Page 41 of Second Draft

“If you want to stay here and watch over me, then I can’t stop you. But I don’t know what you want from me. I can’t–” My breath catches on a small sob that I can’t hold back.

Carter pulls me against his chest and buries his face in my hair, hushing me like a child that needs comforting.

I want to push him away. I need to push him away. But I can’t. All I can do is melt into his embrace and take all the strength and comfort he’s offering.

“I’m…” I gulp in a breath, clutching the hem of his t-shirt in my fists and resting my forehead against his chest. “I’m so confused. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“I don’t want anything that you’re not ready or willing to give.” His palms are on my face, fingers tangled in the back of my hair, and he uses his thumbs to force my chin up to look at him. “I’m not pressuring you. I just want to be here. For you. For this baby. That’s all.”

More tears stream down my cheeks, and my chest tightens. “It’s too hard.”

“What is?”

“Being with you. Touching you.” There’s the truth. Right out in the open. And there’s no taking it back.

His lips twitch up slightly.

“It’s not funny.” I frown up at him.

“No. It’s not.” His grin gets a little bigger, even though I can tell he’s trying to hold it back.

I push on his chest, but he doesn’t let me go. “Then why are you smiling.”

“Because you want me.” He brushes the tears off my cheek with the pads of this thumb and smiles down at me. “I’ll let you in on a little secret.” He leans down, so that his lips brush against the shell of my ear, and whispers, “I want you too.”

A shiver races across my skin.

I pinch my eyes closed, trying to think of anything other than the way he’s holding me, making my body crave him in ways I never thought possible.

“I’m not going to hurt you.” His thumb strokes across my bottom lip.

“You don’t know that.”

“I’m not like my brother. I won’t take off the minute it gets hard. I know what I’m getting into.”

He doesn’t even know the half of it. It’s not just this baby or the stuff with Travis. There are things in my past that broke me, and after seven years, I’m not sure I’ll ever heal.

Maybe he has some hero complex. Wanting to save the damaged and broken damsel in distress.

“I don’t need saving if that’s what this is about.” I may be damaged, but I don’t need a man to make everything better in my life. Even if that man is Carter Bennett.

I put my hands on his chest to push away, but he captures my wrists.

“That’snotwhat this is about.” He tilts his head close to mine, gaze boring into mine. “Don’t push me away.”

Too late. My walls are already up.

“Maybe you’ve got some white knight complex, but I can take care of myself. I always have.”

“Do I look like a white knight, Layla?” His voice is intense, his gaze daring.

I blink up at him. The ink that covers his skin, the dark scruff that shadows his jaw, the piercing blue eyes that scream danger. No, he looks more like the bad boy ready to break my heart than the hero of childhood fantasies. But inside I know he’s more than that. He’s good. And honest. And I so don’t deserve him.

“How can you want this?” I spit out, using my frustration as a weapon against him.

“I wantyou.That’s all that matters.” The seductive tone of his voice winds through me like liquid heat, warming my blood, and sending a thrill racing down my spine, straight to my core.

Unconcealed desire thrums between us with scorching intensity, so strong I can’t deny it even if I tried. It’s been building since the first night we met. I’ve tried to push it down. To think that maybe it was just me. Now he’s voiced the truth, and there was no turning back from that.

---