Channel 20 Something (21 page)

Hale looked at the door then at me. “In case you don’t realize it—the guy’s way into you.”

I shook my head. I still didn’t feel the need to explain my relationship with Aric to Hale since, (A) it wasn’t leading to anything permanent, and (B) there was no need to burden Hale with it when Aric wasn’t the cause of our breakup, and (C) I was a total coward.

“He’s a good guy. We get along well… at work.”

“Right,” Hale said, not quite convinced. The game must have ended, based on the increase in family chatter headed our way. He glanced toward the den then back at me. “Well, I’d better go. There’s more to be said, but we’ll talk another time. Goodnight, Heidi.” He brushed a quick kiss across my cheek, opened the door, and stepped outside.

And I said goodnight to the second guy to walk out of my life that night. In Aric’s case, I hoped it wouldn’t be permanent. Not yet.

When a knock came on my apartment’s front door at just before midnight, I was relieved to see Aric through the peephole. He hadn’t answered his phone earlier, and I’d been fretting over how he’d interpreted the foyer scene with Hale.

I opened the door with a smile. “Hi.”

No smile from Aric. “Did you even call about the Nashville job?” he asked, still standing in the breezeway of my building.

“What?”

“The Nashville job.” Aric finally stepped inside but left the door open and stood glowering down at me. “Did you bother to call Sky? Or were you ever planning to tell me you’re going to just re-sign your contract and stay here? You haven’t gone on
one
interview.”

Why was he railing at me about my tardy job search efforts? And why on earth was this top-of-mind for him at ten-till-twelve on a Monday night?

“Excuse me. Hello. How are you? Would you like to come in? Oh, you would? Please do. Now
what
is going on? Why all these questions about Nashville?”

“You
said
you were ready to move on.” His expression was accusatory and… hurt.

“Yes, and I’ve finally gotten my reel to where I feel it’s good enough to send out. I was planning to apply for a couple of jobs tomorrow that I saw on Medialine. And I didn’t contact your friend in Nashville, because honestly, I don’t think there’s any chance I’ll get the job. I’m not ready. Why would they want someone from market 133 with a thick accent?”

“Because you’re good. You are ready. And your accent’s gotten a lot lighter. Have you been doing the drills?”

“Yes, I have.” I purposely laid on the Southern accent extra-thick and creamy, sidling up to him, stopping just before the fronts of our bodies touched. “Any other questions?”

Aric’s expression softened into a slight smile. I rose on my bare toes and stretched my arms up around his neck, pressing into him and causing the nightshirt I wore to rise high on my thighs.

Aric’s hands automatically went to my waist, but there was still too much tension in his body. My fingers sifted through the hair at the back of his head and rubbed the nape of his neck.

He let out a soft groan, closing his eyes in pleasure before opening them again to focus on me. Caution still edged his voice. “Only one. Are you really ready to move on from Hale?”

Ah, and now we got to what was really going on in his head. “Yes. In fact, I was making sure he understood that tonight when you walked in on us.”

“That’s not what it looked like,” he said in a bruised tone.

I continued stroking the back of his neck. The increased pace of his breathing let me know it was working. “Well, that’s what it was. He’s just having kind of a hard time letting go.”

He dipped his head to drag his lips up the side of my neck. Now
my
breath was coming more quickly. “Can’t blame him there,” Aric muttered between kisses. “Poor bastard. You’d be impossible to get over. I’d hang on to any shred of hope, too, if I were him.”

“Oh, I don’t think he’s still—”

“I don’t want to talk about him anymore.” Aric continued to work on my neck, making the rest of my body anxious to get in on the action.

“Neither do I.” I shifted so our mouths were aligned and kissed Aric, licking his bottom lip the way I knew he liked it. He immediately responded by deepening the kiss, pulling me so tightly against his body it was hard to breathe.

After a few minutes of concentrated kissing, I withdrew slightly. “So are you staying?”

Without removing the arm that held me close to his body, he reached out and slammed the door closed.

