Page 28 of Tinder Embrace
Sophie: Are you forking kidding me right now?
He'd sent me a freaking cliché from fifteen feet away. A couple of kisses didn't make a relationship, and he'd already essentially turned me down.
Sophie: Rude.
Sophie: Fork off.
Chapter 12
Davis
Every time I thought I had a handle on what the fuck I was doing, I bobbled it. I paced my room, disgusted with myself. Sophie was the most beautiful, caring woman I’d ever met. She seemed to see something she liked in my antisocial ass, and all I could do was fuck it up.
I yanked my door open, needing to see her in person, regretting trying to reassure her via text. But my track record keeping my head in her presence wasn’t so hot.
I bypassed her door, beelining for the bathroom instead at the last second, where I splashed water on my face from the sink. I shook the droplets off like a dog, snorting. Like a little cold water could wake me from the spell she had me under.
I examined the man frowning fiercely in the mirror. I needed a haircut. And a shave. Maybe a personality transplant if I was going to attempt a real relationship with Sophie.
Sighing, I tried to see what she saw in me. Lines bracketed my eyes from squinting against the sun out in the fields. My ex had called my mouth “sensuous” when she was feeling kind, but it didn’t have the permanent tilt at the corners, like I was on the edge of laughing. Sophie’s mouth did. The last thing I wanted to do was sully her sweetness with my sour self.
I braced against the sink.
She deserved better. But I couldn’t stay away.
I couldn’t let her think that she was anything less than amazing.
Filled with renewed purpose, I stalked to her door, pausing in front of the solid wood.
What was I thinking? I should leave her alone. Her last text couldn’t have been clearer. She was done with me.
But I wouldn’t sleep if I didn’t apologize. I couldn’t bear the idea that I’d left her upset.
Hands braced on the door molding, I let my head fall forward tothunkagainst Jo’s bedroom door.
If Jo were here, she’d no doubt ram it against the wood a few more times for good measure. I had no business messing with one of her friends. The way I kept lodging my foot in my mouth, she was likely to lodge her own boots in my backside if I made things worse.
"See? This is what I'm talking about," I grumbled, voice rough.
Sophie ripped the door open, surprising me into losing my balance. I fell hard against the door frame, wincing when my bad arm made contact with the wood.
"Dammit."
She shook her head. "I'm sorry, Davis. I didn't mean to hurt you."
"That's my line," I said, unable to tear my eyes away from her soft face. I hated the uncertainty in her expression. The anger.
"How's your arm?" she asked. "Is it your turn with the ice pack?"
I grimaced. "Maybe. I'll get one in a minute. This is more important."
There was so much I wanted to say, but forcing the words out when she stood, so beautiful in front of me, was ten times harder. Text was easy, but she deserved more. More than me, if I was honest. But that didn’t stop me from aching for her.
Apologizing was on the tip of my tongue. I just couldn’t decide what for. For wanting her more than I could express, or for not being enough to make it work? Both were true, and the urge to protect her warred with the desire to make her mine.
Standing in front of her made the conflict worse, until it felt like I was being ripped in two, split down the middle. One half was the man who wanted to tumble her into bed and worship every curve until she melted into a puddle of satisfaction. The other voice inside me whispered “retreat.” Sophie deserved better than a divorced man with mediocre communication skills and hard-won control over his angry side.
"Davis, your mixed signals are driving me wild."
