Page 20 of The Destined SEAL
Try as I might, I can’t keep my eyes open another second. My eyes flutter closed, and I’m lost to a landslide of emotions. The overwhelming sense that I need to keep this. Keep her. Hold onto this feeling and never let it go. Some proverbial tappingon my shoulder, as if to remind me that this electric current streaming from her body to mine can’t be duplicated. All things that are deeply hidden are forced to light by a mere kiss from her lips.
Harper’s hands become more frantic as she tugs at my shirt, and my breathing speeds even as the warning bells start ringing in my head. Even as I envision us going too far, her small, creamy pale body underneath mine as I enter her in a swift, soul-searing thrust, I know I won’t do it.
“Hey,” I say, breaking the kiss. She’s inhaling and exhaling at warp speed, and her eyelashes are lowered. I push a tangle of long hair out of her face. “Hey,” I repeat.
She swallows, and wetness shines in her eyes. She’ll blink in a couple seconds, and the first tears will fall down her round, perfect cheeks. Three. Two. One. “I’m not even sorry! I kissed you like that, and I can’t even be sorry about it!” Harper wails.
I wince, because her voice is loud and screeching as her crying becomes more jagged.
I hear the guilt in her voice. I could tell her that it was just a kiss and that kisses only mean things to teenagers and actors on sitcoms, but we both know I’d be lying. That kiss left a black mark on my soul. With one arm, I pull her against my chest and cradle her head with the other. “It was just an act. It doesn’t have to mean anything.”
She calms under my touch as she mentally sifts for the rightness in my words. “Regardless of what you want it to be, I think we have an answer to our age-old question.”
She sniffles into the crook of my neck, and my cock jerks. Harper shifts, moving her knees so we aren’t lined up anymore. “What question?”
“You didn’t feel anything abnormal in that kiss, did you?”
She shakes her head. “Of course. I felt everything! It still doesn’t matter.”
“You’ll do the right thing even if it means giving this up forever?” My voice cracks, but I cover it with a deep swallow.
She’s the girl who turned Paulie R. in to the teacher when she saw him cheating in fourth grade, the woman who pays for her fountain drinks in her school cafeteria even though she works there. She’s the woman you want till death do you part. The saint. The angel. She’s my devil incarnate. My darkest, dirty secret. It will always be her.
“You’re with some dude right now. It’s not the end of the world. You break up with him, and we continue down our merry path.” Holding my hands out to the sides, I bring them together.
She leans away, her eyes wide. Slowly, as if realizing her mortal mistake in increments, she slides off my lap and backs away from me like I’m holding a live grenade. “I know who I am, and I’m not this type of woman, Ben,” she says, voice quavering. “This whole trip was a bad idea. We aren’t just friends anymore. Were we ever just friends? Have we been lying to ourselves all this time?”
Yes and no. It took extensive physical contact for her to see what I’ve known for quite some time. “Harper, please. You’re my best friend. You’ll always be my best friend.”
“When kisses feel like that, how can you look at me and call me your best friend? Your dick was literally begging like a dog to come out and play. My mouth waters when I think about your lips. This is a case of built-up sexual frustration.”
Her words are sharp—and true. “There are two options,” I say, smirking. She called my dick a dog. The smile is a necessity. First, it will keep the mood light, and second, she has an option to take my offer seriously or dismiss it as garbage. I explain, “You teach the old dog new tricks, and we get this out of our system.” Harper balks, as I knew she would. I continue, “Or we cool it. Take a break for a while. You throw yourself into school and whatever that stank-breath boy is called, and I’ll findsomeone. But this is your decision. Not mine. Not what I want. You need to understand this.”
If we were both thirty and in different places in our lives, maybe I would have laid out the proposition differently, thought about it longer, and been more thoughtful with my word choice. Harper has always been there. She’ll continue to be there. “I’m going to bed. You’re right. My flight is pretty early. Want me to sleep on the couch?” She leans away, on one foot, like she’s heading to my bedroom.
She took a fucking page out of my playbook and ignored my questions altogether.
“Of course not. Let’s go to bed.”
Harper crosses her arms under her chest, forcing her shirt to rise and expose a sliver of tight stomach. “Don’t make me sound like some immature child.”
“You said that, I didn’t.”
Rising from the sofa, I shift my semi-hard dick. Her gaze flits down and then quickly away. Harper licks her lips. She shifts from one foot to the other, deciding just how badly she’d rather sleep in a bed than out here on the couch. How virtuous can she be?
With a hand of fingers splayed in her face, she whispers, “Please don’t touch me. I can’t. I need to be me, and you are?—”
“Studly? Irresistible? Chess champion in three different divisions? I know. I know. Ladies can’t keep their hands off me.”
Sighing, she brings her hand to her chest. It’s still rising and falling quicker than it should. I’ve affected her more than I thought a mere kiss could. Marcus must be a loser, selfish asshole in the sack if I can get her this riled up. Or, it’s just us. My money is on us, and I’m not a gambling man.
“I’m serious, Benny. Just let me have some space tonight. I hate feeling so conflicted.”
I hold out my hands. “After you,” I say. “Everything is settled. I won’t ever touch you again. Not like that.”
Harper’s back straightens, and it reminds me of what happens when she’s scared. Not the type of scared that happens when you watch a scary movie. The kind that happens after you’ve taken an hour-long P.E. class full of verbal abuse and you can’t take much more without falling to pieces. I never wanted to see her like that, and if I had been a different man back in high school, I would have done more to protect her from cruel teenage ways. Now? I have the ability to protect her in every way, shape, and form, and she’s rejected it in favor of doing the right thing. I think.
She spins and faces me, one hand extended between us. “Friends,” she says.