My nerve endings erupted into a joyful chorus, anticipating the pleasure to come. Though we hadn’t done
the deed
, Aric had turned out to be the owner of some very talented hands. He’d made sure I’d gone to bed happy quite a few times in the past few weeks. I decided that wouldn’t be enough for tonight. To hell with waiting—I wanted to give him pleasure, too. I wanted Aric to be as slavishly addicted to my hands and mouth as I had become to his. I wasn’t going to take no for an answer this time. We’d figure out the future when the time came.

I backed into my small living area, pulling Aric with me. When we got to the couch, I maneuvered us around and pushed him back to sit on it. He smiled up at me and lifted one eyebrow—he looked a little surprised and a lot turned on. Feeling brave and determined, I climbed onto his lap to straddle him.

Aric’s eyes dropped to the front of my thin nightshirt and stayed focused there a few seconds before dropping lower. He used the tip of one finger to slowly lift the bottom hem, revealing my lacy white panties. I had to smile at his harsh intake of breath.

“You like to torture me, don’t you?” he whispered. He brought his gaze to mine again, looking at me with glittering, hooded eyes.

“Yes, and you love it.” I leaned forward and pressed my lips to the side of his forehead, moving down his face to his cheekbones, to his jaw, brushing them with soft kisses.

He made one of his ridiculously sexy growling noises, and his hands gripped my thighs as I continued to kiss his ears, his neck. “I thought my chair was great, but I might like your furniture even better.” His voice was tight with excitement.

He felt so good underneath me, his hands alternately squeezing and sliding over me as we kissed. “Yes,” I panted. “We’ll have to take this couch with us, too.”

And we both froze. Without meaning to, I’d referred to some sort of future for us. As in a sharing-furniture-sort-of-future. The slip was a symptom of the kind of thoughts I couldn’t seem to crowd out of my brain lately. As hard as I tried, it was getting more and more impossible to picture my life without him.

Maybe he hadn’t noticed? I tried to prevent any mention of it by covering Aric’s mouth with mine. I kissed him while starting a slow slide up and down his lap, which had become decidedly crowded.

He groaned, but was apparently not going to be put off the subject. He broke contact with my mouth, and his hands stilled my hips. He looked up into my face, studying my eyes in the dim room. “Have you been thinking about us? About what you want?”

“I want what I
always
want, and you’re so mean, you won’t give it to me,” I teased, determined to distract him with a seductive grin. “Do I have to beg you? I will.”

I tried to move against him again, but his grip held me in place.

“Heidi—that’s not what I mean and you know it. Do you still not want anything more?” His expression stayed neutral, but I’d caught an edge of hurt in his voice on the last question.

Sugar
. Did we have to do this? I certainly didn’t want to. And this moment was not my top choice for any kind of conversation, much less a life-altering one. I wanted to finish what we’d started for once, but Aric was forcing the issue instead of being happy with no-strings sex like most guys would be.

“I…” Was I really going to do this? Tell him again that I didn’t want a commitment, taking the chance he might finally get fed up and call things off? Something sharp and sickening twisted in my gut at the thought.

“You…” he prompted, sitting very still, waiting.

“I
have
been thinking, and I still don’t know how we’ll make it work… long term.”

He let out a breath. “Do you always have to have all the answers up front? Do you never just go with your gut? Because mine is telling me this is something worth keeping.” His voice pleaded with me as his hands kneaded my hips.

“I know. Obviously this is—you are—special. But I did go with my gut, you know, before. With Josh. I just followed my feelings.” I hesitated, my eyes begging him to understand. “I promised myself I would never do that again.”

Aric nodded, his lips tight. “And I promised myself I wouldn’t let you sacrifice what you want most for what you want right now.” He lifted me off his lap and set me to the side on the couch.

As he stood, cool air rushed around me to fill the vacuum left in the absence of his body heat. I shivered crossing my arms over my chest. “What I want most?”

He looked down at me, his beautiful green eyes darker than I’d ever seen them. “The fairy tale. The romantic ending. Giving yourself to the one man you love.” He shook his head and shrugged. “Obviously, it’s not me, so…”

I watched him adjust his clothing and search the kitchen countertop for his keys. I sat silently, fighting the sudden onset of tears, incredulous that he was leaving, just like that. His expression was hard now, not angry, but definitely not happy. Was I really going to let him walk out the door? A spiky mass of panic throbbed in my chest.

