Page 70 of Takes Two to Tango

"Don't what? Don't be disappointed? Don't feel like I've put myself out there only to be trampled on? I've finally shed everything. Every bit of the cloak I've wrapped myself in for so long. Babe, I'm more naked here than on that day you caught me unaware in my house."

Her hand brushed his forearm and moved to clasp his hand. "Please. I'm not saying no. I'm just saying not right now.”

He pulled his hand from hers. He'd never known hurt like this. Not really. He'd felt an emptiness when Rayne had left years ago. He'd been angry, confused, but had understood why she'd left. He'd been on a different path, one that he couldn't seem to get off. He'd not had the will to toss away his blue-chip, five-star status for puppy love. He hadn't had the strength to go against his parents, his coaches, or the town to follow a dream.

But that was then. And this was now.

He'd laid it all out for her. Because he loved her. Not because he'd always loved her. But because he'd fallen in love. Real love. With Rayne Rose.

"I love you," he said.

Rayne gasped.

"I fell in love with you. Go figure. My heart has been sitting on a shelf, way up high, almost forgotten. But then a baseball flew over my fence and everything changed. The moment that gate flew open and you stood there, pretty as a bluebonnet and mad as a hornet, I knew. You were here for a reason."

"But maybe that reason wasn't what you thought," she whispered. She sounded so sad. So resigned to overthinking everything about their relationship.

"No," he said, spinning toward her. "I don't think it was for any other reason than we were meant for each other. From the beginning."

"Maybe," she said, staring into his eyes. Dampness hovered on her lashes. "And maybe I came to encourage you to a new place in your life."

He shook his head. "And what about you?"

"Maybe you are my one loose string. The one thing I'd never had completion on. Maybe my coming to Oak Stand was about pulling that string so I could move on and not think about you at the strangest times. Maybe this hasn't been about a new beginning but about closing the book on what was."

Brent turned, anger clawing its way from his gut. "Are you shitting me?"

She stiffened. “No. I’m trying to look at all sides of this. I can't throw everything away because youthinkyou're in love with me. I have a child. I have a-"

''A career. Yes, I know.”

"I don't take that lightly," she said, looking plum miserable. “Surely, you understand? I’m not at liberty to …I don’t know …make decisions based on my heart. Based on what I want with no consideration for the fall out. I’m an adult, Brent. A mother. A business woman. I’m not a girl.”

He looked hard at her.

She was right. Rayne wasn’t the same girl she’d been. This woman didn't think with her heart, didn't leap without looking. She checked and double-checked. Caution had become her nature. But even as he knew this, and to a degree accepted it, he knew she was wrong about seeing their relationship being a slice of life.

But he didn't know what to do about it.

Because his gut told him she loved him. Told him that this could be forever. Told him that he was right. But to push her was to lose her.

"Hell," he murmured, lowering his head. He pressed his lips against hers, tugging her lips apart, loving the way she tasted,mixing the honey of her taste with the saltiness of her regret. Of her doubt. Of her pain.

He pulled her to him, loving the way she fit him. He'd have to let her go.

Had to.

He couldn't manipulate her. She had to choose him because she wanted him, wanted a life with him.

He wanted a heart given. Not taken.

He broke the kiss.

"I don'tthinkI love you. I do," he said, stepping away from her and colliding with the weeping willow's graceful branches. How appropriate they stood next to a crying tree. Symbolic. "And I know you love me."

She pressed her hands to her face. "Brent, I never said I didn't love you. I want to be sure. I have to be sure."

"Okay. So be sure."

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