Page 54 of If Not for My Baby
“Of course,” he says quietly.
“And after everything…” I shake my head. “I don’t deserve your kindness.”
Tom’s enormous hands tense on the older car’s steering wheel. His palm could probably span the entire thing. “You think I’d stop looking out for you just because you don’t feel the way I do?” He sighs, but his eyes remain on the road. “I hate to think of the kind of lads you’ve known.”
That’s how good I am at this whole romantic human-interaction thing: we kiss, I reject him, (likely) puke on him, force him to drive me seven and a half hours across the country, and when he does something thoughtful or chivalrous I get sad and moody because I have feelings I don’t know what to do with. Mike must’ve had a will of steel to put up with me for as long as he did.
But avoiding Tom hasn’t changed those feelings. Neither did rejecting him, nor drowning them out with alcohol. Hasn’t this entire day shown me the way I feel for Tom isn’t changing despite how I try to run from it? What else am I supposed to do outside of just giving this thing between us a chance?
The lazy summer afternoon is slipping into dusk and painting the car’s interior a resplendent watermelon pink. Rays of honeyed light slant across Tom’s cheekbones, and he glows as if candlelit. Rhett Barber’s Ford is awash in the colors of my burgeoning admission.
When I can hardly take the rumbling silence a minute longer, I say, “I’m sorry, Tom.”
I know he knows what I’m referring to. “Stop that,” he commands gently. “None of that.”
“I was really cowardly—”
“Clem, don’t think for a moment—”
“I—” I’m about to dive off a cliff. “I have feelings for you, too.”
When Tom turns to face me his expression is as calm as always, but his broad hand has tightened on the wheel.
“A lot of them, actually,” I breathe. “So many it might be fracturing my brain. It’s definitely driving me to drink.”Tom’s lips quirk up at that, and I release a tiny portion of the air I’m holding in my lungs. “I’m not great at this, if you couldn’t tell. So you’ll have to be patient with me.”
“You’re in luck. I’m a very patient man.”
My blood thrums in my veins. “Good.”
Tom’s lip curls up in a half smile. “Grand.”
We whiz by a large stretch of mellow, breezy grassland. With one hand still on the wheel, Tom slips his other easily around my own, dwarfing it wholly. I wonder if he missed the contact as much as I had. My body is in direct contrast to the warm summer afternoon sprawling around us, rich with farm cottages and golden light. My limbs are tingling. All I can smell is his rain and leather and smoke scent. I want to run until I collapse to expel some of this heady energy. My hangover is nowhere to be found.
“I won’t kiss you again, Clementine,” he says, his thumb stroking lazily across my knuckles. “Even though it’ll require tremendous effort.” His voice has taken on a quiet roughness. “Especially when you’re givin’ me those enormous, needy eyes of yours as you were at the lighthouse.”
I blink, hyperaware of how my eyes have found his lips again. “Why not?”
“You’re in control. There’ll be no pressure from me, is all.”
“Thanks,” I say, disappointed though I know I shouldn’t be.
“Sure,” he replies, noncommittal. But I can hardly hear the word. His thumb has dragged from the backside of my hand to the inside of my palm. He’s running slow circles across my Heart line and up and down my fingers.
I feel each touch between my legs. When he brings those fingers to the inside of my wrist, I’m shocked to find myself fighting a gasp.
“So soft,” he hums, more to himself than me. His voice is like molasses when he speaks like that. Smooth and rich and thick. I want to lap it up, straight from his mouth. Swallow all his murmurs and grunts of approval.
His hand, still encircling my own, has worked its way onto my lap. We sit there, holding hands for a minute as he navigates a new freeway. I debate turning the radio back on to cut the tension but find it’s the last thing I want. I’d rather drown in the onslaught of all our shared desire.
His thumb skates easily over my thigh. Just a little semi-circle while he’s still holding my hand. The slow swishes of a windshield wiper in misting rain just above my knee.
And yet I am seeing stars. I’ve thought of little else besides his hands on me since we kissed all those nights ago. And now…those long fingers wrapped loosely around mine, that easily swiping thumb…it’s turning my borrowed clothes itchy against my skin. I’m the kind of turned on that physically hurts. In my palms, between my legs. I’msweating. I need—
“I think you should pull over,” I say, voice a mere rasp. “Just for a second.”
Tom says nothing, but I can see his throat bob as he registers my implication. His eyes blaze with something I haven’t yet seen as he maneuvers us seamlessly to the side of the rural highway road—his mastery of the one-handed lane change could have me chewing through iron.
The car is hardly in park before I’m climbing across the center console with about as much grace as someone regaining their sea legs. Tom doesn’t seem to care—he scoops me into his lap and my mouth finds his in mere seconds.
