Page 65 of The Love Wager

She’s floundering in my presence, more so than I’ve ever seen her do before. Her cheeks are as red as her hair, and I’m pretty sure she doesn’t know how to act any more than I do.

Before, when it was just her and I in a bubble of protection that the wager between us offered, we were freer. Less cagey. Now, I feel like a tiger in a sideshow. I’m ready for anyone to open the cage, but fuck, I hope it’s her who does it.

“What are you doing here?” she breathes, and I’m caught in her green-eyed stare as if it’s made of quicksand.

“I came to…” I sigh, scrubbing my coffee-scented hand over my face. “I came to get you back.”

“Get me back?” she snorts derisively. “You never had me, technically.”

I step into her, and she backs up on instinct.

Sometimes, she drives me crazy, and today is one of those times.

“Don’t do that. Don’t belittle what we had. You felt it, too. Even if it fucking scared you.”

This gets her attention and has her stepping back into me. “And what’s your grand plan for getting me back?”

“I’m here, aren’t I?”

The smile that tugs her perfect lips up nearly knocks me breathless. As if she knows the power she holds with it, she deepens it, bringing out the tiniest dimple on her cheek. “So cocky that you think your mere presence is all it’ll take to win me over?”

Wrapping an arm behind her back, I tug her into me, bringing her breasts to my front. She gasps, and my soul gobbles up the sound as sustenance.

“The time for your sassy little quips is over, red.”

Like two magnets drawn together, our lips seek one another’s, dancing back and forth in a wicked game of who’s going to cave first.

“Is it now?” she teases.

My hand at her back drops to her ass, gripping firmly. “It is.”

Her breathy little moan tells me she’s missed me, even when her mouth won’t.

“Now, all we need to do is figure out where I’m going to stay, and that’s that.”

She laughs. “That is most definitely notthat.”

“It is if I say it is.”

“Will you stop being pig-headed? You can’t just leave everything behind, Brooks. You have a home and a business and…”

“I don’t have you,” I cut in, which has her blinking up at me through thickly-painted lashes. “And come to find out, that’s the one thing I can’t live without. All the rest of it is neither here nor there.”

“But I saved the bar,” she whispers, her eyes growing headier under my admission.

“You did, and I’m so grateful—Nick’s back home, running it as we speak. And I didn’t have a home. Not until I found you.”

She scoffs, raising a hand to her hip in offense. “I found you, for the record.”

I roll my eyes, shaking my head. “You’re insufferable.”

“Yet, you can’t live without me,” she counters.

“I can’t.” I tighten my arms around her, sidling one hand up to cup her face. “Because I love you, red.”

Her breathing hitches. “Brooks.”

“You don’t have to say it back right now. In fact, I don’t want you to. I want you to say it in your own time. This is my time. No matter if you turn me away today, I needed you to know.” My thumb brushes over her bottom lip, uncaring if makeup is smearing across my skin. “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

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