Page 35 of One Night with Number Nineteen

Ten

Lainey

I’m so stunned by his question that I don’t really process him moving closer, not until I’m suddenly surrounded by the heat of him, the scent of him.

Spice and male.

Strength and heat.

Need blooms in my belly, sends drifting fingers down between my legs.

“It’s okay if you don’t want to talk about it,” he says softly, lifting his hand…and then freezing.

Like he wants to touch me…but is stopping himself.

My heart rolls over in my chest.

“It’s all good, Pages,” he says, his hand dropping to his side, stepping back.

Giving me space.

Not pushing.

I nibble the inside of my cheek, that soft feeling in my chest growing. “It’s not that,” I murmur, and part of me wonders what it would have been like to have the courage to step closer, to close the distance between my body and his hand.

“Then what?” he asks as I’m thinking about that.

As I’m wanting it.

“I just…” I shrug. “I’m not going to write it.”

“Why not?”

Yeah.

Why not?

I shake my head. “Because I couldn’t sleep last night, and I was messing around.” His eyes cloud but I keep talking. “It’s not really my brand. Not really a story my readers would like. It’s too dark, too silly, too…I don’t know. It’s just not me.”

His gaze holds mine, head tipping to the side.

And I brace for…hell, I don’t know what.

Maybe for him to tell me that of course they would like it, to minimize my knowledge of my brand and my readers. Maybe for him to ask me to explain how it doesn’t really feel like me…yet that it also feels like a piece of me I’ve neglected for too long.

One I’ve never explored.

One I’ve ignored and shoved down and shut the door on.

“Would you tell me about it anyway?”

My brows drag together.

“Or not,” he says softly. “Maybe we should talk about why you couldn’t sleep last night.”

God, no.

“Or,” he says, his lips quirking as though he can hear that inner thought blasting through my head, “you could explain the state of your desk.”