Page 66 of The Vineyard Crush

Because one glance into those storm-cloud eyes, and I was done for.

“Look at me, Em.”

So much for that idea.

The command unlocked something primal within me, and my gaze snapped up to meet his without a second thought. Ridge’s pupils blown wide, lips parted as he drank in every line, every curve of my face with an intensity that very nearly stole the breath from my lungs.

“Sweet girl…” His voice a hoarse whisper, he lifted one work-roughened hand to graze the heated skin of my cheek. “What’s really goin’ on in that pretty head?”

Strong, calloused fingers grazed my jaw, tilting my chin up until our mouths hovered a scant breath apart. The hint of cedar and saddle leather surrounded me, a scent as rugged and untamed as the man himself. My pulse galloped wildly as his lips brushed against mine, little more than a whisper of contact, but enough to shatter what little resolve I had left.

I very nearly leaned into him before the memory of Mom’s censure lanced through the thick fog of want.

You’re not enough for him. Never enough.

With a harsh indrawn breath, I jerked back, wrapping my arms around my ribs. The protective stance did nothing to soothe the ache rapidly spreading through my chest.

“I—” My voice emerged smaller, more fragile than I intended. Swallowing hard, I fought to maintain eye contact with those hypnotic green irises, even as hot tears blurred the edges of his concerned frown. “It’s nothing, Ridge. Really, I should—”

Before I could retreat, his calloused fingers grazed my jaw with remarkable tenderness, tilting my chin up to meet that searing emerald gaze once more.

“Don’t pull away from me, sweet girl.” Each softly uttered word landed like a sandbag against my parched defenses. “Did I do somethin’? Or…or don’t you want us anymore—” He cut off abruptly, jaw ticking as his throat worked around a harsh swallow.

The naked vulnerability in Ridge’s expression—the man who projected such unshakable strength—fractured the last of my resolve. A strangled sound, somewhere between a whimper and a sob, escaped my constricted throat. Before I could talk myself out of it, I answered with the only truth that mattered.

“No!” The denial exploded from me immediately, sharp and fierce. Of course, I wanted this—wanted him with every cell in my body. But even as the truth spilt from my lips, doubt swirled up to choke off anything more. “It’s not that, it’s just…”

I flailed for the right explanation, afraid to give voice to my deepest fear and have it become reality. But Ridge simply waited, regarding me with that patient, watchful intensity searing straight through every attempt to deflect.

“It’s just…you deserve better.” The mumbled admission at last slipped out in a tortured rush, my cheeks flushing hot with humiliation.

Ridge’s brows snapped together incredulously. “What?”

“You deserve someone who isn’t…a mess.” My voice cracked as fresh tears blurred my vision. “Someone who won’t add to all your burdens.”

Silence swallowed the room for one eternal heartbeat, then two. The burn of rejected tears stung the backs of my eyes. This was it—the moment he’d finally realize the same as Mom, that I was more complication than he needed in his life. That I—

“Emma.” The sandpaper rasp of Ridge’s voice severed my spiraling thoughts in two. His palms cupped my face with exquisite tenderness, coaxing my gaze upward to find his expression soft with emotion too overwhelming to name. “I love your mess.”

My breath hitched at the reverent honesty gleaming from his stormy eyes. “You don’t add to my burden, darlin’. I haven’t felt this…light in forever.”

The rough pad of his thumb traced the curve of my trembling lower lip in a feather-light caress, leaving a blazing trail of yearning in its wake. My eyelids fluttered as Ridge’s mouth brushed mine—a scant whisper of contact, yet it unleashed a shockwave of liquid heat that liquefied my bones.

“You mean everything to me, you are my rainbow after the storm. Baby, I love you.”

Those six gently spoken syllables detonated the tenuous grip I’d clung to, crumbling my defenses into drifting ash. He loves me. My chest constricted with a burst of harrowing disbelief and fragile hope as Ridge’s nose grazed mine, the words a hallowed vow murmured against my stunned, parted lips.

“In the span of a few short months, you’ve made my life—made the kids’ lives—feel…alive again.” That smokey emerald gaze pierced me, blazing with a conviction that stole what little air remained from my constricted lungs. “If anything, I could never be enough for you.” A mordant twist tugged at one corner of his beautifully sculpted mouth. “But I’m too damn selfish to care.”

The naked longing bleeding into his hoarse confession ignited sparks of blinding, dizzying need in the pit of my abdomen. Before that rapturous wildfire could fully ignite, however, the tiny voice of insecurity that had plagued me for so long whispered its rebuke.

You’ll mess this up. You always do.

My throat burned with the threat of a sob as my chin quivered. I blinked hard against the hot sting of unshed tears, fighting to control the tremor in my tone. “Ridge…” His name emerged as a ragged exhalation, a desperate entreaty more than anything else.

For one fraught heartbeat, doubt flickered in those piercing eyes, tempering the fiery want raging there. Then they blazed anew, dissolving my waning reservations as Ridge crushed his mouth against mine with a low, desperate groan.

This kiss held not an ounce of gentleness, only all-consuming need as his calloused palms cradled my flushed cheeks. His lips moved with ardent insistence, coaxing, demanding a response that quickly stole what little breath remained from my lungs. I moaned into the hungry caress—the guttural, unfettered sound igniting a fresh conflagration of liquid heat pulsing through my veins.

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