The water was lukewarm when I got in. I didn’t even want a shower anymore, my initial reason for wanting one long gone. Still I stood under the nozzle for long minutes, letting the spray get cold enough to shock my brain back into cognitive reasoning.
What the hell was going on between us? Reeve acted like he knew. He acted like I should know as well, and if I read him right, maybe I did know. Maybe. Was it ridiculous that I needed clarification?
One thing was certain – I wasn’t getting answers standing in here.
I shut off the shower and hurriedly wrapped a towel around my hair and another around my body. He’d said he would still be there when I was finished, but all of a sudden I worried that he wouldn’t be. When I opened the bathroom door and found him lying on my bed, his arm thrown over his eyes, I almost sighed audibly.
Then I stood in the doorway and stared in amazement. Because he was still there. And he’d undressed. His shirt and jeans had joined my clothes on the chair and now he was just in his boxer briefs, which meant he was staying. Which meant…?
Seeming to sense me, he shifted his arm above his head and glanced in my direction. “I like it when you look at me like that. Almost as much as I like it when you look at me like you think I might slit your throat in your sleep.”
I opened my mouth to respond then decided there wasn’t any response appropriate. Instead, I asked, “Are we… together?”
“Well.” He turned to his side and propped his head up on his hand.
And I held my breath.
“Right now you’re over there and I’m over here. But when you come over here and we get into bed then, yes, we’ll be together.”
“Reeve!” Goddammit, this was hard enough. “I’m being serious, here. Please.”
His grin faded. “What are you asking, Emily?”
“I’m asking about Amber.” Amber, who was right on the other side of the wall. I could feel her presence in the room as if it were only a thin screen that divided us instead of a foot of drywall and insulation.
“Seeing as how she’s not in the room, I’d say I’m even more not with Amber than I am not with you.”
I let out an exasperated groan. “Why do you keep dancing around this? Do you not know what you want? If that’s the case, just tell me.” I’d never done this before – never had to feel my way around a relationship that wasn’t based on financial security. Strangely, this was so much more difficult than negotiating where I’d live and how much I had for living expenses and whether I’d allow double penetration or cum in my hair. This was my heart on the line, and until now, I’d had no idea how much I valued that.
Reeve sat up, and in the sincerest of tones, he said, “It’s not the case. I know what I want. I want you.” His lip curled into a half-smile. “Now come here.”
My head fell with the weight of relief. Me. He wanted me.
It doesn’t mean he doesn’t want Amber, too, I reminded myself. There had been other men set on sharing us. That arrangement had worked once upon a time, but we were long past that, no matter who Amber was these days.
I pulled the towel off my hair and tossed it to the floor before starting toward the bed. I was nearly to him when I halted. “And what about Amber?”
“She’ll have my protection as long as she wants it.”
I nodded, glad for that, but it hadn’t been what I was asking. “What did you tell her at dinner?”
Reeve sighed as if he were losing patience with the conversation, but he answered all the same. “I didn’t tell her what I would have told her if you had stayed.”
“Which would have been…?” I gestured for him to fill in the blank.
He scooted to the end of the bed and reached for my hand to tug me closer. “That things have changed since she left,” he said. He drew me closer still so that I was standing between his knees. “And that I’m currently in a committed relationship. With you.”
My breath caught around the lump in my throat.
But then I noticed the flirty glint in his eyes, and, though his tone had seemed earnest, I didn’t buy it. I couldn’t.
I rolled my eyes. “No, you wouldn’t have.”
“Yes. I would have.”
I pushed playfully at his shoulder. “Can you stop messing with me for half a second and be honest?”
In a blur of motion, Reeve had me pinned on the bed. “I am being honest.” He narrowed his eyes. “Why is it so hard for you to believe me?”
Because no one ever chose me over Amber.
I couldn’t say it out loud. As if that would jinx it. “It just is.”
No sooner were the words out of my mouth than I realized what this was about for him. My trust. Or lack of trust. Again, he was seeking it. Again, I’d refused to give it. But this time it was totally unintentional on my part.
I searched his face, trying to predict what his reaction would be. I was afraid I’d ruined it. Ruined us. I was so desperate to undo whatever damage I might have done that I opened my mouth and prepared to tell him what he really wanted to hear instead – that I loved him.
Before I could, he broke into a smile. “Well then you can believe it when you hear me say it to her.”
“Okay.” How could a word feel so soft on my tongue when it held so much? I couldn’t even begin to name the emotions wrapped up in those simple two syllables, so many different shades and colors of relief and hope and affection and amazement.
Then reality came storming in, and I remembered my obligations and promises and all the reasons I couldn’t let Reeve declare his love for me to my friend. “I mean, no.”