Page 81 of The Mating Game
But she’s still letting me hold her hand, oddly enough, and I weave her through the crowd until we’re out in the cold, then I drape my coat around her shoulders before I shepherd her to the Bronco. The cold air is good for my raging thoughts, and I can tell Tess is switching from confusion to irritation as she snatches her hand away, electing to climb into the car on her own.
Shit.
I can tell she wants to ask me what my deal is as she watches me fold myself into the driver’s seat and crank the engine, but she remains quiet, leaning against the passenger window with a slight pout that I would find adorable if I didn’t know I’d put it there.
I fiddle with the heat. “Cold?”
I can tell she is, but she’s still sulking, so she shakes her head.
She curls her arms around her middle as she leans on the door, watching the lights go by as I drive us out of town and toward the snowy trail that leads to the lodge. The pouting gives way to her inevitable drowsiness after about ten miles, and I notice her eyelids growing heavy when I glance at her again as we leave town.
Even as she drifts off to sleep, I still can’t fully say what the hell just happened back there.
She’s disoriented whenshe wakes again, leaning into me as I hold her up to help her inside. She’s still wrapped in my coat, and scenting myself on her feels sorightin a way that terrifies me because it makes me want to mark her up more. I don’t really know what’s happening to me when it comes to her.
“Almost there,” I murmur. “Come on now.”
“You’re so confusing,” she mumbles sleepily. “Where are we going?”
“Putting you to bed,” I tell her. “Think you had a little too much.”
I tighten my grip around her waist as we stumble into her room, and she falters slightly when we near the bed, clinging to me tighter.
“I’m sorry,” she groans. “You’re having to take care of me again.”
I don’t tell her how much I’ve begun toliketaking care of her.
“I’m starting to think you’re kind of clumsy,” I chuckle.
She blows a raspberry. “If you didn’t make me sonervous.”
“Oh yeah?” I can feel myself smiling, but I doubt she sees it with the way her eyelids are drooping again. “In you go now.”
I pull off her boots one by one as I tuck her into bed, tossing them to the floor before I pull the covers up and over her. She snuggles into her pillow, and as I shift to leave, I make out the disgruntled sound she makes, her eyes still shut.
“Should have kissed me,” she mutters into her pillow.
She’s probably right, but even now, my head is a bit messy. I’m thinking about the last time I kissed a woman I cared about, how I thought she was going to be my everything, only for me to learn that I was really nothing to her. For nearly a decade I’ve avoided ever finding myself in that situation again, and yet here I am, torn up over a woman I barely know. I can blame hormones and biology all day long, but in the end…I think it might just be her. Every new thing I learn about her only endears her to me further.
“You’re probably right,” I answer softly, knowing she can’t hear me since her breathing is already starting to even out.
I brush her hair behind her ear, tracing a barely there stroke of my thumb down her cheek. She sighs with contentment as she sinks deeper into the bed, and I finally ease myself away from the mattress to let her sleep.
Reginald’s massive form pushes past me when I open the door, jumping onto the foot of her bed and blinking at me with a bored expression. I watch as he curls up in a more comfortable lounging position near her feet, still watching me as if saying,Yeah, you should have kissed her.
I snort to myself as I close the door behind me.
Even the cat knows I fumbled this evening.
19
Tess
“Five more minutes,”I mumble into my pillow.
It takes me several seconds to realize there’s no one actually calling for me, but rather someoneyowlingat me—Reginald, sitting up straight a foot away from me on the bed and making disgruntled sounds. I lift my head to peer over at him, trying to remember how he got in here. Did he sleep with me all night?
At least the cat is starting to like me.
