Page 68 of If This is Love

His gaze flitted just above my head. “You don’t like calling yourself that?”

A lump swelled in my throat, but I swallowed it. “We weren’t allowed to call ourselves something like that.” I paused, realizing the words sounded a lot worse when I said them out loud to someone else. “I mean, at my old church, they just sort of discouraged words like that. We were supposed to focus on life not death. So it was like, even if your spouse passed, you were still married to them.” I darted my eyes away from his and forced an awkward laugh. “It got a bit extreme, which is why I had to leave, but yeah. Now it’s more like a habit that I don’t call myself that.”

“So what do you call yourself instead?”

My brows drew together, and my gaze settled absently on his mouth. “Actually, I don’t think I call myself anything. I just don’t have my husband anymore. I’m just alone.”

I couldn’t look away from his mouth and couldn’t stop thinking about what his lips would feel like against mine.

“Do you feel alone right now?” Every subtle movement of his lips as they formed the words hypnotized me.

“No.” My eyes lifted naturally to his. “But I did this morning. And I came over here because I don’t like that something happened that made you feel like I wouldn’t want to see you today. Because I’m really not just taking pity on you, Gabe. I like being around you.”

He slowly, timidly lowered his forehead to just brush against mine and repeated my words back to me, “I like being around you, too.”

And then… there was just no stopping myself. That pang of endearment for him in my heart was rattling so hard and loud, and it was like an itch that could only be reached by tipping forward and settling my mouth on his. His lips were somehow even softer than I even imagined, and I got completely lost in the feeling and him, and mygod.

This was like sweet liberation I’d never felt.

Both of my hands had traveled to his face, my fingers nestling in his densely bearded cheeks, and his scent was drowning me. It was a combination of sandalwood, leather, and citrus, and he tasted like something that I couldn’t even place. It was just his own breath and essence that came together in a flavor that felt like something I’d been longing for my whole life, and now that I had it, I didn’t want to let it go.

And I kissed him, and kissed him, and kissed him, and his big, strong arms closed around me, and it was pure heaven for about three seconds, until a strange, loud, jarring squawk ripped through the heady, sensual atmosphere.

“Fuck! Shit! Oh nooo…!”

Gabe and I pulled away from each other and turned to see Luke standing in the front doorway basically frozen in place with his hands clutching his hair and staring at us with huge gray eyes. He stood like that long enough for all three of us to silently acknowledge exactly what was happening—yes, Luke totally just caught Gabe and me secretly smooching, and I totally wanted to disappear—and then he frantically spun around and darted back outside, throwing the door shut behind him.

“Oh my fucking god, I can’t believe I just did that,” Luke’s moaning, wailing voice carried through from the other side of the door, and yeah.

This was utterly mortifying, but it wasway betterthanothertimes someone had caught me alone with a man, and at least it washere. At least it wasjust Luke. At least there wasn’t areal reasonfor my entire body to be shaking with terror and shame right now. At least Luke wasn’t about to grab me by my hair and drag me flailing and screaming to stand in front of five hundred people to confess my sins thatweren’t even sins.

At least when I left this house, Luke wouldn’t try to keep me here by slapping my face.

“Ruth,” Gabe’s voice suddenly cut through the fog of my mind, and I had to blink myself back to where I really was. His beautiful, rugged palm was slowly waving in front of my face. “Ruth, can you hear me, honey?”

I blinked my eyes back into focus and realized he was holding the side of my arm, and I was looking at his face. I remembered the day I met him, waking up on the sidewalk and thinking he was one of the Lord’s mighty archangels, and then realizing how silly that was, but somehow, he felt more like that than ever now. And he was so endeared to me that the pang in my heart just never even stopped anymore. And I’d just kissed him when I honestly didn’t know if I should have or not, and Luke caught us, and something that should’ve been sweet and as endearing as the feelings I had for him just felt wrong and sordid and reminded me of everything I lost.

“Yeah,” I managed to say, giving my head a little shake and rubbing my eyes. “I think I might’ve blinked out a little, too.”

Gabe and I just looked at each other, and he had a little crinkle of concern between his dark brows. “Are you okay?”

I nodded just as Luke wailed again on the other side of the door, sounding even more pitiful. “Yeah, I’m okay.” I smiled, nodding my head over my shoulder. “I should go so you can help him. I’ll get the casserole dish another time.”

He gave the subtlest roll of his eyes, but the corner of his mouth tipped up with a little smile. “Yep. Thanks for that. And for coming by.” He offered a dignified nod. “And I’ll see you tomorrow at our usual time.”

I gave him a shaky nod back. “I’m looking forward to it.” I glanced around the room for Jax and saw him curled up on the rug. “Come on, you big baby.” I patted the side of my thigh, and he leaped up to follow me to the door.

Pausing with my hand on the doorknob, I turned to Gabe, but sheepishness kept me from looking up at him. “You didn’t do anything wrong. You don’t make me uncomfortable. Ever. Things in my life make me uncomfortable.” Only then did I find the courage to look at his eyes, and they looked prettier but also sadder than I could remember. “So don’t go overthinking anything and skipping our run.”

He held up two fingers. “Scout’s honor.”

I smiled and waved quickly before he could see how much I was shaking. Opening the door, I found Luke sitting on the top step, hunched over his lap while he rocked and groaned and gripped his hair.

I had to laugh a little as I passed him, and that calmed my frayed nerves a bit. “Luke,” I said with a small laugh and a friendly pat on his shoulder. “You really are just such a special guy, you know that?”

“I’m so fucking sorry, Ruth,” he mumbled. “Jesus fucking Christ, why am I like this?”

“It’s all fine, friend.” I patted him again, and Jax paused to sniff Luke’s hair before we both stepped down the path to my car.

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