Page 76 of Sweatpants & Sweet Tea

DAPHNE

“Crap,”I murmured beneath my breath as I hit my head on the cabinet under the sink. I was sure that was where Aunt Rhonda had said the flashlight was, but I certainly didn’t feel it. “Forget it.”

It was the middle of the night. My computer was dead because I’d been using it all day, so it had been running on the charger, but my phone had a battery and a flashlight. I turned it on and decided I would just go to bed, and hopefully by morning power would be restored.

I was making my way to the front of the house when I saw a figure walking up the steps of the porch. Normally, being a woman alone in a farmhouse on a dark, rainy night when the power was out and seeing a tall, dark figure coming up the steps would be cause for alarm, but in this case, it was cause for arousal because I would know the outline of that body anywhere. It was Harlan Mitchell.

A thrill ran through me as I opened the door just as he was raising his hand to knock. Seeing Harlan standing on the porch, dripping wet, was like coming downstairs on Christmas morning and finding the present you’ve wanted all year wrapped underthe tree with a bow and your name on it. Not that I would know what that felt like. My parents were never big on holidays. But this is what I thought it would feel like.

“Hi,” I smiled at him.

“Hey, I was just coming to see if you were okay.”

“Yeah, I’m good.” I motioned as I stepped to the side.

He walked past me, and I shut the door behind him. When he turned around, he was standing very close to me. And he was dripping wet.

“Here, hold on, let me get you a towel.” I hurried to the linen closet, and when I returned, he’d removed his damp hoodie, leaving him bare-chested and wearing only sweats. The sight sent my hormones into overdrive. I tried not to show my reaction as I handed him the towel. “Here you go.”

“Thanks.” He took it from me and dried off his face and hair. “I didn’t realize it was raining this bad, or I would have driven over. I just wanted to make sure you were okay,” he reiterated.

It was taking all of my self-control not to throw myself at Harlan. I’d missed him so much. I missed the softness of his lips, and the way the rest of the world disappeared when he kissed me. I missed the strength in his arms when he held me. And, I’d made up my mind, there truly was nothing sexier than Harlan Mitchell in gray sweatpants and nothing else.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I was just, um, watching our date, actually.”

“You were?” He laid the towel over the stair railing.

“Yeah, I was watching a rough cut of it when the power went out. I’ve been on my computer all day, though, so it’s dead. Otherwise, I would, you know, show you. I mean, if you wanted to see it.” I felt nervous. I didn’t know if it was because tonight reminded me of the first night we’d been together. Or if it was because I felt strange about how I’d left things when he’d dropped me off. Or if it was because the footage of our date hadsolidified the fact that I loved the man standing half-naked in the front room.

“How does it look?”

“Good.” I worked to keep my expression neutral.

The energy between us was crackling with tension. Or at least that’s how it felt on my end of things. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do or say as we stood, silently staring at one another.

Breaking eye contact with him, I walked past him toward the dining room table. “So were you already awake when the lights we?—"

“I want to kiss you,” he interjected as he reached out and grabbed my wrist.

My heart slammed into my chest as my gaze lifted to his.

“Actually, I want to do a lot more than just kiss you,” he confessed.

My eyes fluttered shut as I inhaled a shallow breath. As much as I wanted to give in to the temptation that Harlan was presenting, there was something stopping me. I knew that it would only lead to heartache. This wasn’t realistic. We weren’t realistic.

“I’m… leaving. This won’t change anything. We can’t…”

I felt him take a step toward me. I opened my eyes and found myself staring at his chiseled chest. He lifted his hand and cupped my cheek, tilting my head up so my gaze met his.

“I don’t care. I’ll take whatever I can get. I want to be with you. If this is the last night we have together, I don’t want to waste it.”

He was saying that now, because we were alone, the lights were out, and it was raining outside. But what about in the morning? Would he feel the same? I knew he cared about me. He had feelings for me. He’d shown me that he did even if he hadn’t said the words.

And it wasn’t just his emotional well-being I was worried about. It had been hell not acting on the feelings that I had for Harlan these past weeks, but I’d stayed strong because I knew that he could hurt me, and I needed to protect myself. Did I do all that for nothing, to just throw it all away because I got swept up in the romance of a storm?

“I know that there is something between us, and I know that you feel it, too. I know you want this just as much as I do,” he challenged.

My head was frantically scribbling a pros and cons list, jotting down every reason this was a good and bad idea. But the moment Harlan ran the roughened pad of his thumb across my bottom lip, he erased my mind completely. It was blank. I wasn’t thinking anything. All I could do was feel.

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