Page 94 of Beg, Borrow, or Steal

“How long have you been out here?” I ask when I get closer and note the laptop, blankets, and support pillow behind her back.

She meets my gaze. “Not long. Since I got back from the farm.”

I cock my head. “Which was?”

“About two hours ago.”

I couldn’t keep the smile off my face even if someone threatened to key my Land Rover. “And why have you been out here?”

“Are you just going to stand there all night gloating that I’ve been worried, waiting for you, or are you going to join me?”

“Am I invited?”

She holds up a beer bottle for me. I don’t give it a second thought before shaking my head. “No, I don’t—”

“It’s a ginger beer,” she amends softly, looking shyer than I think I’ve ever seen Emily look. “Alcohol free.” Or no, maybe not shy…tender.Vulnerable.

The emotions I’ve been shoving down my throat since I left my parents’ house are now bubbling up. “You didn’t have to do that for me. You don’t have to drink that when I know you like beer.”

“I know I don’t,” she says with a taunting Emily smile. “And that makes it all the more fun.”

I eye her pallet with open longing now, my bones feeling so weary I could fall over. She scoots over and pats the spot beside her. A minute later, we’re shoulder to shoulder, backs leaningagainst the truck window and staring up at winking stars, ginger beers in hand.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asks.

“Not yet.” I shift to look at her. “I want to make sure we’re okay. And Maddie. What happened with her?”

Her face angles in my direction and the moon reflects in her sharp green eyes. “It’s a long story that I’ll fill you in on later. But for now, you can know that she let me cry on her shoulder and I realized I need to do that more often.” She pauses, her eyes dropping to my hand, and then she reaches over to take it in hers. “Jack…thank you for wanting to be there for me the other night. And for encouraging me not to give up on my dreams. Historically, I have an incredible record of handling things on my own pretty well. But lately…since my grandma passed…” She presses her tongue into her cheek. “Um, there’s just been this…” She’s pushing through stopped-up emotions. “This sadness and loneliness that I have struggled to climb out of. And I don’t like for people to see me in those places, because I’m afraid if I do, I’ll be even harder to love.”

I push her hair back from her face, just wanting to be close to her. “I can relate.”

“Of course you can,” she says with a smile. “That’s why you scare the hell out of me. I’ve never…I’ve never met anyone who makes me feel so seen and known as you do, Jack. And to be honest, your friendship lately”—tears race down her cheeks—“has been one of the best things to ever happen to me. And I was scared that you’d think you wanted me, and then you would get close to me and realize that I’m too tough to love. Hell, I’m difficult to even be around some days, and now I can addsadto the list too.”

She shrugs. “I guess I’m saying I don’t actually want to go slow with you.I love you, Jack.I don’t want to be friends with benefits. Iwant to hug each other when we’re sad and help each other find the bright side of things when all we can see is the dark.” Her hand squeezes mine like she’s reminding herself I’m still sitting here. “And I realize I don’t have a lot to offer you at this moment in my life besides a very messy person who is somehow also a perfectionist and enjoys bickering more than she should. I can be a porcupine sometimes, but I also make really great buttered noodles and have the best movie nights with an incredible selection of snacks, and, oh!” She brightens like she was struck by a revelation. “I can also help you grade papers when you’re behind. I’m very good at grading. I have a supercute sticker stash too that you’re welcome to use anytime you—”

I kiss her.

I kiss her long and slow for just a minute. Just a heartbeat. My tongue sweeps her mouth in a lazy summertime backstroke. And then I pull away and I hold her face in my hands—forehead to forehead. “I love you too, Emily…I don’t need anything from you other than for you to unlock the door for me so I can come lie with you when the darkness is too heavy to crawl out of. And if you need to fight, you can fight with me. And if you want to make love, make it with me.” I kiss her once more. “You think you’re unlovable, but I think I’ve never known how to love until knowing you.”

Chapter Thirty-Two

Emily

Our kiss is different this time. There is no restraint or a hint of indecision. We are fully giving ourselves to each other with this kiss, with our touches, with our bodies.

I love him, I love him, I love him,I think as I climb over his lap and kiss him deeper.

I love you, I love you, I love you,his hands say as they skirt up my abdomen and chest, sinking into the back of my hair to leverage a firmer pressure of his mouth against mine. I push against his shoulders and Jack sinks back into the bed of the truck.

“Here?” he asks, looking up at me from where his head is laid back against the pillow from the little pallet I had made earlier.

“Here,” I repeat back to him as I lean down and kiss my way up his neck. Tasting the salt of his skin and the scruff on his jaw. “Madison is inside, and I don’t want to wake her up.” I pull back enough to grin down at him. “Plus, there’s no phone out here.”

I close my eyes against the incredible feel of Jack’s rough fingers when he pushes the wall of my hair back from my face and over myshoulder. “As long as you’re sure. I can wait if you don’t want it to happen out here.”

I lean down again, hovering close enough to his mouth that he can feel my smile. Poison-ivy eyes looking into amber whiskey. “I don’t want to wait another damn minute. So no teasing tonight. I need you.”

His answer is to curve his hand around my ass and squeeze. Jack lifts his head to catch my mouth, coaxing it open as his tongue tastes me again and again. I slide my hands under his shirt and up his heated skin until I can feel his pounding heart. His ribs expand with a deep breath and need melts into my body, consuming me. I want to kiss him forever. I want to live inside it. I think I can find the answers to the beginning and end of time in Jack’s mouth if I keep kissing him long enough.

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