Letting Go (Thatch #1)(31)
Just because I’d finally acknowledged that truth didn’t mean that we had to change.
With a deep breath, I dropped my purse and keys on the bar and walked across the room and up the stairs to the loft. The water from the shower was running, and I caught myself looking at the closed door to the bathroom. I’d seen Jagger naked before. From the times we’d all skinny-dipped in the lake, and from others when I’d come to his place and he hadn’t been expecting me while he was changing or just getting out of the shower. But now I couldn’t stop thinking about him in the shower, the way his body looked, the way it would feel.
It took a second to realize my body was trembling and my breaths were too quick and shallow. I was on the edge of hyperventilating and, at the same time, welcoming the way my body slowly heated at the thoughts I’d just been having of him. The dizzying waves, shaking, and cold sweat that had just covered my body, mixed with a heat that had everything to do with the guy currently in the shower, were too much. I took hard and deep breaths in and out as I tried to calm myself, but my conflicting thoughts were only making it worse.
Knowing I was allowed to think about him in the way I had been didn’t stop me from going back to my old way of thinking. That I couldn’t do that to Ben, that it was spitting on his memory.
I can’t do this. I can’t do this.
Gripping the chain around my neck, I tried to push those thoughts out of my mind, but they were loud. Too loud. Suddenly Jagger was right in front of me, and my eyes flew open when I felt him there. I focused on his worried expression as he knelt between my legs, both hands cupping my cheeks as he mumbled over and over again for me to breathe. And it was there and then, in the calm that poured through my body and the way my chest warmed as I stared into his green eyes, that I knew I could do this. That I remembered why I hadn’t been able to let him walk away from me the night before.
Because, despite everything from our past, I was undeniably in love with him.
“Grey,” he said on a breath when I’d calmed down, his eyebrows pinching together like he was in pain.
“I’m sor—”
“Don’t,” he begged. “Don’t say you’re sorry. You’re fine. I swear I’ll take care of you, and I won’t push you into anything.”
“I know you won’t. I’m not scared of you or this, Jagger, I swear. It’s just so hard to stop the way I’ve been thinking for the last two years.”
“You don’t have to stop thinking that way. You don’t. We will go as slow or as fast as you want. The only thing that has changed between us is that everything is out there now. We’re still best friends, and we can stay just that for however long you want. Even if it’s forever.”
I hated the sincerity in his tone. Because even though that wasn’t what I wanted for us, I knew he would do exactly what he was saying without a second thought. It killed me that after he’d waited for me for so long, there was still something between us. There would always be something between us. “I don’t want that. I want you, and I want a life with you—one that’s different from how it has been. I just . . .”
One of his hands left my cheek to curl around my fist, gripping Ben’s ring. “I know,” he said softly. “You don’t have to explain anything to me. I already know.” Standing up, he kept his hand on my face so I would continue looking at him. “Do you want to go home?”
“No! No, I don’t. I was counting down the hours until I could come see you tonight. I want to go eat; I just want to be with you. I’m sorry that I—”
“Grey, I told you, it’s fine. Please don’t apologize. Let me get dressed and we’ll leave.”
My eyes automatically dropped to the towel wrapped around his waist for the first time since he’d come out of the bathroom, before quickly darting back up to his face. He took a step away before turning toward his dresser, and I watched as he pulled clothes out before walking to the bathroom.
“Jagger,” I said before he could reach the door. He looked over his shoulder at me, his face blank. “I love you.” It was true, and I’d wanted to say it over and again since the first time I’d finally said it the night before. But even I wasn’t deaf to the way those three words had just sounded. Like a mix of trying to convince him and me.
A sad smile crossed his face before he nodded. “I know you do.”
As soon as the door to the bathroom closed, I fell onto my back on the bed and tried to hold back the tears that had been threatening to spill since before Jagger had found me quickly losing it.
All I’d wanted was to spend time alone with Jagger after having gone so long without him, but I’d already messed everything up within five minutes of being there. I knew from his words, and from the fact that he hadn’t kissed me since the night before, that Jagger was letting me set the pace. I didn’t want anything holding me back from a relationship with him, but knew I was allowing Ben’s memory to do exactly that. I wished I could say I could stop, but at that moment, it would’ve been a lie.
After clinging to it for so long, I wondered if I would ever be able to let go of my past with Ben.
Chapter 7
Grey
July 15, 2014
THREE LIGHT TAPS on my door pulled me out of my daydream just as my mom came walking into my room. I stared at her blandly for a second as I finished pushing aside the lingering thoughts I’d been having, until I caught on to the coy smile she was trying to hide. She was failing. Horribly.