Undercover in the CEO's Bed(34)

He cleared his throat, which felt incredibly dry and tight. He moistened his lips. He started to sing “Hard to Say I’m Sorry.”

Holy hell, was that his voice warbling out? He never realized how crappy he was at singing. If only he had backup singers or a piano player, but he had nothing. Nothing, except blind desperation.

His voice faltered. He paused to clear his throat again. Jacinta’s eyes were like saucers, and the packed waiting room had fallen silent. All his relatives were staring at him, plus about twenty strangers. He felt their eyes drilling into his back as sweat prickled beneath his shirt and broke out on his palms. He felt stupid and clownish and bumbling, but wait...was that a glimmer of something in Jacinta’s eyes? Even if it was only amusement, it was something, at least.

He drew in another breath and launched into the song once more. This time, he sang with more gusto, and he was just as crappy as before, only louder. His off-key singing echoed in the beige room, the smell of disinfectant filling his nostrils with every breath. More people wandered into the waiting room, their faces wincing as he cracked the high notes, and a little girl clapped her hands over her ears in protest. But he didn’t care because all his attention was focused on the woman standing in front of him and the emotions playing across her face.

He came to the chorus again and stretched his arms out. He was sorry and he could never let her go, and didn’t she know that now he was kneeling in front of her singing his heart out in front of all these people?

Her face screwed up, and tears gathered in her eyes. Oh shit. Were those happy tears or sad tears or was his singing that excruciating?

He came to the end of the song, and his voice petered out. Remaining on his knees, he gazed up at her, hardly daring to breathe.

“Jacinta?” Hope and fear wavered through him. “I love you, sweetheart.” He didn’t know what else to say, so he stopped, and all he could hear was the booming of his heart.

She gulped and screwed up her eyes even tighter. She looked like she was struggling to speak.

“Will you give me a second chance?” he blurted out, unable to bear the suspense.

“I—I—” she sputtered.

“Yeah, give him another chance, Jacinta,” Holly piped up from the back. “I’m sure he couldn’t sound any worse than that effort.”

“Oh!” Indignation burst across Jacinta’s face as she flung her arms around his neck. “I love your singing.”

Giddy with disbelief, he rose to his feet and gingerly put his arms around her as if his luck might shatter at any moment. “That’s—that’s good to know, because I have to warn you, I know other cheesy songs, and if you don’t give me another chance, I’ll be forced to sing them to you in public.”

Her chin quivered, and the tears returned to her eyes. “Lex, did you mean that? Do you really love me?”

Her uncertainty made his heart clench. “Yes, I love you. But it’s hard for me to admit that, because you scare me.”

“I scare you?” she asked, astonished.

“I’ve always walked alone. I never expected to fall in love. Hell, I wasn’t even sure what love was. So when we first met and clicked so well, the intensity took me by surprise, and I wasn’t ready for it. Maybe subconsciously I was waiting for something bad to happen, and when we hit that first roadblock, I blew it out of proportion.”

“No, it wasn’t really like that.” She squeezed his arms, her hands warm against his shirtsleeves, leaving him shaky. “I understand how you felt. You have principles, and I asked you to abandon them for me, just because we were together. I shouldn’t have done that. I wasn’t fair to you and, as it turns out, I haven’t been fair to Kevin either.

“I’ve been protecting Kevin for way too long, treating him like a child instead of the adult he is. You told me it was better for him in the long run to learn from his mistakes. You’re right about that.”

Standing on tiptoe, she slipped her arms tight around his neck to bring her face half an inch from his. Her eyes were luminous and mesmerizing. “And yes,” she murmured with a shy smile. “I love you, too, Lex. With all my heart.”

The dam in his chest caved in as her words filled him with tenderness and soaring happiness.

“Louder, Jacinta,” Kirk said from the crowd. “We didn’t hear you.”

An adorable blush rose in her cheeks. “I love you, Lex.” She raised her voice, her gaze fixed on him.

“Oh honey, I apologize for my relatives.”

Kirk snorted. “And we apologize for his singing.”

He couldn’t hold out any longer, not with Jacinta gazing at him so starry-eyed and the length of her body molded against his. He pulled her into his chest and pressed a starving kiss onto her mouth. She instantly responded, snuggling into his embrace as she kissed him back, her lips parting to let his tongue play with hers.

As a hubbub broke out around them, he gauged it would be smart to go somewhere more private. He broke off the kiss and led her hand in hand down the corridor toward the hospital exit.

“Where are we going?” she asked, sounding excited and breathless.

“I don’t know. Somewhere we won’t be interrupted.”

She clasped his hand tenderly. “I take it that things between you and Kirk and Holly are better?”

“They’re improving. Thanks to you.”

“I’m glad.”

He couldn’t stop staring at her in wonder, amazed he’d won her back. “Jacy...” He swallowed as a deep happiness bubbled up inside him. “You mean everything to me, you know that, don’t you?”

“Remind me again, will you?”

She looked so ecstatic that he was forced to pull her into a doorway and kiss her again. He nuzzled his lips down her neck and nudged aside her shirt collar before sweeping the tip of his tongue over the top of her breast. The answering shudder from her made him hard in a second.

“I’m so glad we don’t have to pretend anymore,” she sighed. “It was getting so difficult pretending to love you without giving away that I did really love you.”

“Uh, does that even make sense?”

“I don’t know. But it will if you just kiss me.”

He didn’t need to be told twice. He gathered her closer, and proceeded to make everything clear to her. When he was kissing her, all was right in the world.