Waking Up Pregnant(48)
Her mouth pulled to the side and her eyes went to some faraway place it made him feel good to think he might be with her in.
“It was fun. It was great,” he said, appreciative for what she was sharing, but still not any closer to understanding why she’d taken off without so much as a goodbye.
“When I fell into bed with you, I thought I could handle it. We were both adults. You made me feel things I never feel. And I wanted more of it.”
The next breath she took was unsteady.
“I wanted more of your eyes on me, looking like you couldn’t look away.” She peered back at him and lifted one shoulder. “I know that wasn’t really the way it was. What we were doing was about a physical release. It was about sex. And I was okay with it. It’s just—I don’t know, it had been so long since I’d been intimate with someone—I wasn’t prepared for how it would make me feel. And I knew the kinds of things running through my head didn’t belong there.”
He shouldn’t ask. But, hell, he wanted to know. “What things?”
Darcy turned to the window, hiding her eyes from his, but not the pink stain infusing her cheeks.
“That being in your arms made me feel like I never wanted to leave. It was something I could get used to too fast. Something I might hope for more of.”
“Then why the hell did you leave?”
This time the laughter that passed her lips had a bitter sound to it. A sharp edge to warn him from getting too close.
“Because that’s not what either of us had been looking for. You didn’t pick me up looking for a new girlfriend or someone to settle down with. You picked me up looking for the kind of good time that happens in Vegas and stays in Vegas. A few hours of fun, remember? No broken hearts in the street. But the time we shared meant something to me, and I wasn’t willing to risk tainting the memory of it with some awkward dismissal where you handed me my panties and thanked me for the great time.”
“You didn’t know it was going to go that way.”
“I didn’t. But that’s the point, Jeff. I couldn’t stand the idea of waiting around to find out. I didn’t want to be the cocktail waitress tucked into your bed hoping you weren’t going to kick her out before morning.”
So she’d bolted. Taken the drastic, undoable action before he’d even had a chance to give her another alternative. It wasn’t the same as what happened with Margo. Not even close to the betrayal he’d never seen coming. And yet that sense of somehow being cheated lingered in the back of his mind, prompting him to come back with the different ways it could have gone.
“You could have gotten dressed and waited for me to come back. You could have been the one to say goodbye.”
“Except then I’d still have been standing there hoping.” The vulnerability in her eyes was like a blow to the chest, momentarily knocking the wind from his lungs.
What kind of life had she had that a little hope was such a bad thing?
He caught her chin in the crook of his finger. “I wanted to see you again. I wanted—” He broke off and shook his head. “Before I realized our protection failed, I was going to tell you I wanted to see you again.”
But then the moment he saw what had happened everything changed. If Darcy had been there when he’d come out of the bathroom, yes, he’d have been able to explain about the protection. They’d have exchanged information. He’d have promised to get in touch within a few weeks. But he wouldn’t have asked her to stay. He wouldn’t have tried to convince her to give him the next day or night or anything else. Because he’d have been too worried about the rest of his life.