The Dirty Series 2(119)

I squint at the floor-to-ceiling windows on the other side of the bedroom, trying to determine the time by the quality of the light. “I don’t think so.”

“Then we’ve still got time.” Ace wraps one arm around my waist and pulls me back down next to him. The air in his apartment has cooled—he must still be running the air conditioning, despite the fall temperatures creeping a little lower each day—and it feels unbelievable for my smooth bare skin to slide down under his soft sheets.

We lay in silence for a few minutes, nothing but the sound of our breathing evident in the room, and I think Ace might have fallen asleep again.

Then he says, “I shouldn’t be doing this with you, but I can’t help it.”

“Why not?”

“You’re too gorgeous and perfect.”

I laugh softly. “Why shouldn’t you be doing it?”

His arm around my waist tenses, but he presses his lips to the back of my neck, and heat cascades down from where he’s kissing me all the way to my toes.

“I just shouldn’t.”

I sigh a little. “That’s not really an answer.”

He takes in a deep breath, and I feel his chest press against my back. I wait for the next breath, and the next. I could keep waiting for breaths for the rest of my life, lying just like this, and be perfectly happy.

Well—eventually I’d want to roll over and do something else to his sexy, muscled body. But right now….

My heart beats a little harder. I’m careening from utter contentment to a strange fluttering in my chest that makes the back of my neck feel cold even with Ace’s hot breath, his soft lips, against it. My shiver prompts him to answer.

“This kind of….” His voice trails off, and for a split second I think he might say “love.” “This kind of infatuation always ends in heartbreak.” Ace’s voice is a little odd as he says this, not curled so tightly into his happiness. Does he really believe what he’s saying?

I turn in his arms so I can look into his eyes, but they’re still closed, so I settle for running a finger down the sharp line of his jaw. “Infatuation?” I say softly.

I don’t want him to tell me that he’s in love with me. I don’t want to tell him that I’m in love with him. That’s not what I’m going for, even if it’s—even if it might be true, on some level.

Ace opens his eyes and looks into mine, and I’m swept right up into them, for the first time noticing a green ring like lightning around his pupils.

“You’re not obsessed with me?” He flashes a half-smile that sends electricity running through my fingertips.

I suck in a breath. “A little bit.”

“But?”

“But it’s…it’s….”

“It’s more than that, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

This is as close as I’m going to come to admitting my feelings for him right now, because here it comes—another wave of unease. If this is going to grow any deeper, I need to know what the hell is going on with him. I’m not sure I’m going to like what I find out

Ace doesn’t agree with me out loud, but he does lean in and kiss me, softly, slowly, unlike any other kiss we’ve shared before. When he pulls back, I ask the first question out of the many that are roiling in my mind.

“Where did you go, Ace?”

He raises one eyebrow. “I’m still right here.”

“I mean, before you were here. Before you…came back to New York City.”

His expression goes a little harder. I feel sick. I don’t want to have this conversation, but I have to. Who the hell knows? This could be the end of it all, right now, if he reacts the way he did last Saturday. One week ago. How can I possibly feel so intense about things after one week?

Because it’s him, says the voice in the back of my mind.

“I was in Italy.”

“Italy?”

“Yes.”

Italy is not one of the places that’s been mentioned on Rainflower Blue. People have suggested everywhere from Seattle to the Middle East, but never Italy.

“Why were you there?”

I keep my tone soothing and soft, not wanting to put the pressure on but wanting him to answer me so we can leave this charged, uncomfortable moment behind.

I have one hand just above Ace’s hip, on the hard muscles of his waist, and I feel his body tense.

“Business.”

It’s a lie, and we both know it. If not a full lie, then a half-truth. The way his face has frozen tells me that it was more than business. Much more.

The voice comes again. That doesn’t make him a murderer.

I have a sense that I’m up against some boundary, and if I touch it, this idyllic afternoon will come to a grinding halt.