Going for Four: Counting on Love, Book 4 (24 page)

BOOK: Going for Four: Counting on Love, Book 4
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She slapped her hand over his mouth. She liked the foreplay. But she didn’t want it to culminate in the office with him talking to her…and she was close. She wanted him naked too—except for the fire helmet of course.

“Not that one,” she said of the text.

He pulled her hand away, then pressed her palm to his lips, then flicked his tongue out, running it along the line in the middle of her hand.

She made a quick fist, the tingles shooting from her palm to her nipples. Damn.

“So you mean the text about sitting you up there without your panties and photocopying your sweet pussy?”

Typically that word made her flinch. But when Cody said it, it made her hot.

“That one,” she confirmed.

He gave her a grin that told her exactly how much he loved making her panties wet at work.

Yeah, well, she wasn’t going to be the only one worked up and uncomfortable for the rest of the shift.

“Look in my second desk drawer.”

He gave her a funny, sweet smile, then leaned to pull the drawer open. He pulled out the folded piece of paper and held it up. “This?”

“Yep.”

“For me?”

“Yep.”

“I know what this better be.”

“It is.”

He opened it slowly, then sat staring at it. Finally he lifted his gaze to hers. “Holy shit.”

“That’s why I breathe faster every time I make copies.”

It was a photocopy of her sitting—without panties—on the copy machine.

He looked at it again for a long moment. Then he folded it and tucked it into his pocket.

He sighed and met her gaze. “I want you every second of the day.”

“Me too.”

And it was more than physical. It was like when that barrier broke, everything else they’d made up to keep them apart crumbled as well. She was fully in love and she wanted everything—waking up late on Sunday morning beside him, dancing with him—and only him—at Trudy’s and being free to press as close as she wanted to and whisper naughty things in his ear and feel his hand run up the back of her neck and into her hair.

She wanted to be free to be in love with him, to let the world know it.

“I don’t want to hide it. I want to kiss you and touch you and tell you how I feel all the time,” he said, as if reading her mind.

Her heart melted at that. “Me too,” she said softly.

“Which means we need to tell your brother about us.”

Yeah, they did.

Dammit.

“I know.”

“So how should we do it?”

“I think we should take off for Hawaii and send him a postcard.”

“Meaning Hawaii is where you want to spend the rest of your life?”

She laughed. “I can think of worse places.”

Cody’s smile faded and he lifted his hand, fingering a tendril of her hair. “We need to tell him in person. Together.”

She nodded. “I know.”

“Maybe with Ryan, Shane and Nate around though,” he added.

She smiled at that. “Maybe Emma could set up a game night.”

“That would be…maybe not the best way to handle it.”

“I don’t know. It has some important ingredients—liquor, fun, our friends and family.” She ran her hand up and down his chest

“We should tell him alone, just us. But in public. Like dinner or something.”

“Public is good.” In public he wouldn’t yell as much. Or throw things. Probably.

“If we take him to his favorite place, he’d be in a good mood.”

“No need to spend your hard-earned money. Just tell me now.”

They both swung toward the doorway, moving apart guiltily.

And clearly telling Conner everything he needed to know.

His expression hardened and he pushed his hands into his front pockets.

“Conner,” Olivia started.

“Actually, Liv, I want to hear it from Cody.”

Conner was staring at his best friend with a combination of hurt, anger and disbelief.

Cody moved in closer to Olivia and took her hand, slipping his fingers between hers. She held on to him tightly. This was it. No going back now.

“Olivia and I are together, Conner,” Cody said evenly. “We’ve taken our relationship from friends to more, and…this is it.”

Her heart tripped at the words. She’d assumed. But hearing him tell her brother made it even more real.

“Of course you did.”

Those were not the words she’d expected from her brother.

“What?” she asked. “You’re not surprised?”

“I shouldn’t be,” Conner said tightly. “I know Cody. I’ve see him in action, up close and personal. I should have known better than to think he meant anything he said to me.”

“Dixon, dammit—” Cody started.

“And of course it’s Olivia,” Conner said with a humorless laugh. “You wouldn’t go for Amanda or Iz or Emma. No, you’d go for the sweet, genuine one that trusts everyone.”

“It’s Olivia because it’s
Olivia
,” Cody said, clearly angry. “You know I care about her, dammit.”

“Yes. I know you cared about Ashley too. I know you thought she was amazing. So amazing that you were planning to marry her.”

Olivia felt Cody’s hold on her hand tighten.

“That’s right,” Cody said. “But that was a long time ago.”

“Because she was sweet and trusting and wanted to believe the best of you and being in love,” Conner went on. “You could do no wrong. Being with her was easy, being with her meant you didn’t have to be a good guy because you could be something even better—forgiven. You could go out and have all the fun you wanted and never worry about screwing anything up. She’d always be there.”

“Ashley was ten years ago. I thought we’d moved on.” Cody’s voice barely sounded like him.

Glancing up at his face confirmed that he was, indeed, completely pissed off.

“I thought we had too.” Conner gave a bark of laughter. “Your relationship with Olivia was my proof that you had matured and were capable of having a relationship with a woman you weren’t sleeping with or trying to sleep with. Isn’t that ironic?”

It was, actually.

Olivia flinched at the look of anger and hurt on Conner’s face as he turned to Cody.

“I trusted you. With
Olivia
. You told me there was nothing to worry about.”

She looked up at Cody. “You said that? When?”

