Page 59 of Jam and Jingle Bells
I gripped his hand in both of mine. “I didn’t need finessing. I needed honesty and that’s what you offered. I love you, Ellis. I may not know where to go from here, but I know that much.”
He raised one brow and shifted to see me better. “Maybe you could let me be your boyfriend?”
Boyfriend?
“Don’t look so petrified, Addie,” he teased. “It’s usually the next step after saying I love you.”
I nodded, my head on a string. “I know, I guess it just took me by surprise. The last boyfriend I had didn’t work out so well. I was with him for years and never once told him I loved him. How screwed up is that?”
“Did you love him?” he asked, one brow furrowed to his nose.
“It’s taken me a lot of years to understand that I didn’t love him. I always held back part of my heart. Something was off but I didn’t know what.”
“My guess is you eventually found out and it wasn’t good,” he whispered, resting back on the pillow and brushing the hair off my forehead.
I cleared my throat and stared at my hands. “I stumbled across him and my best friend making out in the woods one night. It turned out they’d been sleeping together the entire time we’d been together.”
He let out a breath as though he’d been punched. “Addie,” he whispered, “look at me.”
I couldn’t look at him. That age-old shame, pain, embarrassment, and regret filled me and tears leaked from my eyes.
I shook my head and wiped my face on my shoulder. “You can’t begin to imagine the embarrassment that came from knowing I wasn’t good enough for him.”
“No, sweetheart, he wasn’t good enough for you,” he said quietly from the bed.
“I don’t think so, Ellis. Clearly, I wasn’t satisfying him in bed since he had to go on the side and get it somewhere else. He said he wanted to sleep with a black woman because we were supposed to be animals in bed. Apparently, I wasn’t.”
“Addie, look at me.”
I forced my gaze off my hands and to his bed where he’d scooted to the edge. “It wasn’t you, sweetheart. He couldn’t fulfill something inside himself. That’s not on you, that’s on him. What happened after you broke up?”
“I stopped dating and he kept seeing my ex-best friend.”
“And found a new side number?” he asked, grasping my hand even though I refused to make eye contact.
“That’s what I heard. Can’t confirm since I cut them out of my life. They moved to Saginaw because half of this town wanted to kill them when they found out what was going on. And before you say it, he was dating me first. He started sleeping with her after I introduced them.”
He wrapped his hand around my wrist and held me still. “I would never, ever say or assume that you were the side girl. You’re not a side girl. You’re the main attraction, and you’re my girl now. Do you understand? I care about what happened with him only because he hurt you and that will be a constant reminder to me not to do the same. He’s ancient history. I’m here now and I’m going to love you the way a boyfriend should, completely and with everything I have. Oh, and for the record, I don’t buy that you aren’t good in bed. I can’t keep my hands off you and we haven’t even gotten that far. I can’t even fathom what it will be like to have you wrapped around me. Maybe the difference is, sex is just sex until the heart is involved. I’m totally in love with you and once the heart gets involved, then it’s—”
“Making love,” I whispered. “By that definition then I suppose I’ve never made love to anyone.”
He smiled and his eyes were glassy but bright and hungry. “Then let’s be each other’s first, okay? If you can’t use the word boyfriend, I’ll understand, just promise me that you can see me as more than a friend.”
I stood and hugged him carefully, pressing a kiss to his neck, my heart filled with blinding love for him. “I’m not afraid of the word, Ellis. I’m afraid of getting hurt. Are you going to hurt me?”
His arm tightened around my back and he kissed his way up my jawline to my ear. “I would take a bullet for you, Addie. I would give up my life so you could keep living yours. I would fight someone twice my size to protect you. You know how Mason loves Mel and Shep loves Ivy?” he asked, stroking my back with one finger. It was soothing and erotic at the same time. I nodded and he kissed me again before he answered. “That’s how I love you.”
I held him to me, my face buried in his neck while I took shaky breaths of acceptance. “You must really love me then because those two guys would do anything for their girls.”
He kissed my temple with his warm lips. “And I’d do anything for mine. I’ll even call her Addie and nothing else until she’s comfortable taking each new step.”
I laughed softly as I snuggled into his side. “You can call me whatever you want, but I’m going to call you my boyfriend,” I whispered, kissing his lips for a moment.
When I gazed up at him he was grinning. “And I’m going to call you my girl, forever and always.”
I parked the car under the overhang and put my hand on his arm. “Wait for me to come around, okay?”
He eyed me and I was grateful to see they were back to twinkling. “I can walk, Addie. You heard the doctor, activity as tolerated.”
