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‘Will you show me how to jump?’
Oh, she had no idea how he wanted to make her jump.
‘When you have wrist, knee and elbow pads on, plus a helmet,’ he said roughly. And when she was through her pregnancy.
But he wanted her to do it again, too. The devil in him who loved a dare wanted to see her sparkling some more with her skirt flying and her spirit free, delighted that she’d felt the pure and simple joy of it. But she couldn’t—and he shouldn’t have let her take even that little risk.
Frustration made him more tense.
He felt her stiffen in response and her smile faded as she looked into his face.
‘I’d better get to work.’ She looked down, the bloom in her cheeks deeper.
Yeah, she had better get back to her computers and her safe, indoor, insular little world. Because mucking around with the usual regime like this wasn’t good for his heart.
Kelsi made her weak body take her own weight. Jack turned and quickly moved to pick up the skateboard—but he shoved it onto the deck. No more riding, then.
Damn.
She walked all the way to work but her body was still on an adrenaline high—feeling more full of energy and zing than it ever had. But it wasn’t from the skateboarding, it had been those too few moments in his arms. And she was such a fool, because he couldn’t get away from her quick enough.
The yearning was appalling—the never ending need to be near him. But during dinner that night the turmoil was there, a scarce centimetre beneath the surface, and the antagonism between them rubbed the veneer of calm to dangerous thinness. Every look contained a challenge, in every word she searched for a double meaning. And the words grew fewer, the looks longer, until the tension between them silently screamed.
She tried to dig deeper into her defensive trench. Combating the uncoiling desire by imagining what life would be like when she was living in the big part of the house and he was back visiting—bringing his latest lover to the flat with him.
Absolute torture.
The idea hurt so much she knew that this solution of his wasn’t something that she could live with long-term.
She couldn’t resist watching out of her window later that night when he was doing more exercises and then kicking out on his board. She wished she were out there, too, with him teaching her some more moves.
She’d never have imagined in a million years that she’d like skateboarding, that she’d want to go so fast and just have some fun. That she’d spend half her life now wishing she could bunk work and go to the beach with him, or boarding or just take off somewhere to do something purely for fun. Because Jack knew how to have fun and she wanted in on that adventure.
But he wasn’t offering that.
Finally, thankfully, Friday arrived. She was so looking forward to having the weekend away from work and to the builders not banging downstairs. Hopefully Jack would go away somewhere, too, and she could put herself back together properly and make a decent decision about her future.
As she dragged herself downstairs on her way to work she saw he was up already and waiting for her by the front door. She had to go close to get past him—and he wasn’t moving. And as she walked through he stepped to the side—blocking her path completely.
His fingers brushed the smudges under her silver-tinted eyes—she was hoping they’d help her see through the clouds to the lining.
‘You’re not getting enough sleep,’ he said.
She turned away, unable to bear his touch. ‘Neither are you.’ Shamefully husky. But she knew it was true. He looked leaner and right now he was as pale as the snow he loved.
‘Are you sure the builders aren’t bothering you?’ he asked. ‘I’ve told them not to start until you’ve gone to work and to stop any loud banging after you get home but I want to get this done as soon as possible.’
So he could get away? ‘They don’t bother me.’
What bothered her was knowing he slept so near. That was what kept her awake. The unutterable loneliness—the kind of loneliness she’d never felt in all her life, even though she’d been living by herself for over a year now. So near and yet so out of reach.
His knee was better. She’d seen him stretching out this morning—pushing his regime—seen his smile as it hadn’t troubled him.
That bothered her, too.
‘Have you been feeling sick at all?’ He looked into her face, his blue eyes focused closely on her features.
She felt herself flushing. ‘Absolutely not.’ She faked her answer, faked her smile.
