Page 20 of Make Me Love You

“Cost isn’t a problem, if I’m providing the free labor,” she muttered, more to herself than him. “The town maintenance fund can cover a few gallons of paint.”

She scratched a fingernail against the surface, chipping off little bits of paint, and frowned. “I’ll have to sand off this old, rusted stuff first. Oh my God, that’s going to suck. I wonder what kind of paint works on cast iron? I’ll have to ask Noah at the hardware store. Or the internet. The internet knows everything.”

He nodded in agreement, though he doubted she noticed. She was in her own world now, where he didn’t exist.

“Twenty lamp posts, seven feet tall... I think I have a ladder that could work...maybe. Hm.” She stepped back, hands on her hips, and looked the lamp post up and down. “Boost me up.”

He blinked. “Say that again?”

“Boost me up.” She waved impatiently, motioning him closer. “The top of my ladder reaches about to your waist, maybe a little higher. I want to see if I can reach the top of the lamp post from there.”

He wasn’t about to protest. She was going to touch him, willingly, and he didn’t care that the touching would only consist of being stepped on. He’d let her walk all over him, if that was what she wanted to do.

He dutifully shifted himself between her and the lamp post, laced his hands together, and crouched down. “Okay, then. Come on.”

She took hold of his shoulders for balance and stepped onto his waiting hands.

“Hang on tight,” he said. “I’m going to stand. You ready?”

“I—” Her voice came out raspy. She cleared her throat. “Yes. I’m ready.”

He tried not to let that bother him, that she was clearly nervous. “Don’t be scared. I’m not going to drop you. Hold tight to me, okay?”

She didn’t answer, but her fingers dug into his shoulders. He stood slowly, so damn slowly, her body sliding against his as she moved with him. Fully straightened, her feet were braced at his waist, and his eyes were level with the waistband of her jeans.

“Oh,” she said cheerfully. “This is good. This is perfect.”

Perfect? He tried not to groan. It was torture. She smelled so good. So...edible. Literally edible. Like tortillas and peppers and spices. His last girlfriend had worn some kind of floral perfume that made him sneeze. Emma’s scent didn’t make him sneeze. It made him hungry. For burritos...and other things.

“I don’t even have to stretch to reach the top.” She lifted her arms.

He could tell she lifted her arms because her T-shirt came up, revealing a strip of soft, pale stomach and the most lickable belly button he had ever seen. He didn’t consider belly buttons lickable, as a rule, but hers was. He wanted to delve his tongue in that shallow indentation, swirl, and then move farther south. Yes.

No. The thought of putting his mouth there, at the juncture of her thighs, made his insides weaken, and he couldn’t afford to weaken with Emma literally depending on him to stay strong. He gritted his teeth.

“You almost done using me as a stepladder?” he asked, torn between hoping and dreading her answer was yes. He didn’t want to stop holding her, but he didn’t know how much he could take before he gave in to temptation and licked her navel.

“Right. Sorry.” She gave him a soft pat on the head, like he was a dog or something. “You can put me down now. Wait. You know what? I’ll just jump.” Without waiting for his reply, she pushed off from his shoulders and hopped down. “Thanks.”

“Yeah.” He looked at the marks from her shoes crisscrossing his palms. It hadn’t hurt, but then again, he hadn’t really been paying attention to how his hands felt. He had been much more focused on the mere inch of air that had separated her skin from his mouth. “No problem.”

She looked at him, then quickly looked away again like she was embarrassed. Her mouth opened and closed but no words came out. Finally, she shook her head, an answer to a question he hadn’t yet asked.

“What?” he said.

She pushed back a lock of hair that had escaped the bun and tucked it behind her ear. “I keep forgetting I’m mad at you.”

He stopped breathing. He took an unconscious step toward her, hoping.

It was the wrong move.

She backed up, keeping the distance between them. “But I am mad at you. I’ll always be mad. It doesn’t matter how nice you are, how familiar it feels to be near you, how—it doesn’t matter. None of it. Nothing can change that you arrested my dad. He didn’t even have a chance.”

He let out the breath he had been holding, long and slow. “I know. It isn’t fair. You’re right to be mad.”

She frowned, her eyebrows pushed together in a straight line. “Stop being reasonable about it. You can’t make me change my mind. We can’t be friends again.”

“I’m not trying to change your mind.” He knew better than that. No one ever changed their mind, not when it came to him. His mom had loved him—so she had said—but he hadn’t been able to talk her into staying with him, either. Emma was no different. Forgiveness, unconditional love...that was for other people, if it existed at all. Not for him.

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