Page 46 of Long Road Home

“I’ll be up in a few minutes.”

His thumb swiped my cheek again and his eyes dropped to my mouth. That hand on the back of my neck flexed, tightening his grip and he finally blew out a breath. “Take all the time you need.”

He stepped back and left. But his unsaid words were as loud as his spoken ones.

Take all the time you need to get used to this.

Take all the time you need to decide.

Take all the time you need…because I’m not going anywhere.

I endedup following Jordan upstairs that night and I watched the two of them play video games for hours until I more than gently suggested it was time for Toby and me to get home. At the door to Jordan’s house, there was that moment…that awkward moment where something sweet and hopeful, perhaps something playful could be said.

Instead, all I managed was a quiet and strange, “Thanks for dinner. It was a lovely evening,” as I brushed past Jordan, his hand on the doorframe giving me no room to pass him without brushing my chest against his.

Based on the smirk he gave me, chuckling at how very, not-adorably awkward I was making everything, he’d totally planned for that to happen.

“Yeah, lovely,” was all he’d said, the edges of his full light pink lips tilting slowly up at the corners.

It was now two days later, and I’d thought of those lips more than humanly healthy.

I thought of them on my mouth, my neck, that spot on my shoulder he once found that drove me crazy. For the last forty-eight hours I was a walking zombie, but instead of needing brains for survival, I was surviving on memories of Jordan’s mouth and his hands and his body.

It was my fuel. And for the first time in a decade, there was a very real possibility it might not be a fantasy.

It could potentially be reality.

That was terrifying.

I couldn’t screw it up again. I couldn’t.

Another vision of Jordan, this time younger, hit me and I closed my eyes.

His hands shook as they pressed to my sides. We were on his ranch, hidden by rocks and boulders down by the creek and we’d been kissing like we’d been doing for weeks…but this…this was something else. His hands trembled as they slid closer to my hips, farther up, grazing beneath my breasts that changed when he kissed me so perfectly.

He asked me if it was okay, right before pressing up my shirt to expose my stomach and his head bent, lips brushed my navel.

The pleasure had been so intense, that initial sting I didn’t know was arousal. Everything inside of me sparked and sizzled in such a beautiful, “this must be what sex feels like,” sort of way.

I’d learn months later how much more incredible actual sex was.

“Shit,” I mumbled. I slammed my laptop closed. Work was impossible with Jordan on my brain. If I kept working on a website I was creating, there was a too real possibility the logo I was working on for a law firm would include a giant penis.

I’d barely managed to finish anything all day on it. Enough was enough. Forcing my creativity to happen when I wasn’t only stuck on Jordan’s lips and skills was bad enough.

The biggest distraction was when he’d been on his back deck and so plainly stated, “I’ll get there.” So surely spoken, not a waver in his words or the focus in his eyes.

Almost like it was a done deal.

A girl could hope. But that still sent me back to the fact that this was my breach to heal and repair and I only had weeks to get moving.

Procrastinating or running wasn’t an option this time.

“Hey, Toby!” I shouted, pushing away from where I’d set up my makeshift office at the dining table. “Let’s go get some food.”

No response came from him which meant he had his headphones on, probably gaming with friends back home.

I headed up there and knocked on his room. His voice came through the door and I waited a beat and knocked again, and when he still didn’t answer, I opened it.

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