The Hard Truth About Sunshine(17)

"You're a bit inconsistent to be honest," she says with a cute shrug and a slow bat of her eyelashes. "You say mean things to deflect, but it's really kind of obvious. You internalize, and I'm sure you've got a million reasons to do so. You never talk about what happened to you or how you feel about it, and you clearly don't want to. So you do asshole-like things to push people away. Like I said …  totally obvious."

"What does that have to do with liking me?" I ask in a low voice, but before she can answer me, her phone starts ringing. She pushes a hand into her back pocket and deftly hits the button that sends the call to voice mail.

Jillian is a popular person, apparently, because her phone rings a lot even though she never answers it. Connor asked her about it once, but she just said, "I like texting better than talking."

Made sense to me because I'm the same way.

Jillian smoothly continues, the ringing of the phone already dismissed and forgotten. "My theory is that because you're not that great at the whole asshole thing, you probably weren't always that way. And I'd like to find out more about the real Christopher Barlow. But until you choose to do that, I'll just stick with the ‘you're hot' reason why I want to kiss you and go with that."

A bubbling sensation forms inside my throat, way down low. It roils, surges upward, and feels completely foreign as it bursts free from my mouth.

It's a laugh.

A completely take-me-by-surprise laugh that I had no intention of giving, and frankly, I didn't think I had it in me to give. But goddamn, she's funny and sweet, and she makes me think there could possibly be hope for me.

Jillian grins back at me.

"Christ," I mutter as my left hand slides out of my pocket and wraps around the back of her neck where I grip her gently. "You're like a blaze of bright sunshine that the fucking darkest sunglasses can't repel."

She gives me a pouty look. "That's a compliment, right?"

I answer her with that kiss she asked for because in this moment, Jillian forgives me for being an asshole and she thinks I'm hot. I've been a risk-averse kind of guy for the last few years, but right now, I'm thinking she's a sure bet.

For the kiss, I mean.

When our lips first touch, my entire body relaxes for a moment as if this is the most natural thing in the world. Then Jillian boldly opens her mouth to touch her tongue to mine, and my entire body tightens. My fingers dig slightly into her neck, and I have to suppress the groan that wants to tear free. Jillian sighs into my mouth, her tongue rolling against mine. A breathy, dreamy, satisfied sound that makes me feel every bit a man.

It's the best fucking kiss I can remember, which means it's time to pull away. I end the kiss with a soft brush of my lips against hers. I end it because that was about as perfect as it can get, and I don't want anything else to mar that right now.         

     



 

I stare down at her as she slowly opens her eyes, a wistful curve to her lips. When she focuses on me, she says, "That was good."

"It was." My admission is reluctant because it would be so much easier if the kiss had been bad.

Jillian rubs her thumb along my breastbone before stepping away from me. "I hope we do that again. Good night, Christopher."

I stand there silently and watch her as she goes to her room. She gives a knock on the door without looking back at me, and Barb opens it within a few seconds. Jillian disappears inside, and I am more confused than ever.

When I walk to the room I'm sharing with Connor, I see he's left the deadbolt engaged so the door remains slightly cracked open. When I enter, I see him on the bed closest to the bathroom, surfing on his phone.

He looks over at me and gives me a sly grin.

"What?" I ask defensively, wondering if he was watching out the window or something.

Connor shakes his head. "Nothing."

"Damn right, nothing," I mutter as I pull my toiletry kit out of my bag.

I walk past his bed toward the bathroom, but his words stop me dead. "She really likes you."

My head whips to look at him. "What makes you say that?"

"Because she told me."

"She did?" I ask dubiously.

"Yeah," he returns with a confident nod of his head. "Totally."

I still don't really understand why. I know she said the whole "hot" thing, and she alluded to me not really being an asshole, but now I find out she's told Connor she likes me.

Maybe there's some truth to it.

Maybe I'm just a way to pass her time.

In an unprecedented burst of candor, I tell Connor an absolute lie that should be hard truth. "I don't think I'm interested."

