Page 38 of When We Dare

My words came out rapidly, each one sharp. I felt as if I was punctuating all my old feelings as I spoke. When I finished, I felt a sense of huge relief. Maybe my heart would crack if I lost Stella over this, but it wasn’t as if I’d ever had her to begin with.

She was completely silent. I didn’t know how long it was before she spoke, but each second felt like forever. She slowly tipped her head to the side, her eyes warm. “I wouldn’t hold that against someone.”

It felt as if my heart clapped, the sound loud inside my head. My shoulders sagged as I let out a deep breath. I rested a hand on the counter beside me as I dipped my head and sucked in another gulp of air. “Well, that’s a relief,” I said when I lifted my head.

Her lips teased a little at the corners. “I hope you wouldn’t think I was that harsh and judgmental.”

“If my past belonged to anyone other than me, I wouldn’t think you would be. I don’t exactly think clearly about my own mistakes.”

Her chin dipped in acknowledgment. “I understand that.” After a beat, uncertainty darted through her eyes. “We don’t talk much about ourselves with each other.”

“No, we don’t,” I agreed.

As our eyes connected across the distance between us, it felt as if something shimmied to life. I had become accustomed to the feeling of intimacy I experienced when we were together. That feeling was connected to our fiery hot encounters and the aftermath of being twined together.

This, here and now, was linked to that intimacy, but it ran deeper. The acknowledgment of how we tried to keep things to the surface made it so very obvious that something else had flourished, something beyond our control.

My heart thumped several rounding kicks in my chest, my ribs reverberating from the force.

Stella cleared her throat. “I understand more than you could imagine about having a parent whose life is messy. As you probably know from Parker, I don’t remember my dad because he wasn’t around. What I knew about him was that he was in and out of jail a lot. That wasn’t the kind of chaos I had in my life, but my mom—” Stella’s eyes contained a sense of resignation and love. “I love my mom. So much. But she never had good judgment about men and my dad was just one of a long string of not great guys. I originally wanted to go to law school for the money. I desperately didn’t want to be scraping by and relying on a man, or anyone else, to bail me out. After I started law school, I realized it mattered because I could maybe help people. Something like that.” Her lips twisted to the side with a self-deprecating smile. “All of that to say, I understand. When your childhood is a little bumpy, you eventually figure out that you just don’t know anyone’s whole story.”

“No, you don’t,” I said slowly. Hope was unfurling inside of me. And yet, I wasn’t ready to face what my heart was hoping for.

She cleared her throat again. “I’m not used to having an older brother. How did this even come up with Parker?”

“Honestly, this –” I paused, unsure of how to put my thoughts and feelings into words. “Thing between us—” I gestured back and forth.What the hell? You’re calling it a thing.I ignored my asshole of a mental critic and forged on. “I started to talk to Parker about it. He connected the dots and realized it was you.”

“What is thisthing?” she pressed.

We stared at each other. All the while the air felt as if it was filled with a shower of sparks—emotions, intimacy, and the fierce desire that bound us together—all flickering around us. “I don’t know. Uh, and we haven’t even talked about whether we’re telling anyone about us. If I’d any clue who Parker was to you, I wouldn’t have said anything.”

Stella shrugged. “It’s okay. He is my brother, but he’s new to me. Was he all awkward about it?”

I let out a dry chuckle. “He warned me not to hurt you.”

Her eyes widened slightly. “Are you serious?” Her tone was disbelieving.

“Yup, that’s what he said.”

Her cheeks flushed pink and she let out a wondering laugh. “Well, that seems a little ridiculous.”

“If I had a little sister, I would feel protective,” I offered.

While this whole thing had come about because I didn’t know what to do with the feelings that were burgeoning by the second inside of me, I felt a little defensive that Parker would feel the need to warn me. I had no fucking clue how to do a serious relationship. I’d certainly never hurt Stella knowingly, but what if I couldn’t be the man she needed? What if it didn’t even matter? What if she didn’t feel the way I did?

After a long moment, she shrugged again. “I’ll talk to him. I don’t need an overprotective older brother. Nobody, much less my brand new to me brother, has any say in my love life.”

At the word “love”, I wanted to grab it out of the air and hold it close, to tuck it inside my heart.

“I guess I should ask if we are trying to keep this a secret. Janet suspects something,” I said.

Stella’s laugh sputtered out. “Of course she does. I love Janet, but she notices everything.”

I turned to look out the window. With it being deep into winter, it was already almost fully dark. The moon was high in the sky with the stars bright in the darkness.

When I brought my gaze back to hers, uncertainty was flickering in her eyes. She curled her hand around the hem of her shirt and rubbed it between her fingers nervously.

I wanted to step close and wrap her in my arms. I didn’t need to know why she was nervous, I simply wanted to make that feeling dissipate for her, to will it away.

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