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She took my hand. “I’m glad you didn’t, and I had the same trepidation.”
“As far as the two of us go, I apologize for my family’s part in the past, and I hope we can drop the animosity that’s eaten away at our parents all this time.”
“Me too.” Her smile conveyed an honesty I couldn’t doubt.
Here I was, breaking with my father and taking the Bensons’ side in this. I’d expected it to be hard, but now that I’d learned the truth about Uncle Jack, I felt relieved to be able to get it out in the open.
I’d stressed about this conversation ever since learning the truth hidden in the BENSNAP file. I took the next leap. “Can we just be Adam and Kelly, and forget the last names for good?”
She moved over to snuggle with me again—a good sign.
I draped an arm behind her. With the guilt I’d felt since reading the BENSNAP file finally unloaded, I relaxed into the sofa. Worrying about the talk, followed by actually getting it out in the open had drained me. It could have gone wrong in so many ways.
This time, she was the one to move my hand up to the side of her boob. “Hi, Adam. I’m Kelly.” Her other hand returned to my thigh, and my cock took notice once again. “Your kissing student, remember?”
I kissed the top of her head. “I remember. Want to watch a movie?” The feel of her against me was electric, and the fact that we’d gotten past Benson and Cartwright made it feel even better.
Her soft eyes connected with me. “If you do.”
I raised my glass for another sip. I needed decompression time.
“Maybe you’ve had enough?”
Normally I would have taken offense at someone commenting on my drinking, but her tone had been kind.
“Maybe so.” I’d needed it to calm me earlier, but having her warm form against me was better medicine.
Her finger tapped my thigh. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For talking to me.” Her hand shifted higher on my thigh. “Like a boyfriend.”
The twitch in my cock shifted to my heart as I understood the words. She wanted to take things further.
* * *
Kelly
It hadn’t beenthe talk I’d expected, it had been better. Putting the family feud aside and not letting it affect us the way it did our parents seemed overdue.
The man next to me wasn’t the ogre I’d been taught any Cartwright would be. He had integrity, and an honesty that put him far ahead of any of the men I’d met since coming to this town.
My reaction upon learning he’d be my protector now seemed so alien to me. I’d recoiled at the idea of spending any time with him, and I’d been so horribly wrong.
“You’re not saying anything,” he said after a while.
“Just thinking.”
“Me too.”
His opening up to me about his uncle’s past made his evasive behavior understandable in retrospect. It had been a hard set of things to admit—betraying his family almost.
As I snuggled up against Adam, I closed my eyes and ignored the movie. I could feel the beat of his heart, a true heart, a kind heart, the heart of a brave man to have admitted what he had tonight.
He’d been open with me, and I could only hope I hadn’t gone too far with those words I wanted to be true.
His thumb continued to stroke the side of my breast through my shirt as the movie played.