"Why?" His eyebrows are up high, the expression on his face incredulous. "She's amazing."

Apparently, now that I've staked my position to Connor, I feel the need to defend it. "I've been burned before. Not interested in going there again."

"Burned? How?"

I give a sigh and brush my fingers through my hair. "Long story short, I had a girlfriend who dumped me when I came back with parts of me left in the desert."

Connor winces, but I give him the rest.

"My parents never came to see me during my recovery; it was too much on them. I'm not keen on facing the whole potential for abandonment again."

Propping up on his elbow, Connor levels me with a solemn look. "Christopher, I don't think them abandoning you had anything to do with your injuries. I think it had everything to do with the fact that they're the assholes. They're the ones who are deficient and weak-the ones who are broken."

"Maybe so," I say in agreement. "But it's sort of left me with trust issues."

It's a sympathetic look that Connor gives me. "And anger issues. No wonder you're an asshole. I totally understand it now though."

I can't help the snicker that pops out. For some reason, Connor's got me relaxed, so I admit, "Besides …  someone like Jillian is too good for the likes of me."

"She's not like that," Connor insists. "She doesn't look at you as broken or less than anything."

"I don't mean that," I say with a shake of my head. The minute Jillian grabbed my deformed hand, I knew she saw past the scars. "I mean, my baggage is too heavy. My issues are too dark. I'd drag her down so fast that her light would be extinguished."

"Or," Connor suggests, "her light is so bright it will drive away your darkness."

I make a non-committal noise. It's a nice thought, but I'd be a fool to hope it's true.





Chapter 14





I had our cross-country route all planned. My preference had been to drive straight across from Raleigh to Los Angeles, which could be done in roughly thirty-five hours. Connor, however, had wanted to see a specific part of the Pacific Ocean, a placed called Cannon Beach in Oregon. This added ten hours onto my original plan as we had to cut up northwest. Then I made a deviation so Barb could piss on her abusive uncle's grave.

That's fine. Back on track and headed to Denver.

Granted, we could do this trip a lot faster with continuous driving, but I don't trust anyone else to drive my vehicle. Jillian can't see, Connor is just too inexperienced, and Barb would likely drive us off a cliff. I have to settle with driving nine to ten hours a day or more and stretching the trip by a few days.

To help compensate for this extra time on the road, my plan today is to drive hard to make it to Denver by dinnertime, which is why I insisted we leave at six this morning.         

     



 

Things are never that easy though. Jillian throws a monkey wrench at me, which is something I actually think she derives pleasure in doing. As I'm rearranging some stuff in the rear of my SUV, waiting on the others to come out of the rooms, Jillian suddenly appears at the tailgate.

"Good morning," she says hesitantly.

I turn to look at her. With a sigh, I ask in a long, drawled-out tone, "What do you want?"

I'd come to recognize that look on her face when she was going to ask for something that she was pretty sure she wouldn't get. It was the same look on her face when she proposed this trip, and when she told me she had forgotten her wallet and needed to borrow money.

"Can we make a change to the route again?" she asks quickly, and I try not to focus on her lips as she talks. Reminds me too much of our kisses. "It's really not that much out of the way. Maybe an additional five hours of driving time, but we can make that up."

With a cocked eyebrow, I stand straight and fold my arms across my chest. "Where to?"

"Yellowstone," she practically gushes. "Connor would love to see Yellowstone, and I Googled it …  the difference we lose by not going to Boise after Denver is really only about five hours."

"For fuck's sake, Jillian," I say sarcastically. "It won't add just five hours onto the trip. It will add an entire day once we get there because you don't just look at the sign at the front of the park and leave. You have to drive around and see shit."

"I know," she pleads with me. "But come on, Christopher. He's dying. Why can't you give another day of your time to make this happen?"

Just two days ago, my answer would have been, "Because I don't give a fuck he's dying."

But today, I'm apparently a slightly different man as I find myself nodding in acquiescence without any real hesitation. "Okay, fine."