?” he murmured, lifting his hand and placing some hair behind my ear. He was so close that I knew if I took a breath too deep, I’d be touching him.
“Raf,” I whispered. I swore I’d said his name a hundred times in the last thirty minutes, but each and every time the word left my mouth, his eyes would flash.
“Yeah, mama?” He pushed closer, backing me up until I was flush against the countertop.
“You…”
“I?”
His eyes swirled with mischief, pulling me in unlike anything else ever had.
“You’re too young,” I blurted out.
He raised a brow, tilting his head to the side. “Age is just a number, mama.”
I snorted. “No it’s not. I’m thirty years old, Raf. You’re too young…” I trailed off, biting down on my bottom lip as I stared up at him.
“And I’m twenty.” He shrugged like it didn’t matter. And maybe it didn’t.
My stomach swirled as my gaze connected with his. I shouldn’t have been looking at him like that. I shouldn’t have wanted him to look at me the way he was. There were a whole host of reasons why: he was ten years younger than me; I was a single mom; I was on the run from my husband.
But…I couldn’t bring myself to care about a single one of them as he dipped his head down, bringing his face level to mine and his lips only centimeters away.
“Say the word,” he growled out. “Say the word and I won’t touch you.” He paused, searching my eyes as he waited. There was no way I was going to say a single thing, not now, not ever. His hand moved to the side of my face, holding me in place. “Last chance.”
I pulled in one last breath, telling myself that I was ready.
But it was a lie.
The biggest lie I’d ever told myself.
Because as Raf’s lips pressed against mine, I knew I was done for. I knew nothing would ever be the same again.