“I do,” I whispered.

Aric stopped his search, and his head whipped around to look at me.

“I do…” The word
love
froze at the end of my tongue, refusing to come out. “…care about you… very much.” I swallowed, stunned at how difficult it was to express my feelings, as real as they were. “And I don’t want it to be over between us.”

Aric came back to me in quick strides and fell onto his knees in front of the couch. His large hands covered the tops of my thighs as he looked into my eyes. “I don’t want to force you into anything. And I haven’t wanted to give you an ultimatum. But I need… something. It’s getting harder and harder for me to be with you, not knowing whether you… what you’re thinking about us. I need to know you think I’m worth committing to.”

“Oh Aric.” I took his face between my palms, reading his defenseless expression. I’d been horrible. He hadn’t told me much about his father, but I knew he’d basically abandoned Aric. And I’d gone and made him feel like I was constantly on the verge of doing the same thing.

A tear made it past my control and slipped down my cheek, and Aric’s breath hitched. His hand came to my face, holding it as his thumb smoothed over the tiny drop. “Please tell me that’s not a good-bye tear.”

I shook my head, causing my cheek to rub against his hand, spreading the moisture. “No. I don’t want to say goodbye. I want…” Oh God, I was going to say it. I couldn’t stop myself. “I want to be with you. I want you to be mine. I want to be yours.”

“Heidi,” he whispered. Then he surged forward and kissed me, his hands coming up to hold my head, all the gentleness replaced by something fierce and profound. He kissed me like he would consume me, and I wanted him to.

I scooted forward on the sofa cushion so my legs clamped onto his sides where he kneeled before me on the floor. Now that I’d admitted it, my need for him crashed over me with a violent force. I couldn’t pull him close enough. My fingers scrambled to hold on to him, grabbing his hair, stroking his neck and shoulders, sliding into the neckline of his t-shirt, seeking contact with the delicious heat of his skin.

His mouth abandoned mine only long enough for him to strip his shirt off in one swift move, and then he was back, sliding his hands through my hair, touching my face. My fingers roamed over his chest, his hard abdomen, the muscles moving over his ribs. I would never stop being amazed at his body.

I pulled out of the kiss and just looked at him. With his clothes on, it was still obvious Aric was lean and well-built. But only seeing him like this was it possible to appreciate the true power and beauty of him. Thick muscle and sinew rippled under smooth skin. The dusting of blond hair on his chest and forearms glinted in the lamplight as he moved, making him look like some sort of mythical golden god.

I wanted to touch him all over, wanted to feel the delicious weight of his body on top of mine. This time it wasn’t just to satisfy an urge or to get it over with. I wanted him to be part of my life, part of me. “Let’s go to bed,” I whispered.

He stilled, staring at me with an intensity that almost made his eyes glow. “Say it. Tell me again.”

I rolled my eyes but couldn’t help smiling. “You’re mine.”

“And?”

“And I’m yours.”

His expression stayed piercing. “And you’re ready to be with me, only me? And not just for right now?”

I was fully aware of the profound nature of my words as I answered. “Yes. I want you. And I always will.” And God help me, it was true. “Now—I want you inside of me, where you belong.”

Aric must have heard all he needed to hear. His eyelids flared, and he stood, scooping me up and carrying me across the small apartment to my bed, where he made a very convincing case that I’d want and need him not just for now, but for forever.

“That. Was. Incredible.” Aric dropped a kiss on top of my head, breathing hard and holding me tightly against his side, as if afraid I might bolt from the bed and escape. He needn’t have worried. I had no desire to be anywhere else.

We lay together in the dim lamplight, my head in the crook of his shoulder, my arm wrapped around his waist, one leg tucked between his. My body weighed four hundred pounds as I sank into him and the mattress, wearing the deeply satisfied smile of someone who’s just experienced hands-down the best sex of her life. I’d only
thought
Josh had known what he was doing. My bad.

After a few minutes, Aric’s breath grew slow and even. I lifted my head to see if he was sleeping. His face was still flushed and severely beautiful.

His eyes opened. He gave me a slightly drunken looking smile. “Finally,” he breathed.