Page 78 of Belong With Me

“You and me?” I asked, wanting to make sure I was following her random, drunken logic.

“Yeah,” she mumbled as her chin dropped to her chest, looking at the bed cover once more.

“Hey, it’s okay.” I reached out to stroke the back of my fingers against her soft cheek.

“It’s real,” she mumbled again. “It wasn’t supposed to, but it is. What I feel for you is real.”

My heart beat faster in my chest. “What was it supposed to be?” I asked, remaining perfectly still. I waited for the answer that I wasn’t sure I really wanted to hear. No matter how much I wanted the truth. I’d been hurt in the past. Only with Sienna in the past three weeks had I finally allowed someone back in.

“A bit of fun.” She paused.

“Fun?” I repeated her own word.

“You were meant to be a job.” She spoke so quietly it was almost a whisper.

My heart stopped. “Having sex with me was a job?” I asked, not sure if I really wanted to know the answer. After all, a woman like Sienna was so damn out of my league, it wouldn’t be a surprise. Swallowing, I asked the rest, “Why would sleeping with me be part of your job?”

“Yes, and no.”

Again with that half answer, that really didn’t answer anything at all. The answer itself didn’t even make sense. Frustration started to bubble up with the confusion. “You better explain yourself, Sin.”

“Daddy told me to sleep with whoever I had to, to get the job done. But I—” I watched her head shake from side to side. “I couldn’t do it.” Her voice cracked toward the end. “I didn’t want to do it, and then you took me in, treated me so kindly and I caught feelings.”

Her confession sent a wave of feeling washing through me. Tamping them down, I inhaled and then exhaled a deep breath, trying to control myself just enough to ask what I needed to. Once her answer was out there between us, there was no telling what I would do. Just what job was she talking about?

“So, it wasn’t just me then? You were meant to sleep with my brothers too?” My blood pressure started to spike at the thought of Wyatt or Colton having their hands on her. On watching the way her mouth opened in a perfect O when she orgasmed. Or her running her fingers through their hair in that way that made lightning sing through my veins. “Have you slept with them?” I growled.

“No, Ry. I haven’t slept with them.” She hiccupped a little. Despite the fact I was starting to see red, it was still cute as all fuck.

“Who then?” My question was bitten out. I clenched my hands tightly, thinking of the other ranchers in town. Of those in the bar checking her out the other night. About that asshole—

“Sanderson,” she murmured, and it was like she’d ripped the word from my soul. I felt tension start in my lower back at the sound of his name dropping from her lips. I knew immediately she wasn’t referring to Logan, but his older brother, Ethan. The man who stole Anna-Beth from me. The man who said he was arranging to meet up with her later that night.

I thought he was just lying, but if not, then I was once again a fucking fool. If she was confessing that she’d slept with him, I could not for one second promise I wouldn’t get in my truck and hit him with it. Swallowing the lump in my throat, I asked the question I wasn’t ready to hear the answer to, “Are you saying you slept with him?”

She stopped moving her eyes from one point to another and they focused again, flicking up at me, open wide with emotion. “No. God no. He wanted to sleep with me, he was asking me to that night at the bar, you heard him. But even without meeting you I wouldn’t have done it. He is nothing but a total ass.” Her lips formed a pout then she quietly added, “He’s gross too.”

I lost a breath, thankful she didn’t touch him. “That we are in total agreement about.”

Her glassy eyes remained locked on mine. Wet with unshed tears. “I refuse to be his pawn anymore. I’m done with all of it.” I sat watching her as she took her time looking over me, taking in her fill. Her small hand reached out and landed on my knee. “Tell me I’m not alone in this. Tell me it’s real between you and me. I’m not seeing something that isn’t there, am I?”

I wanted to tell her it sure as hell was real for me. But I also wanted to know what on earth she was talking about. In this intoxicated state, it felt wrong to drag the answers from her. I also wanted her to tell me all about this without the alcohol loosening her tongue. But there was one question I needed her to answer. One question that I would risk being an asshole for asking, when she didn’t really have any defense against me. “Do you care for me? Truly?” I hardened my heart; if this answer wasn’t good, I needed to be able to leave her.

She squeezed my knee and leaned forward. Her head burrowed into the crook of my shoulder. “Yeah, I do.” A loud yawn escaped her, and she turned her head to muffle the sound against my neck. “Yes, I care about you. I was never supposed to, and it happened without my permission, but I do. I care too damn much, really. It hurts knowing that I have to leave soon. After all, I’m pretty sure I’m in lo—”

The soft snore came from nowhere as she stopped right in the middle of a word. A word, that if I was correct in deducing, was one I desperately wanted to hear fall from her lips. It scared me a little, that in the space of a few weeks my world had changed so dramatically.

But then there were the consequences from saying that word, and at the thought of finally hearing it directed at me. I would much rather wait until she was sober to hear it. Then, there would be no doubt in both our minds of the gravity of it. That it wasn’t just something said in the moment, or with the alcohol emboldening her.

I would wait for that moment, along with the answers to many other questions tonight’s ramblings had brought up. Including just who her father thought he was telling her to sleep with me. But for now, I could wait till tomorrow morning.

Cupping the back of her head, I helped lay her down on the bed, and looked at her with her eyes closed. That sassy mouth of hers completely relaxed, and her long black hair tangled on the pillow. I gently removed her shoes, setting them down at the end of the bed, then pulled the covers back on the other side of the bed and lifted her so she could snuggle underneath. I pressed a kiss on her forehead, and she smiled and mumbled something before hiccupping in her sleep and snuggling further into the pillow.

Looking down at her while she rested, in those early moments of sleep, I thought of that night I first saw her, on her hands and knees on the side of the road. How had the past three weeks flown by and changed everything for me? Leaning forward, I pressed my lips to her forehead again. “Sweet dreams,” I whispered onto her skin before kissing her once more.

After retrieving some Tylenol and a glass of water from the bathroom, I set them on the bedside table within easy reach for her and wandered across to the door. Looking back at her sleeping form, I smiled. As much as I wanted to slip under the covers and hold her against me for the rest of the night, I wouldn’t.

Tomorrow, once those three words dropped from her sassy mouth, I knew one thing for certain. I wouldn’t ever be letting her go. She would know, one way or another, that she had a home here.

That she would always belong with me.

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