Page 42 of The Biker and the Gamer
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One evening, after getting home from work, sitting there and nursing a cold beer, waiting for Alec to come over as we’d planned earlier, my phone pings with a text.
The Gamer:Come outside.
I frown at the text, confused. Leyana has given him the code to the front gates and I keep the doors open when I know he’s coming over. He usually just walks right in, so his request is strange.
When I amble outside, phone still in hand, I see him standing on the other side of the pool, his hands dangling by his sides like a puppet, a body of water between us.
As I begin to move toward him, he holds up a hand. "Stay right there."
"What?" I glance around, wondering what the hell is going on. "Why?"
"Because we need to talk about this without you trying to deflect or distract me with sex."
Oh.
He's here to havethetalk.
Anxiety climbs in my veins and I immediately want to touch him, pull his head down to kiss me, wrap my legs around him, anything to shut him up. But I can’t. He’s too far away.
That's his plan.
I wrap my arms around myself instead and pretend to shiver. "It's cold. Let's go inside.”
"It’s the most humid night of the week, Kendra," he points out, politely calling me a liar.
But I truly am shivering. From fear. "Alec—"
"I'm in love with you," he blurts, shocking me. "I'm not sure when it happened. Maybe it was last night, maybe it was last week, maybe it’s since I first laid eyes on you. But thewhendoesn’t matter. What matters is this truth: I'm in love with you. So much that I don't know what to do with myself."
He takes a breath and shoves his fingers back through his hair, then repeats the action with the other hand, visibly anxious. “I know this is not what you want to hear. You just want to ‘hang’, and ‘chill’, for as long as it lasts. But I crave more than that from you. A real relationship. To make you mine. This,”—He gestures back and forth between us—“is not fulfilling for me. I want more. I want you, Kendra.Allof you.”
Shell-shocked and dumfounded, I just stare at him across the pool. He’s in love with me? When? How?Why?
I know whyIlove him: he’s the most interesting man I’ve ever known. The only man to ever make me aware of my heartbeat, aware of every pulse point in my body. The only man to ever make me want to bebetter.
But why on God’s green earth would he fall in love withme? I’m a terrible human. A people-hater. Mean and negative. EvenIhate me. Why would a good, awesome, amazing, brilliant person like Alec Vaughn subject himself to the tragedy of falling in love with me?
“Say something!” he half-shouts at me when all I do is stare at him. He looks as terrified as I feel.
“You’re leaving in a few days,” is all I manage to get out.
“Come with me.”
What I do next is impetuous and insensitive and the second I do it I wish I could take it back: I laugh. A loud, obnoxious cackle as I ask, “You’re joking, right?”
His expression falls. I’ve laughed in his face at something that probably took a lot out of him to ask me. It’s very Kendra Tisdale of me. Mean and insensitive. Though I truly didn’t mean to be this time.
“Why would I joke about something like that?”
“Dude, you’re asking me to give up my life to come and live yours,” I say, throwing my arms out. “What, you think because you’re rich I’m just gonna leave everything behind and follow you around, lapping at your heels? I’m not that kinda girl, Alec. Six weeks, and it’s like you don’t even know me at all.”
“I do know you,” he says as he begins moving around the pool to get to me. “And despite all that I know, the bad and the ugly, I’m still madly in love with you.”
The closer he gets to me, the more I back up. “No, you don’t. Because if you did, you’d know how much the people here mean to me, and that I would never, ever leave them. My life was rough, and for a long time, all I knew was Grunt and Scratch. And then there was Judge, and Cookie, and Onyx. And then there was Toni, and now Neo, and Leyana…None of them are blood, but these people aremy family, Alec. Bonds that've taken years to cultivate. Nothing is worth leaving them for.”
“Ouch,” he mouths, stopping in front of me.
