The Summer Deal (Wildstone #5)(84)

Her Biggest Regret was calling.

She stared at the screen before she answered. “Deck.”

“You called.”

His voice. God, that low, gruff voice. “I did,” she admitted.

“Then you hung up on me. And didn’t answer your phone.”

She squeezed her eyes shut. “Yeah.”

Out of all the things he could have said, what came out of his mouth both surprised her and warmed her cold, dead heart.

“Are you okay?”

God. Even now, when she’d screwed up so badly, he cared. “No,” she whispered.

Someone sat next to her, and she lifted her head to glare at them, but instead she stopped breathing.

It was Deck, still holding his phone to his ear, just looking at her.

“How did you find me?”

“Your sister.” He pulled his phone from his ear, hit disconnect, and waited as she did the same. “Why did you call me, Kins?”

Tell him. Don’t blow it with him like you did with Brynn. Get something good in your life. “Because I was wrong.”

“About . . . ?” he asked.

Okay, he wasn’t going to make this easy, and she got that. “I was wrong to push you away, wrong to let you think I didn’t have feelings, deep feelings, for you.”

“So why did you?”

“Because I couldn’t admit I was scared.” She took a breath. “Scared to be alone. Scared to blow it. Scared to face my questionable future.” She paused and met his gaze. “Scared to admit the things I feel for you.”

“Newsflash, babe. You’re going to face the medical shit whether you like it or not. And you are alone. You did blow it. Because I’d have been there with you if you’d let me. Every step of the way.”

“I know.” She closed her eyes. “I’m sorry I’ve been such a coward.”

He lifted her chin with a finger and waited until she looked at him. “You’re anything but a coward, Kinsey. You’re one of the bravest women I’ve ever known.”

Her throat tightened. “But I’m not normal.”

“Look at me. Do I look normal? Do I look like I want normal?”

“But I’ll never be the woman standing at the door waiting for you at the end of the day wearing heels and pearls. I mean, unless we’re playing some kinky sex game.”

He snorted. “I’m putting that into the queue. Also, you’ve been watching old sitcom reruns again.”

She lifted a shoulder, and he bumped his broad-as-a-mountain shoulder to hers. “All I want is for you to do you, and let me be a part of your life while you’re doing it.”

“You said you wanted more.”

“Yes,” he said. “More being more you in my life. More you sharing yourself. Letting me in.”

“I want that too.”

His eyes never wavered from hers as he took a beat. “Why now, after all this time?”

Fair question. “Because I’m slower than most when it comes to matters of the heart? I think I’m getting caught up though.”

He didn’t smile, didn’t move a muscle. “I was starting to think maybe I was wrong on how you felt about me.”

“Yeah,” she said, not proud of this. “I’m pretty good at evading, misdirecting, and avoiding the truth.”

“You mean lying.”

She had to take a deep breath. “Yes. That.”

“So my question stands. Why now?”

Get this right, Kins, or lose him forever. “People don’t . . . see me. Not all of me anyway.”

“What does that mean?”

She shook her head, trying desperately to find the words. “You’re the kind of person who walks into a room and everyone notices you.”

“Yeah, because I’m as tall as the green giant and covered in tats. It’s hard to miss me.”

“That’s not it,” she said. “You change the light, you change the energy, without even knowing you do it. But someone like me walks into a room and no one . . . sees me. You’re so much more than me, Deck. You could do a lot better.”

He stared her, and finally shook his head. “The first time I saw you was in the ER. You’d collapsed from dehydration from the flu. It was two in the morning and you were trying to tell the on-call doctor about your medical history and he wasn’t listening. You got up off your cot, hospital gown flapping open as you laid into him about patient rights and the skill of listening.” He smiled. “That doctor was an asshole, and I fell in love with you right then and there. I saw you then, and I’ve seen you every second since. Now say ‘Why, Deck?’”

“Why, Deck?” she whispered.

“Because Kinsey Teresa Davis, you light up my life.”

She blinked. “That’s a song. A very old song. And if you say it again, it’s going to get stuck in my head.”

“You light up my life.”

“Oh my God,” she said, but inside she was thinking, Oh my God . . .

“Need me to say it another way? You had me at hello.”

She fought a half-hysterical laugh. “I never said hello to you that night.”

“I know.” He smiled as if the memory were precious. “You said, ‘What the hell are you staring at? Never seen a girl’s ass before?’”