Page 64 of The Fiance Dilemma

MATTHEW:And there’s nothing about you I want to fix.

MATTHEW:There’s nothing about you that needs fixing.

I stared at the screen. My heart now pounding. Drumming in my ears. Making my chest rise and fall.Heaving.I was heaving, and I couldn’t believe he’d just told me that.

JOSIE:Stop that. Don’t be nice to me.

MATTHEW:Do you want me to be mad? Because I am, but not at you. You don’t need to hide from me. Give me everything that’s making you feel this way. I meant it when I said we would talk later. And I said that before anything happened. That video doesn’t matter.

JOSIE:Of course it matters.

MATTHEW:It doesn’t to me. The only thing that matters right now is you.

The only thing that matters right now is you.

I blinked at the phone, incapable of making sense of the ruckus he was causing in my head, the wreck in my chest. And once more, my fingers were flying over the screen and I was once again talking, just like he wanted. Just like he asked.

JOSIE:I wish you wouldn’t have said that. I wish… we could go back to what we were doing. To what we know how to do. Our rules. Meaningless jokes. Touching and it not meaning anything. You, talking about magic or demanding that I grope your ass. I wish you’d wanted to flirt and distract me, say those things that made me blush, or I don’t know, ask for something outrageous like a nude, just because it’d take my mind off things.

MATTHEW:Nudes. Jokes. A distraction. My dirty mouth. Is that all you want from me, then?

No. I didn’t. Not even close. I didn’t even know why I’d typed that, only that I needed him. Matthew. Not because he was goofy or flirty, but because I desperately needed him in a way I couldn’t explain. In a way that made me scared of losing him if I got too close. Too fast. If I gave him a little too much. If he saw me on that stupid video in such a low moment. But he’d been right. There were things I wasn’t ready to hear. Or perhaps, I simply wasn’t brave enough to admit any of this.

JOSIE:Maybe I do.

MATTHEW:You mean that?

The air was sawing in and out of my lungs now. My skin burning for a reason that had nothing to do with the temperature of the water, or the steam clinging everywhere.

MATTHEW:Do you mean that, Josie?

My heart doubled, tripled its pace.

JOSIE:Yes.

My phone buzzed in my hand. Matthew was calling. I picked up.

“Hi,” I breathed into the line.

Matthew’s answer was immediate, his voice deep, intimate in the silence of the night. “I’ll give you what you need.”

I swallowed. “Matthew—”

“How much wine did you have?”

My laugh was strange. Strangled. Not really a laugh. “None.”

His sigh was deep and relieved. Also a little sad.

“I’m so—” I started.

But he cut me off. “Stop apologizing. I’m not sorry. Not with you.” My lips parted with a question, but he beat me to it again. “Ask me what I’m wearing, Josie.”

My skin flushed warmer still. I hesitated. Just for an instant. But this is what I had asked for, hadn’t I? I’d all but begged him to distract me. Guilt sprouted. He’d already given me so much, and I kept—

“Ask me what I’m wearing, Baby Blue,” he repeated. His voice had changed. Turned a little lighter. Easier. “You’ll like my answer, I promise.”

The guilt started to recede. “What are you wearing?”

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