A SEAL's Courage (Military Match #1)(58)

His gut knotted, regret twisting through his chest. Of course she’d ask him that. She ought to hate him, but deep down where it counted, she still cared.

God, he was such a fool. He knew now why he’d come.

He wanted her. All of her. Maybe he’d fail. Hell, he’d be lucky if she let him past the door. But he had to try. Because his world didn’t make sense without her anymore.

He stepped up to the doorway. Somehow he managed to stop himself from stepping over the threshold and sweeping her into his arms for the desperate need to feel her against him. It had been only a week, but it had felt like an eternity. But if he touched her, it had to be her choice. So he stuffed his hands in his pockets. “No. Can we talk?”

She looked up, misery and exhaustion in her eyes. “I’m tired, Trent. It’s been a long night.”

“I know, but this can’t wait.” Too keyed up to wait for permission, he stepped forward, grabbed her hand, and pulled her the beyond the door enough to close it. If he didn’t say the words now, he might never get another chance.

He led her into the living room, then released her hand and faced her. One look at those big brown eyes and everything he wanted to tell her got narrowed down to three impossible words.

His shoulders slumped. “I miss you.”

Tears flooded her eyes, and Lauren folded her arms again, dropping her gaze to the tan carpeting. “Don’t do this to me. It’s not fair.”

He took that step, closed the distance between them as much as he dared, but stuffed his free hand back in his pocket. “I’m not here to make your life miserable. I just realized something I need you to know.”

She lifted her gaze and shook her head, looking at him like he’d lost his mind. “Then say it, so you can leave and I can go back to bed.”

His gut roiled, his chest aching. Will was right. Their friendship never would’ve recovered from this.

He released a heavy breath. “I don’t blame you for hating me.”

She let out a huff of a laugh. “I don’t hate you. I just can’t stuff my feelings back into that neat little box you want me to and pretend like I can be just your friend.”

Hope blossomed inside of him. Maybe, just maybe, she’d forgive him for being a blind fool.

He drew a breath and launched into the speech he’d been telling her over and over in his head for hours.

“I came home a year and a half ago feeling like a part of me had died. Hell, part of me wished I had. I lived in the dark, went through the motions. But spending time with you?” He shook his head, unable to stop himself from reaching out to her, caressing her chin with his thumb. She shivered beneath his touch, and he only just managed to stop himself from moving closer. “You opened me. Made me live. Hell. You made me want to live. You made me feel human again.”

He stopped to judge her reaction. Waited for her to say something. When she didn’t, when she shifted from one foot to the other and tugged her chin from his grasp, he sighed and went on. She listened at least. That had to count for something.

“Every day since we ended this, I’ve gone back to living in the dark. My apartment is cold and empty. I finished that carving of you. It’s gorgeous. But like all the rest, it sits in the closet because I can’t bear to look at it. It reminds me of you. I get up every morning more alone than I did the day before. A piece of me is missing, and it took Will pointing it out to me to realize what it was.”

He caught the wobble in her lower lip right before she turned her back to him, staring in the direction of the wall of curtained windows on the other side of the room. Her shoulders were stiff, her back straight. Clearly she didn’t intend to make this easy.

So he stepped up behind her, close enough that her sleep-warm skin infused his. A shiver moved through her that had his hands fisting with the effort not to touch, not to invade her space. “Aren’t you going to ask me what that something is?”

She shook her head. “I’m not sure what you’re trying to prove here, but this is cruel, Trent.”

The wobble in her voice sapped the last of his willpower. He pulled his hands from his pockets and slipped his arms around her waist, tugging her back against him. She didn’t go willingly, but she didn’t pull away, either. It was something, at least. So he continued. “I’m not trying to be. I just need you to know. That something is you.”

Her breathing hitched, and his chest tightened. He’d hurt her, and he hated himself for it. All he could do now was pray that somehow, when it was all said and done, she’d understand.

“I’ve kept you at a distance because I’m terrified to lose you. You’re a light in the dark, Lauren. But you wouldn’t even look at me tonight. You haven’t said two words to me since I left, and it’s eating at me. I haven’t slept since I left your apartment that morning, you know that? Because I miss you. I miss every damn thing about you. Your smile. The sound of your laugh. Hell, I miss you teasing me. But you know what I miss the most?”

This time he waited. He needed some sort of reaction from her. Encouragement. A go to hell. Something to tell him he was getting to her. She listened, but he was even making a dent?

When she continued to remain silent, he leaned his head beside her ear and rushed on. He’d come all the way out here at two in the morning. At the very least, he needed to say the words. “I miss waking up to you in the morning.”