Put Me Back Together(59)

“I did,” Lucas said simply. “He was hurting you.”

I lowered my eyes farther still. “I didn’t like it,” I said.

“Most girls like it if you come to their defense,” Lucas said. “You know, knight in shining armour and all that.” He seemed truly confused, which only made it harder to go on.

“Not me,” I said. “I don’t like that side of guys, that violent side.”

“You’re the one who punched him!” Lucas said.

I met his eyes with a serious look. “I shouldn’t have,” I said. “I scared myself. And you scared me.”

Lucas seemed to consider this. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I never want you to be afraid of me. But you can’t expect me to stand back and let someone hurt you. When I stepped into that room and saw you screaming at him to let you go, saw his hands pressing into your arms, I just…” A muscle flexed in his jaw and he couldn’t seem to go on.

“You lost your head,” I finished for him. This was something I understood. This was something I had experience with. “Most people would say it was a natural reaction and just brush it off. But I’m not most people. I can’t have that kind of…behaviour around me. I can’t have you hitting people for me, not ever. I need you to promise.”

His eyes were almost fearful as they looked at me now. He drew his arms around me, holding me lightly by the waist, as if he thought putting too much pressure on my body might break me into pieces. “God, Katie,” he whispered, searching my eyes, “what did he do to you?”

I turned my head and looked out at the snowflakes. I was not going to explain. I was not going to address the “he” Lucas had referred to. He might want to know everything about me, but that didn’t mean I was willing to tell him everything, or even that he’d like what he found out. Telling him about Brandon and the reason aggressive guys made me run for the hills wasn’t a first date secret. It was a last date secret.


“Promise me,” I repeated.

Letting my eyes creep back to his face, I saw the muscles in his jaw working overtime as though he was picturing Buck Mullard with his hands gripping my wrists again. “I can’t say I won’t get furious if someone tries to hurt you again,” he said carefully. “But I can say that I’ll try to control myself. How does that sound?”

I nodded, but my trust was waning. I knew I was the one who’d asked for his promise, but now that I had it, it didn’t seem like enough.

“I’m not a violent guy, Katie,” Lucas persisted. “You know that, don’t you?”

They never are, I thought. Until they are.

“I want you to stay like this,” I said, sadly stroking his cheek. “I don’t want you to change.” I think a part of me had forgotten I was saying any of this out loud. My sorrow at the idea that I’d have to give Lucas up had taken control of my mouth. Even though I’d known it would probably turn out that way all along, it devastated me. I was like a little girl holding a puppy that wasn’t hers.

I wanted to keep him forever.

“I won’t change,” Lucas said. “I don’t know why you think I will, but I won’t. I’m not pretending, Katie. When I said yesterday that I’m the real me with you, I really meant it.”

He looked so sure of himself, so harmless with his soft hands and his beautiful face. I so wanted it to be true.

“Can you do one more thing for me, Lucas?” I said.

“Anything,” he replied.

I sat down in the driver’s seat and looked up at him.

“Kiss me,” I said.

He followed me into the car as I moved backwards over the gearshift and into the passenger’s seat. He grinned and his face looked nothing like the animal I’d seen in him that night. He was just himself, the guy who was stealing my heart.

“Oh yeah, I can do that,” he said as his lips met mine.





15





“Mmm,” Lucas said, “you taste like chocolate.” I smiled against his mouth because so did he, and the glorious taste had me kissing him more hungrily than I ever had before.

One of his hands grasped the back of my neck as he lavished his appreciation on my mouth while he placed the other lightly on my knee. Within two minutes of being in the car our coats had come off, though I had no real memory of taking them off. His bulky suit jacket was a barrier to my hands, which were itching to explore his chest, but I was too shy to ask him to take it off, as well, or worse yet, to undo the buttons myself. I worried over this for a moment as Lucas’s mouth traveled down my neck, but when he delved farther, feathering kisses over the bare skin of my upper chest, I pushed both my hands into his hair and concentrated instead on the heat of his lips and the explosion of feeling wherever he placed them. Both his hands moved to my waist as he pressed his mouth into my neck just below my ear. I felt almost delirious with heat, as though I were actually losing my senses. I was wishing his tentative fingers would move higher when, as if at my command, they did. The moment his right hand brushed ever so lightly over my breast I moaned into Lucas’s ear, my fingers digging into his arms.

We fell back against the seat, which was still in its leaned-back position. I wasn’t exactly sure how Lucas had maneuvered his body over the gearshift, but he didn’t seem particularly bothered about it.