“Help me?” Her eyes lit up like I’d said the most ridiculous thing. “I don’t need help.”
“I wasn’t asking if you did,” I shot back.
“No, you’re just assuming,” she retorted, not meeting my eyes as she continued to unload her supplies.
“Not at all. I know what you can do.” My voice cracked with amusement, but I wanted her to look at me.
“I thought that if we’re going to be friends,” I continued, “this might be a good place to start.”
Getting off my chair, I walked towards her, hoping she would know I wanted anything but friendship.
“I mean…” I kept going when she didn’t say anything. “It’s not like we’re going to be able to go back to climbing trees and having sleepovers, is it?”
Her chest filled with a quiet breath, and she stopped unloading for a split second. Her eyes met mine, and for a moment, I thought she’d let me plant her ass on the counter and let me show her how a sleepover between us would work.
But then she narrowed her eyes and talked more with her teeth than her lips. “Like I said, I don’t need help.”
“Like I said, I wasn’t asking,” I repeated, not missing a beat. “Did you think that Porter was going to let you conduct experiments with fire by yourself?” I had no idea what her experiment was, but after catching sight of some of her materials and Porter’s apprehension about leaving her alone, I gathered that it would involve the burners.
“How do you know about my experiment? And who said we’re going to be friends?” she sneered before bending down to get something out of her bag. “You know, maybe too much damage has been done. I know you’ve apologized, but it’s not so easy for me.”
This was not the Tate I knew. Tate was tough. Even when I’d made her cry over the years with my pranks, she held her head high and moved on.
Tate didn’t need grand gestures. Did she?
“You’re not getting girly on me, are you?” I was trying at sarcasm, but I wanted a f**king miracle.
Yes, Jared. Thank you for apologizing, and I forgive you. Let’s move on.
That’s what I really wanted.
But she buried her face in her binder and ignored me. Or tried to look like she was ignoring me.
My fingers were humming, and I balled up my fists to try to erase the urge to touch her.
She kept staring at her papers, but I knew she wasn’t reading anything. She was feeling me like I was feeling her.
Finally, she sighed, giving up the petense, and looked up at me like my mother did when she’d had enough. “Jared, I appreciate the effort you’re putting in here, but it’s unnecessary. Contrary to what your ego is blowing you up with, I’ve been surviving just fine without you for the last three years. I work better alone, and I would not appreciate your help today or any other day. We’re not friends.”
My pulse throbbed in my throat, and I swallowed.
Fine without me?
And I hadn’t breathed a single day without her on my mind.
She leveled me with her resigned expression and flat eyes. I wondered if she’d believed what she’d said.
I wondered if it was true.
She turned back around to her work table, not giving away anything until she knocked her binder to the floor, and its contents spilled everywhere.
I stepped behind her, and we bent down together to pick up the papers.
Was she nervous?
Tate wasn’t usually clumsy.
Gathering up the papers, I pinched my eyebrows together and studied the internet printouts of cars for sale that were among the papers. “You’re looking at cars?” I asked.
The selection included a Mustang, a Charger, a 300M and a G8.
“Yeah,” she snipped. “I’m getting myself a birthday present.”
Birthday. I nearly said it out loud.
I guess now I knew what to tell her dad she wanted.
She’d want the car soon. Her birthday was coming up in less than a week. I wondered if he’d trust me to tag along with her to go buy one instead of making her wait.
Would she trust me?
“Jared?” She held out her hand for the papers.
I blinked, coming out of my thoughts. “I forgot your birthday was coming up,” I lied. “Does your dad know you’re looking to buy a car so soon?” I asked as I came up beside her at the table.
“Does your mom know you provide alcohol to minors and sleep around on the weekends?” she retorted, serving my shit back to me.
“‘Does my mom care’ would be a better question.” I couldn’t hide the disdain in my tone as I started helping her unload her crate.
Even before I’d met Tate, my relationship with my mother was broken. I roamed, left to stick up for myself or my mom on the few occasions one of her a**hole drinking buddies got rough. Not that I could throw much weight around at that age, but I tried.
In her monologue, Tate reminded me of how she healed me when she thought I’d healed her. We were both fighting for happiness. Fighting to just be kids when we met.
Those four years we spent together were the best I’d ever felt.
I snapped my head to the side when I heard glass shatter to the floor.
What the…?
Tate had whipped around, probably having tried to catch the flask, and leaned on the counter looking down at her mess.
What the hell was going on with her?
She stared at the damage, almost looking like she was in pain as her chest rose and fell in hard, deep breaths.
Tate wasn’t what I would call “controlled,” but she’d been holding her own with Madoc and me since her return.
