All She Ever Wanted - Barbara Freethy [65]
"It didn't feel gone a moment ago," he muttered.
She pulled away from him, smoothing down her wrinkled blouse, as if she could erase the memory of his hands on her breasts. But in truth they were still tingling, just as her lips were still burning and her stomach still churning with desire and need. Not that she'd tell him that.
Cole sat back in his seat, his hands resting now on the steering wheel, but he made no attempt to start the car. "It meant a lot to me, Natalie, that night in the car, that Christmas, and the other times, too. It was never just sex with you. I want you to know that."
She drew in a sharp breath, feeling dangerously close to losing it. "We should go, right now, and you should stop talking before you say something you regret."
He turned his head to look at her. "I wasn't honest with you before, Natalie."
"Cole, I don't want to get into it now."
"We have to. Dylan said something to me yesterday at the club, about how I'd made it clear to you that it was over between us and how you wouldn't let go. That wasn't the way it was." He paused. "I know now that I was sending you mixed signals back then. I had too many balls up in the air. I was lying to my father about my career plans, trying to set up that job overseas so I could present it to him as a done deal. I was lying to my mother about getting an apartment in San Francisco, and I was avoiding Em, so she wouldn't see how much lying I was doing. Worse, I was lying to myself, pretending that you and I were just a casual thing, because if I let myself believe it was more, maybe I wouldn't want to go on with my plans. Maybe you'd somehow suck me into a life I didn't want."
"I guess my telling you I loved you didn't help," she said, suddenly understanding so much more.
"Love has so many strings, Natalie. I was afraid I'd get tangled up in those strings and never find my way out."
"So you cut them."
"I wish I had cut them, but we both know I just kept giving you more and more slack, confusing you with my intentions."
"Hoping I'd eventually let go. But I can be as persistent as you when I want something, and I wanted you," she said. "I couldn't see past that. I wish you'd told me this before. I thought I was doing something wrong." And she'd driven herself crazy trying to second-guess Cole, trying to figure out how she'd screwed up the best thing in her life.
"You weren't doing anything wrong. I was a stupid kid back then. I didn't know how to break up with a woman. I didn't know how to call a halt, slow things down, so I just avoided it."
She thought about that for a moment and had to ask. "Have you really changed, Cole? For a newsman, you're remarkably unskilled in the art of communication."
He gave her a self-condemning smile as he nodded his head in agreement. "You're right. I still don't like to make the breakup speech. It's awkward and uncomfortable."
"And it's not awkward to stay with someone you don't care about?"
"I keep busy," he said with a shrug. "Something else you and I have in common, Natalie. And I don't recall you making the big breakup speech with me, either. What happened to equal rights?"
"I didn't want to break up with you, you stupid man," she said in exasperation. "I was madly in love with you, although God knows why. You were impatient, short-tempered, and annoying."
"Come on, tell me what you really think," he said with a laugh that was irresistibly contagious. After a long, pointed glare, Natalie found herself smiling, then chuckling, finally laughing right along with him. It was a welcome release to the emotional tension of the day, and something they both needed.
"I'm glad we cleared the air," he said as he started the car. "I guess it's time to move on."
"I guess it is." She took one last look at her childhood house and knew she would never come back. One ghost had been laid to rest. It was time to get rid of the rest of them.
Chapter 11
Malone was not