Page 60 of Bronco

“So leaving it alone is probably the right thing to do.”Uh, what?My libido is not a happy camper right now, but I feel likehe wants to be let off the hook. For the first time since I’ve known him, Bronco looks uncomfortable.

“Exactly.” The words are like poison because I don’t believe a word of it.

I shouldn’t have kissed him! Then I’d be none the wiser to how freaking amazing his mouth feels.Imagining his hands on me? That is pure torture.

Shit, shit, shit! When did I begin crushing big time on my best friend?

Then again, he did bring up the whole fuck buddy subject, not that I like that term, but I guess it describes the situation perfectly. Not that I’ll ever get to find out.

“One person may feel something the other one doesn’t, then things get weird,” he says, the final nail in the coffin. Meaning,me?

He stares at me as I avoid his gaze, busying myself at the coffee machine as I froth the milk. Thank God I have this as a distraction, otherwise, I may very well just will the ground to swallow me whole. I try not to notice every single inch of him, but that’s a little hard. He’s so fucking sexy standing there in his sweats, his cap back on, and he has this kinda lost puppy look about him. It’s making my insides turn to jelly.

“And you’re totally right. When feelings come into play, things can get weird,” I prattle on.You also don’t want to be the one being rejected. “We’d get deeper into it, and one of us would probably want out, or we’d meet someone else and then complicate things even more. One-night hook ups rarely work, not if you’re friends.”

“Sounds like you’ve put some thought into it.”

“Well, like you said before, how many couples remain friends after they’ve had sex? Not many, I’ll bet.”

He doesn’t say anything, but he’s also not smiling like his usual self. He’s just watching me carefully. I didn’t know kissing him would throw us this off course.

Eventually he speaks. “You’re right on all counts, which rests my case, and the whole reason why I told Nevada the exact same thing.”

“Or.” I swallow hard. I just can’t seem to shut the hell up. Without thinking, I power on. “We could just do it and have no feelings, no emotions, just enjoy the sex.”

It’s a bold statement, one I’m not sure that I mean in its entirety.

Even though he hasn’t moved a muscle, I know something between us has changed. He just won’t admit it.

“No feelings or emotions?”

I know it sounds cold, but it’s pretty much a regurgitation of what he already said, and a part of me needs to know if he’s just wanting a way out. Maybe the kiss threw him off? If that’s the case, then it’s pretty pathetic. I’m a big girl, I can take the truth.

“Yeah, I mean, we care about each other, but it’s not like I’m asking you to marry me in the morning.” Oh, no. I’m babbling. I sound like a desperate, pathetic, horny chick who is too scared to ask her best friend to bone her. And maybe I am. I don’t want things to change between us, but I feel the desire deep within me to know what it would be like to be in his arms for one night. “It’d be one night, theoretically.”

“Just sex?” He takes a seat at the counter.

“Yep.” I pop the ‘p’, getting a little annoyed, truth be told. Okay, I get the idea he wants no strings attached, but I thought he’d have a few more words.

“Huh.”

Embarrassment floods through me. “Clearly by the look on your face, and your body language, I’ve just poured cold wateron the fire.” I’m assuming there was fire, but maybe I imagined that, too?

“It’s not that?—”

“Then what is it?” I continue to make the hot chocolates, the humiliation point is fast approaching.I’ve made the wrong decision. I’m such an idiot for propositioning him like that.

“It’s like you said; it could ruin what we have.” His voice is low, defeated, and that just highlights how dumb this entire thing was to begin with.

“Okay, I get it, you don’t want to. It’s fine, Bronc.”

His eyes darken somehow when I slide his drink over to him. I stand still in my tracks, trying to gauge where this is going. “It isn’t that I don’t want to.”Wow. Just wow.

“But you’re a man,” I finish for him. “Apparently the only one who doesn’t think with his dick, because that’s how all other men think, right?”

“So, you want me to think with my dick,Princess?Is that it? Cause I can do that without even blinkin’.”

“That’s not what I meant, and here we are fighting about it already. Case in point.”

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