Nets and Lies(56)

His words made me cry harder. As I wiped my cheeks with the back of my hand, I sniffed, “Don’t you get it? I’ve been a horrible person, Nick! I could’ve sent Coach T to jail if everyone believed me!” When another thought flashed in my mind, my emotional pain doubled me over in physical pain. “I killed my baby.”

In an instant, Nick wrapped his arms around me as hard sobs wracked my body. “Hey now, I didn’t mean to upset you. Don’t cry,” he crooned in my ear.

Through hiccupping breaths, I said, “I don’t deserve good things to happen to me. I deserve to pay over and over for what I’ve done!”

He rubbed wide circles over my back. “No, you don’t. It’s called forgiveness, and you’ve got to try to forgive yourself.” Pulling away, he cupped my face in his hands. “You’ve done some shitty things in your past. But it’s the past. Don’t look back anymore. Just look forward.”

I stared into his deep blue eyes. “Do you really believe that?”

“There wouldn’t be a reason for me to live anymore if I didn’t focus on the future.”

Gripping the sides of his shirt, I said, “Then thank goodness for that because I can’t imagine a world without you in it.”

At that moment, an acrid smell assaulted my nostrils. “Shit, the rice!” Nick cried, spinning away from me.

“I’m sorry.”

He chuckled. “What are you apologizing for?”

I swiped the tears off my cheek with the back of my hand. “It’s my fault you weren’t watching the rice.”

Nick shook his head at me. “Would you stop with the ‘everything is Jordan’s fault’?” He picked up the pot and dumped out the burnt contents. “See,” he said, waving the box at me as he started on a new batch. “It’s all good, so don’t beat yourself up.”

“I’ll try,” I murmured.

After my emotional melt-down, we didn’t talk for a few minutes. Instead, we just listened to the radio Nick had turned on. While I started munching on the chips and salsa, Nick finally broke the silence. “So how did you like church?”

I swallowed hard. “Oh, um, it was…interesting.”

Nick paused in stirring the rice and cocked his eyebrow at me. “You know you can tell me the truth, Jordan.”

“I am,” I insisted.

He bit his lip and then started spooning the rice into a bowl. He glanced up and smiled at my expression. “I’m sorry I’m being so pushy about it. It’s just with my recovery and AA, my faith is the most important thing in my life.”

I sighed. “I did like it, Nick. Everyone was so nice and accepting—I haven’t had that in a long time.”

“But?”

“It’s all a little overwhelming. I mean, so much has happened to me in the last few weeks that it’s going to take me a little time to process. I’ve never had faith before—if anything I had the opposite of it. I’m used to ‘if you want it, you get it’ kinda motto.” I shook my head. “And faith isn’t that. It’s about believing in something not even tangible.”

He took my words in and then nodded. “I understand.”

I hesitated for a moment before saying, “But I’m willing to try.”

His mouth gaped open. “You are?”

“Yeah, I am.” I hopped down and took the plates off the counter. As I set them on the table, I said, “But you’re going to have to cut me some slack sometimes, okay?”

He nodded.

I smiled. “More than anything, I have faith in you.”

“Why?”

“Because of this.” I reached out and touched his heart. “You’ve got the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever met.”

Nick leaned forward, his breath hovering on my cheek. His lips almost brushed against mine, but he jerked away. Not wanting to miss the moment, I leaned forward. Electricity charged through me at the feeling of his lips on mine. I fisted his shirt in my hands and jerked him against me. My tongue slid against his lips before thrusting into his mouth. I was so lost in the overwhelming sensations coursing through my body that I didn’t realize Nick wasn’t kissing me back.

Instead, his hands came to my waist, and he shoved me away. I bumped back into the counter. Dazed, I stared up at him. Oh God, I’d thrown myself at him, and he didn’t want me. Everything had just been about friendship, and I had totally missed the mark.

“Jordan…” he started.

I shook my head furiously. “No, you don’t have to say it. I get it. I’m a dirty, nasty whore who ruins men’s lives when she doesn’t get what she wants. How could you possibly want to be with someone like that!” Turning, I fled from the kitchen and raced for the door. I started to fling it open, but there were so many deadbolts I didn’t know how to open it.

Nick’s hand covered mine. “Stop. I don’t want you to go.”

Humiliation pricked against my skin like tiny knives. “Please just open the door.”

“No, not until you hear me out.” Taking my shoulders in his hands, he slowly turned me around. “You just totally misread what happened in the kitchen.”

“Yeah right.”

“Trust me when I say there isn’t one fiber of my being that doesn’t want to sleep with you.”