Until now.
“I make you nervous,” I said regretfully, looking at the shattered glass on the floor.
“Just go.” I heard her pained whisper and flinched.
Looking up at her, I saw the embarrassment and frustration in her eyes. She didn’t want me here. I didn’t know if it was because she hated me and needed me gone or because she wasn’t sure what she wanted.
I was finally seeing how I had twisted her up. I was playing with her, even though I didn’t mean to. I thought I hated her, so I pushed her. Now, I wanted her, so I was pulling her back in.
Time and again, it was about me and never her.
“Look at me.” I brought my hand up to her cheek and a shock of heat traveled through my arm. “I’m sorry. I should never have treated you the way I did.”
Her eyes met mine, and I willed her to believe me.
Her breathing got shallow, and she searched for something in my eyes.
Or waited for something.
Placing my other hand on her cheek, I never broke contact. She watched me inch in, not welcoming me but not resisting it, either.
I moved my lips closer, never taking my eyes from hers as I waited for her to push me away. As the seconds ticked by I finally snatched up her mouth before I let her have any more time to reconsider.
Hell, yes.
I held her in my hands, tasting her sweet, full lips like I couldn’t get enough.
Tate. My Tate. My best friend, and my worst enemy. The girl that turned my world upside down with her overalls and red baseball cap.
The only person in every one of my good memories.
Her hands were hesitant at first, but then they snaked around my neck, and I felt her unfold around me.
Goddamn, her soft body rubbed against mine, the softest moan coming out of her mouth, and my fists tightened in her hair. I was about to lose it. She had the power. Always had and always would.
She moved her h*ps up against mine, and I ran my hands down her sides and around to her perfect, rounded ass.
Grabbing it in my hands, I jerked her into me.
Mine.
The f**king wet, heat of her mouth, and the curve of her br**sts against my chest, got my c*ck aching for release. I wanted to push all this shit onto the floor and take her on the table.
I wondered if she was a virgin, and my neck broke out in a sweat at the thought of anyone else kissing her like this.
“I’ve wanted you for so long,” I whispered against her mouth. “All the times I’d see you next door…it drove me crazy.”
She opened her mouth wider and dove in for more.
Yeah, we weren’t leaving here for a while.
Chapter 26
I wasn’t about to make love to Tate for the first time on a lab table—not that she’d let me—but I wasn’t letting go of her yet, either.
Unfortunately, she had other ideas.
“Don’t…” She ripped away from my lips and pulled back.
What? No.
I opened my eyes, breathing hard and suddenly very empty.
I searched every inch of her face, wondering why the hell she’d made me stop. Her mouth had been molded to mine, totally kissing me back.
She’d wanted that.
But not now. Her blue eyes narrowed angrily, and she looked like she had on invisible armor.
Her body wanted it, but she didn’t.
She didn’t.
So I backed off. “Then I won’t,” I replied coldly.
She stared at me, looking a million miles away. “What are you up to?”
“I want us to be friends.” I let out a bitter laugh.
“Why now?”
Jesus.
“Why so many questions?” I retorted.
“You didn’t think it was going to be this easy, did you?”
“Yes,” I lied. “I was hoping we could move forward without looking back.” I knew it was too much to expect, but I let myself hope that Tate would see the bigger picture.
That with all of the anger and damage, with all the distance and misunderstanding, we still fit.
“We can’t,” she shot back. “You go from threatening me one day to kissing me the next. I don’t switch gears that fast.”
Me?
“Kissing you? You kissed me back… both times,” I pointed out. “And now you’re off to the school dance with Madoc. You might say I’m the one with whiplash here.”
She blinked, and her face faltered for a moment. “I don’t have to explain myself to you,” she replied pathetically.
“You shouldn’t go.”
“I want to. And he asked me.” She returned to her work, signaling the end of the discussion.
No f**king way.
My arms burned. I wanted to bring her back into them.
Stepping up behind her, I breathed her in. The top of her head fell just below my chin, and her whole torso—arms included—fit the width of my chest.
She fit.
“Has he been on your mind, Tate?” I inhaled the scent in her hair and braced both of my hands on the table on each side of her, caging her in. “Do you want him? Or is it me you dream of?”
Her hands slowed what they were doing, and I took that as a good sign, so I kept going.
“I said that when I put my hands on you, you’d want it. Remember?” I asked smoothly, trying to touch her with my words.
She paused for a moment and then turned around to look at me. “I don’t think it’s any secret that I like it when you touch me. When you’re ready to tell me everything you’re holding back, then maybe I’ll trust you again. Until then…” And she turned back around, cutting the connection.