Page 71 of The Catch

“It’s just that for the first time, this is starting to feel like you and I aren’t doing the same thing.”

“I didn’t mean what I said, Josh. I had no right to hold your past over your head while I’m still sorting through mine. I love you. We are absolutely doing the same thing.”

Josh sighed heavily, dropping his face into his hands. “Look, you were right about some of it,” he offered like the grown-up that he was. “I was rushing you after I said I wouldn’t.”

“You weren’t rushing me.” This was her chance. Dani was right. She needed to meet him halfway. She hadn’t put an ounce of skin in the game yet, and that was about to change. This was what he wanted, and it only took one night for her to realize that losing him was not an option. “Josh, I don’t want to hold us back anymore,” she said, lacing their fingers and squeezing. “I want this. I want all of it. Ask me again.”

Twenty-seven

They say that sometimes silencecan be louder than words. This was one of those times.

Josh’s lips parted then snapped shut, his gaze dropped from her face and landed like a stone in the empty space between them. She heard her answer loud and clear.

“Cat…” His voice was full of pity, and she wasn’t sure if it was for her or for himself.

“It’s okay. I understand. I—”

“I will ask you again, Cat.” He reached out to cup her cheek and kissed her forehead. “But not today. I can’t wake up one morning and find you changed your mind too. That’s the thing that scares me. So I’m gonna give you more time.”

Cat swallowed hard, nodding against his palm. She deserved that. She didn’t want more time. She knew that now, but what could she say?Please? You can trust me. Let me move into your house so you can pin all of your hopes on me. I promise never to hurt you again.Who would believe her after this? She wouldn’t believe herself.

“I love you, Josh,” she said. No matter what happened next, she knew that for sure.

Josh wrapped his arm around her waist, tugging her onto his lap. “I love you too. I don’t want to fight with you. I don’t want to do this again.”

“I don’t either.”

He brushed his nose against hers, then his lips in the kind of slow kiss that made all of her limbs feel loose and liquid.

“It’s still so early,” she whispered, nodding toward his bedroom.

Josh laughed, a full and genuine laugh against the hollow of her throat, and relief started to bloom inside her chest.

“You wanna go back to bed?” He scooped his hands under her thighs and stood. Cat laughed too, and the uncertainty in his eyes disappeared, his pupils going black with the kind of intensity she was used to. She used to fidget nervously whenever he would trap her in it. There was so much feeling there, so much emotion right at the surface, that her heart would race, and her skin would flush under his stare. Now, though, she reveled in it, setting herself firmly in his sights and waiting to be beamed into him.

Josh carried her down the hallway to his bedroom, dropping her in the middle of his mattress. He lowered himself above her, hovering just shy of pressing with all of his weight.

“I missed you last night,” she said as she reached between them to unbuckle his belt.

He helped her, then reached for her shirt. They both tugged until she was free of it, then he moved to her jeans, helping her kick them off. All of the anger and fear from the night before was simmering into something else, and her skin was prickling with the electricity of it.

“I missed you too.”

“Show me.”

His hand fell between them, fitting perfectly between her thighs, and she almost burst into tears at the sensation of having him back. Being with Josh wasn’t like being with other men. He made an impression, one she was sure was permanently part of her now. Like a scar but happier, something there wasn’t a word for. Whatever it was, she was never walking away from it again.

She clung to him a little desperately, fingertips and thighs squeezing around him until he could barely move. He stopped kissing her neck and looked into her eyes. “You okay?”

It had been a long time since he’d asked her that, and the whole of how they got to this place flashed before her eyes. “Yeah, baby,” she whispered. “I’m okay.”

She wanted to ask him if he was okay. If they were okay, but the shake in his voice when he spoke again told her the answer was “not yet.”

“Tell me you’re still mine, Cat,” he said. His eyes were begging for a promise that he could believe in. He needed to hear it now when she was open and exposed beneath him, and their bodies were so close that a lie could never fit between them. She wished like hell she’d never made him question it.

“I’m yours, Josh.” She slipped her fingers into his hair, pulling lightly, and looked at him with all of the devotion and love she felt pulsing through her blood. “I’m right here.”

Josh kissed her temple, blowing a relieved breath into her ear. “Me too,” he said. “I’m right here too.”

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