Page 72 of Degrees of Control

James screwed up his eyes. “You’re leaving soon.”

“Please don’t say that. If I thought there was something worth staying for, I’d stay. Do you want me to stay?”

James exhaled. His temples thudded even harder against his brain. What Charlotte was suggesting just wasn’t possible. He didn’t know the first thing about keeping a woman happy, he didn’t know how to be a boyfriend. Whenever his trifling relationships extended past a few weeks, he got frustrated and mean and his eyes wandered. Who was he to string this sweet girl along for a month or three months or a year, force her to extend her visa and stay away from her family only to discover what he already knew; that he was an asshole and she was wasting her time?

“No, darlin’,” he said. “I think last night proves I’m not ready to be your man.”

Much as I might wish otherwise, getting together would make both of us hate me more than I already do.

Charlotte touched his arm. “Thank you for saying that. I know it couldn’t have been easy.”

Yeah, she was, without a doubt, the strangest woman he’d ever met.

“Do you want to keep hooking up with me?” she asked. “Until I go home, that is?”

James couldn’t have been more surprised if Charlotte asked him to adopt her. At first he thought she was messing with him, but her eyes were wide and honest. “What? What do you mean?”

“Do you want to keep fucking me, James?”

He didn’t have to say it out loud, did he? To actually admit that he wanted to screw her every day of the week, but not offer her any of the warmth or commitment she deserved?

Charlotte laughed. “I know this is embarrassing, James, but you have to say something.”

James rubbed his aching forehead. “Yeah, I like fucking you and I want to keep doing it. Of course I want to keep doing it.”

“Okay, good. Me too.”

James looked at her in amazement. This wasn’t how he’d expected the night to go. Not by a fucking long shot. “Can you handle that?”

Charlotte nodded eagerly. “I think I have feelings for you because we let other things get in the way. So we just keep having sex, but no more dinners or sleepovers or threatening Dale. Is that cool?”

“If he comes near you again I’ll—”

“You won’t do anything,I’llcall the police.” She frowned at him. “I really like you, James, you’re gorgeous and sexy and we get along well, but if you don’t want me…that way, we have to keep sex and our personal business separate.”

James struggled against the heat in his chest that was insisting that her safetywashis business, that she was his business. Her offer was better than he could have ever hoped for. There would be no tears and tantrums, no letting her down easy, just filthy, unattached sex. His wheelhouse from the day he turned…from the time he started having sex.

“Fine,” he said. “You got yourself a deal, Blue-Eyes.”

She stepped toward him, little finger extended. “Pinkie promise?”

James stood stock-still, grinning at the ridiculousness, the Charlotte-ness of this situation. She wiggled her finger at him. “C’mon, just do it.”

James smiled in spite of his pounding head and obeyed, wrapping his pinkie around hers, completely swallowing it.

“God, your hands are huge,” she whispered. “So we have an agreement, Mr. Hunter?”

He stared at her, trying to assess if she was doing what he thought she was.

Charlotte blinked up at him. “I know something else that’s good for hangovers, if you’re interested?”

“Really? What might that be, Blue-Eyes?”

With a devious smile, Charlotte reached forward and unbuckled his belt. James closed his eyes and let the feel of her hands and then her mouth overtake him. He’d won. The party was a non-issue and Charlotte was happy to be his fuck buddy until she went back to Australia. What more could he possibly want? His skull throbbed, the pain insistent, but he ignored it.

Chapter 19

Eight weeks after that conversation in his barely-used kitchen, James was losing his mind. He was hardly sleeping, barely eating, he turned on the stovetop and left it lit for hours. He forgot people’s names, drank too much whiskey and spilled coffee on himself constantly. Forget cancer, David was convinced he’d joined a cult.

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