Her bravery faltered, her eyes wide. “Really?”
“Yeah,” he said. “If you want a lesson, Rose, I’ll give it. But you better be prepared to want to learn it.”
He could see her weighing it. All her brashness had walked her into something she didn’t know a damn thing about. Yes, she was a woman. And yes, he damn well respected her as one. But that little bit of uncertainty highlighted the gulf in their ages and experience, which was the real reason he shouldn’t have told her to come to his place. Not Ryder and any loyalty to him.
But it was too late now.
He’d decided, the moment he’d first started feeling things for Rose about the time she was nineteen or so, that he would never, ever act on the lust that twisted his gut into knots.
That when he’d started noticing the fit of her T-shirts over her breasts, the way her smile lit up her face, the way her dark hair showed flashes of gold in the sun, he’d just push it down the way he did all the feelings he didn’t want.
He lived less than five miles from a father he’d gone out of his way to never meet. From half brothers he never spoke to.
When he decided on something, he stuck to it.
Changing his mind took doing.
Or, took a taste of her lips.
And now his mind was changed. Going back wasn’t an option.
She bit her bottom lip. “Should I bring something?”
“No.” Just her. That was all he needed.
“Wine?”
“No. Don’t bring wine. You’re not allowed to lower your inhibitions, dull your senses, or anything else that will make you act out of character. You need to show up and be you.”
“What about cheese? Cheese is not especially mood altering.”
“Why the hell are you offering me wine and cheese? You’ve never been into fussy stuff.”
“I’m not fussy.” She frowned. “I’m just trying to be classy.”
Trying to bring class into their ill-advised sex lesson? Shit, he didn’t want class. He wanted it dirty and sweaty and everything he’d been aching for the past five years.
“I don’t need you to be classy,” he bit out. “Be you.”
There was a flash of stark vulnerability on her face that made her look younger, and made him feel like an asshole.
“That’s why I need it to be you,” she said softly.
“Why?”
“Because you know me. You want me. That means something to me.”
Discomfort shifted his gut. “Well, I’m glad,” he said.
“The crowd is really thinning out,” she commented.
“And I bet we can take a break,” he said decisively.
They needed to get out of this booth for a minute, and if the girl was coming over to his place for sex...well. He ought to take her out first.
A half-assed attempt at being a gentleman.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because. I think we should wander around a bit. I’ll get you some cider, come on.”
He strode out of the booth, and she grabbed hold of her coat, scampering after him. “Cider?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he said.
“You don’t like Christmas,” she said.
His stomach twisted. “No. But I like you. So. I want to walk around with you.”
A small smile curved her lips upward and he felt himself smile in response. He couldn’t help it.
They walked side by side, not touching. She flexed her fingertips and he could tell she felt that same kind of restlessness that he did.
It was funny. The way he could feel her indignation. He’d been able to do that for a long time.
But he could feel the way she wanted to touch him now. Could feel just how much she wanted him to take her hand. But he couldn’t do it here. Because whatever happened between them, it was going to have to just be the two of them.
This was on his terms.
She might be getting something out of this, but his was his fantasy.
His downfall.
He’d decide how it went.
The cider booth was being run by Glenda, the owner of the Mustard Seed Café, who also had chili hot chocolate. There were also candied cinnamon-spiced nuts. He bought two ciders and a paper cone full of the spiced nuts, handing them to Rose.
They wandered after that, Logan not feeling the cold or seeing much around him.
Rose walked beside him with the cone of nuts in one hand, and her cider the other.
He felt like a high school boy trying to impress a girl, and he didn’t like it one bit. He had that tension in his limbs he could remember from that age, too. That intense anticipation. Dates from when he’d been a kid. When the high school football game ended they’d get in his truck and would they park for a while? How far would she want to go?
He’d taken safe sex seriously even back then. His mom had given him condoms once he’d grown to over six feet tall at the age of fifteen. He would never leave some poor girl pregnant, she’d told him. The condoms were insurance, not permission.
He’d already had some. He hadn’t told her that.
There was something about this moment with Rose, the anticipation, that brought him back to those years and he didn’t like it.
He had to be a lot better than a horny sixteen-year-old for her.
But damn if he didn’t feel like one.
For her part, Rose seemed oblivious. She tilted the cone up to her mouth and shook it, dumping some into her mouth. “These are good,” she said around a mouthful.
His stomach tightened. “Glad you like them.”
During their brief circuit, they ran into Pansy and West. Pansy eyed them both suspiciously. Rose took another defiant mouthful of nuts and chewed them ostentatiously as she stared her sister down. They also went by Iris’s booth, where she and Sammy were serving baked goods.
“Ryder went off to get me a cheeseburger,” Sammy said. “You just missed him.”
He wasn’t that broken up that he had missed Ryder. All things considered.
He recognized Rose’s body language getting awkward again.
It must be Iris. This whole thing really did have Rose
