Page 26 of All Jacked Up

“I was afraid of failure.”

I waited for her to say more, but she just sat there, looking uncertain and nervous.

“Okay. But after you were a success, why not then?”

The tip of her pink tongue darted out to wet her lips, and my eyes zoned in on them. Damn, who would have thought that her mouth would look like that once those fucking braces were off?

“I think maybe it was that our friendship or whatever had been built on a certain impression you had of me, and I didn’t want to change anything …” She trailed off.

“I see. So, you wanted me to think you were the cat lady.”

She let out a soft laugh and shrugged. “Yes—no—I’m not sure.”

I couldn’t force her to give me a straight answer. Hell, the texting we’d done over the past ten years was weird. We never saw each other. I had never spent time with her out of the library in the high school, yet somehow, she’d become important. Seeing her words on my phone screen had become a part of my life that I wanted to keep. I enjoyed it.

“I think I get that. But what about your engagement?”

She gave me a pointed look. “You aren’t someone who believes in any kind of serious relationship, and I guess … I didn’t want to hear anything negative about it.”

“What? You didn’t want me to tell you how fucking stupid it was?” I asked, unable to hold back my grin.

“Exactly.”

The server came to take our plates and asked if we wanted dessert. I ordered a black coffee, and Noa asked for a cappuccino.

When we were alone again, Noa cleared her throat and shifted in her seat. Keeping my eyes above her neck was a struggle, but honestly, her mouth was as lethal as her body. At least for my cock.

“How long are you in town?” she asked.

I couldn’t stay, and the longer I spent in her presence, the more likely I’d end up trying to get her naked. Telling her I was here until I got rid of Neilson wasn’t an option. She’d probably frown at that since she was or was not engaged to the bastard. For now anyway.

“Headed back after this lunch,” I lied.

Her disappointment made my cock twitch, and that right there was a reason I had to put several states between us. Go back to texting.

“Oh.”

Yeah. Oh.

“Do you ever come home? I mean, to Madison to visit? You’ve never mentioned it in your texts.” And I had never asked.

She shook her head. “No. I’m not close to my mother. She wants to see me about as much as I want to see her.” The bitterness in her tone didn’t mask the hurt.

Why hadn’t I ever asked about her parents? It seemed we’d talked about everything—or had that been me unloading on her? Not both ways?

“I didn’t realize you had such a bad relationship with her.”

“I don’t talk about it.”

And I hadn’t asked.

She inhaled deeply, then smiled, but it didn’t meet her eyes.

“I never thought we’d do this. You know, converse in person.”

Yeah, neither had I.

“It was time,” I replied.

---