Page 74 of Jonas

“Here? Like right⁠—”

“That kiss, the one before it, you opening up, telling me about your family, me telling you about mine. Here. Now. Is this us feeling each other out, seeing if there’s something to explore or are we blowing off steam?”

Derrika shook her head and mumbled, “No.”

“No?”

“No, I’m not blowing off steam.” I whooshed out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. “But, also, no I’m not feeling you out.” That felt like a kick to the balls. “I think…I think…”

She trailed off and when it was obvious she wasn’t going to say more, I prompted, “You think what?”

“Nothing, it’s stupid.” She reached for my phone and I debated pushing her for an answer.

I let go of my phone and told her, “I’m gonna give you that play, baby. But I’m gonna do it telling you nothing you have to say is stupid. If this is where we’re at, and we’re both at a place where we want to explore if there’s something between us, not only do I want to know what you’re thinking, I gotta know. I get you wanna feel me out—that goes both ways. I get you wanting to protect yourself—again that goes both ways. But with our histories, for this to work, even in the beginning, we gotta lay it out.”

I glanced down at my phone then back up and held her eyes, giving her more truth. “I lived in dysfunction. Chaos. Selfishness. Screaming, yelling, drunken fights that ended with fists and bloodshed. Everything outside the four walls of my house was a lie. I lived that lie and hid the truth until my brother bled out on the kitchen floor. Saying that to say this—as we feel our way through this, the only thing you’ll get from me is honesty, and I expect that back. Knowing that, you wanna rethink your answer?”

There was no hesitation when she answered, “No.”

I waited for more, hoping she understood I was willing to let her slide on not giving me her thoughts, but it cost me.

Then she said, “I was going to say, that kiss wasn’t me feeling you out because I’m already beyond that.”

“That’s not stupid, Dee Dee.”

“You’re right, it’s not, but admitting that puts me out there, especially when I tell you I’m beyond that, because I knew the moment I met you there was something different about you. I just couldn’t put my finger on it. I knew being close to you would be dangerous to my heart because with the barest hint you were interested, I’d hand it over.

“So it might not be stupid, but it’s scary how easily I open up to you when no one else in my life outside of Utah knows my past. I might not be able to put it into words why I feel like my soul recognizes you, but it does. You’re also right—with our histories, the only way to build trust is to simply give it to the other person. There would be no earning it with either of us. I wouldn’t let you in, not really, because I wouldn’t believe in it. So there it is, I know where I’m at. I know when this is over, I don’t want us to be over. I want to see if what I feel is right and true.” She paused to smile. “Or I could be feeling what I’m feeling because you’re hot.”

Right around the part where she said she thought there was something different about me, my heart started pounding against my ribcage. By the time she admitted she was scared, my lungs were burning. When she rightly stated the only way for us to trust each other was to give that freely, I felt heat lick up my spine. I was savoring that burn until her pause—then the burn was replaced with the overwhelming need to kiss the smartass off her tongue.

But doing that might lead to me flashing my pasty ass, something I’d rather not do.

So instead of courting making a homemade porn starring me and Derrika, I smirked and asked, “It’s the beard, isn’t it?”

I thought she’d at least smile. She didn’t, she whispered, “It’s your eyes. Or more to the point, how you look at me. I feel seen, and for a girl like me who’s never had that, never felt it not even for a second, not only is it attractive and a total turn-on, it feels beautiful.”

Well fuck.

I leaned forward until my forehead rested on hers and warned, “Never thought I’d say this but I’m fresh out of control, baby. No more talking.”

I stepped back, snatched her hand not holding my phone, and sent us in the direction of the path that would take us to the cabin.

Thankfully, we made the trek in silence. I did not lie, my control had slipped. One more word from her sweet lips and I would not care who saw what when I showed her exactly how I felt about her laying herself bare.

CHAPTER TWENTY

On the walk back to the cabin, my head was filled with five hundred and fifty-two things. None of these having to do with the impending doom the Chinese had already instigated. None of them had to do with meeting the President of the United States in a few hours.

I mean, the President.

My head was filled with Jonas, our kiss, and his phone in my hand. And, yes, right then his phone was more important than meeting POTUS, more important than getting back to the basement in the big house and checking to see what new intel Kira had been able to uncover, it was more important than everything.

Normally, a man handing over his cell to a woman he barely knew, would be a show of trust. Jonas doing it was a sign of absolute trust.

So, yeah, his phone in my hand—and what that meant—was taking up a lot of space in my head, and what was left over was taken up by our kiss. Not the first one—the second one. The first one was brilliant. The second one was so hot, if my hair hadn’t been wet and caked with mud it would’ve caught fire. It might’ve been a while since I’d kissed a man—okay, a long while—but none had ever come close to being that good.

I was no relationship expert—hell, I wasn’t even a relationship enthusiast, more like a novice, so I couldn’t know for sure—but evidence was strongly suggesting that having a mysterious emotional attachment to someone, no matter how much it was in its infancy, made everything better.