Laid Bare - Lauren Dane [37]
“I love you, Erin.”
She could not love him. Would not. The price was too damned high! She had to close her eyes again because tears welled up. Too late, too late, because she knew she loved him too, had for years, and it had lain dormant in her heart until she saw him in her café just weeks before.
Shit.
He kissed each eyelid. “I know it might seem sudden but it’s not really. We’ve known each other ten years. You fit in the empty spaces just right. There’s a spot in my life that’s your size. Don’t say anything just now. Let me take you to dinner. Let me love you. The rest is what’s important. Not words, but deeds.”
If he’d been harsh or hurt, if he’d demanded an answer, she could have resisted. But this gentleness was not something she could deal with.
So she nodded and allowed him to help her up.
He insisted on holding her hand as they walked over to Fourth and Virginia, to Lola.
He pulled her chair out for her, then moved his next to hers instead of across. His arm rested at her back, at the top of the chair, and he smelled so good she wanted to eat him up.
“What’s good here? The only place Tom Douglas had when I lived here before was the Dahlia Lounge.” He grinned at her before brushing a strand of hair back that had stuck to her lip gloss.
“Most everything. First of all we have to get fresh pita. It comes with all these different spreads and it’s really delish. I’m having a tagine, but the kabobs are yummy too. It all is, I promise.”
They ordered, and when the bread arrived, she automatically made him a plate, laughing and asking him what he liked and didn’t. When she placed the plate in front of him and looked into his eyes, she jolted a moment.
“Are you mad?”
He brushed a thumb over her collarbone, ever so softly as he shook his head. “No. I love when you do that. When you take care of me. It’s,” he licked his lips, searching for words, “it gets to me.”
“Th-thank you. That’s a lovely thing to say.” She didn’t say more, because she liked taking care of him. A lot.
She couldn’t love Todd Keenan. Period. The cost of loving people was losing them, and she could not bear it again. It was too late not to love her brothers, but she needed to put the kibosh on this love thing for Todd right then.
Fucking—hell yes. Loving—hell no. She didn’t have the time to love anyone else. Her love bill was full. He needed a woman who was whole and not fucked up. She was not that woman.
12
Todd walked back with her, loving the way the breeze ruffled the bottom of her dress. Her hair, so shockingly pink, looked like soft cotton candy. He nearly laughed aloud at the thought that he’d ever find such a description romantic, much less beautiful, but there it was.
On her it all worked. Because she was simply one of a kind. One of a kind and nervous as the shadows had lengthened into night.
She’d jumped several times as sudden laughter or talking drifted from a doorway, from the fronts of the cafés and stores marking their route back to her building.
Her eyes cut left and right and her spine vibrated with tension.
This was not the woman he’d fucked in an alley ten years ago. That woman had been totally fearless and he ached for whatever had happened to her to rob her of that.
“Why don’t you tell me what happened?” he asked gently as he led her into her house and helped her out of her sweater.
“What do you mean?” She toed out of her shoes and set them on a wooden rack near the door and he followed suit.
“I know a little bit about the attack. Not a lot. I know you lost a child. Tell me what makes you jump at shadows.”
She turned. He noted her knuckles on the hand holding her bag had gone white.
“I don’t want to talk about it. Yes, I lost a child. I nearly died. You can imagine the rest.”
She had no fucking idea. Todd worked to keep himself relaxed, even as his body wanted to go and pick her up, force her to tell him and hold her forever. “I can, and it scares the shit out of me. Share it. You can trust me to catch you when you fall.”
She took a step back