“Two years ago when I saw how he was looking at you at Trudy’s one night,” Conner said.

Cody wouldn’t look at her. His gaze was locked on Conner.

“He said ‘nothing to worry about, man’,” Conner said, practically spitting the words. “And I decided that he deserved a second chance. A chance to show me that he could respect a woman and
deserve
her trust.”

“Fuck, Conner, this isn’t about Ashley,” Cody said. “This is nothing like that. I resisted with Olivia. I fought it. I tried to do it right.”

“You resisted,” Conner scoffed. “Sure you did. You spend every waking moment with her.”

“Leaving Olivia alone, keeping my hands to myself while being close to her has been the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” Cody said.

Her heart flipped at his words, but then squeezed in pain again when she looked at her brother. Her stomach was in knots. The two men she loved and trusted and respected more than anyone were glaring at each other unforgivingly.

“Yeah, really torturous,” Conner said. “You poor thing. Fucking your way around Omaha and then going to her house the next day to bake bread and have her tell you how great you are.” He pulled his hands from his pockets and made two fists. “Now that I know this, it all makes a lot more sense. I was actually
relieved
that you were looking out for her. I never had to worry about other assholes treating her badly because you were always there before I could warn them off.”

Olivia looked up at Cody again. “What’s he talking about?”

Cody was clearly gritting his teeth.

“Tell her,” Conner said. “Tell her how you continually told guys to back off and leave her alone. Tell her that while you were out fucking everything that would let you close, she was sitting at home alone because you told all the guys they’d have to answer to both of us if anything happened.”

“You did that?” she asked Cody.

Finally he looked at her. “I was watching out for you. None of them were good enough.”

“But…” She was so confused. It sounded almost sweet that he had been keeping guys away from her who weren’t good enough. It sounded almost like he’d been jealous. So why did it make her stomach hurt at the same time?

“None of them were
good enough
?” Conner repeated. “Or were most of them a hell of a lot better than
you
and you were afraid she’d realize it?”

Well,
that
stung. And she wasn’t even entirely sure why.

“What are you talking about?” she demanded of her brother.

“You’re always there. He tucked you away safely in this little ‘friend’ corner, where he could still see you all the time, where you’re always available if he needs to feel better about himself or have a real conversation with a woman. He doesn’t have to have a real relationship with anyone else because he has you, but he doesn’t have to commit to you because you’re only friends. He has
all
his needs met—including the one where he needs to not have any complicated expectations from anyone.” Conner looked at her now, his eyes full of regret. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it, that I trusted it was real, Liv.”

“I’ve resisted those ‘complicated expectations’ with Olivia because of
you
, you ass,” Cody said through gritted teeth. “I couldn’t be more than her friend because of
you
.”

“I’m a very easy excuse,” Conner said with a nod. “Glad I could be there for you, buddy.” The sarcasm was thick. “Hate to see you actually make a commitment to a woman. That’d be terrible.”

“If I was willing to make a commitment to Olivia, you would have been fine?” Cody demanded. “Really? You would have given us your blessing?”

“No,” Conner shot back. “Because you’ve never worked for anything in your life. My
sister
and her love and trust are things you should have to work for.”

Olivia was almost unable to look at her brother without crying. He was so upset. She remembered seeing him angry about Shane and Isabelle fighting, but even that had been nothing compared to this.

Of course, she knew she was different in Conner’s eyes. She was his youngest sister, the one who had needed the most from him after their dad died, the one who was—as he said—sweet and trusting. She was also the one who had needed saving from her own decisions and mistakes. To think that he’d failed to protect her from the man he was closest to would make him completely irrational. At least.

Conner didn’t see her as strong or tough or worldly or any of the things she knew he saw in their sisters. Amanda was confident and in charge, Isabelle was strong and smart and capable, Emma was tough and experienced and didn’t take crap from anyone.

Part of that was Conner’s fault because he
wanted
to see her as sweet and optimistic. He loved that side of her. She could make him smile and bring him out of a bad mood faster than anyone.

But part of it was on her. She didn’t show her tough side. She didn’t need to. She had Conner and their mom and her sisters and their guys and, yes, Cody. She didn’t need to be tough.

But she could be.

Maybe.

A long silence had stretched between the two men. Finally Cody said quietly, “I’ve always loved her, Conner.”

Conner scoffed, but the words hit Olivia directly in the chest.

She turned to Cody, her heart pounding. “You’ve
always
loved me?”

He met her eyes. “Yes.”

“What does that mean?”

He swallowed hard. “Always.”

Cody had
loved
her always? She’d known he loved her as a friend, would do anything for her, wanted her. But he’d
loved
her?

“But I thought…” She trailed off, words failing her.

They’d been resisting their physical attraction. It had been about sex. And that had made sense. Sleeping with Conner’s sister, having a fling, a hookup, would have been terrible. Plus, Cody was a good guy and would never sleep with her and potentially encourage her to think there was more to his feelings if it weren’t true. As much as she’d wanted him, she’d always appreciated that. Her feelings had been strong, and she wouldn’t have survived making love with him only to hear
I still want to be only friends
the next morning.

He had avoided sex with her because he
didn’t
love her. At least, that’s what she’d been telling herself. It was also why, now that they
had
slept together, she knew that things were serious. Like maybe he was falling in love with her
now
.

But…

“How long?” she asked, her throat tight.

“Always. I fell fast after we started hanging out.”

BOOK: Going for Four: Counting on Love, Book 4
4.19Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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