Thrill Me (Fool's Gold #18)(24)

“How do you figure?”

“I’m the reason you left.”

His dark gaze settled on her face. “I wondered if we’d get to that.”

“We had to,” she whispered. “It was inevitable.”

One corner of his mouth turned up. “I’d love to dump this on you, but I was a big boy. I made my choices.”

“No, you reacted to mine. To me breaking up with you.” She reached for him and rested her fingers on his forearm. “Del, I promised to marry you. We were going to run off together.”

“Yeah. So either way I was leaving. Why didn’t I see that before?”

She shook his arm. “That’s not the point. I’m trying to apologize here. If you could listen?”

“No apology required. You changed your mind. You’re allowed. I wish you’d been honest with me— You could have told me you had concerns. But you didn’t. It’s not like I was the love of your life.”

She listened for bitterness and heard only resignation. Which made her feel awful. Why did he have to be so accepting? Anger and resentment would be a lot easier to deal with.

So here it was. Her moment to come clean.

“I’m sorry,” she told him. “About what happened. About what I said. I know it’s too late and that hearing it now doesn’t change anything, but I want you to know, I lied.”

His gaze sharpened. “About?”

She glanced down at the wild grass and flowers below, then forced herself to stare directly into his dark eyes. “I didn’t have concerns. Not the way you think. It was... I was terrified. I loved you more than I ever thought I could love anyone. You were my entire world. But I couldn’t trust you.”

He started to pull back, but she held on to his arm. “It’s not personal,” she told him. “Watching my mom and how she was with men. The things she said. I was so afraid that no one could love me. At the same time I believed you did, and that was more than I could handle. I guess the truth isn’t that I didn’t trust you, I didn’t trust myself.”

She dropped his arm and wanted to turn away. But this apology had been ten years in the making. She had to see it through to the end.

“You were my first love and my first time and when you asked me to marry you, I was thrilled. And so frightened. What if it didn’t work out? I knew having you leave would destroy me. Plus, I wanted to go to college and have a career. What if I asked for that and you said no? So in my eighteen-year-old logic, I decided I had to end things in such a way that you wouldn’t try to talk me into staying.”

She swallowed against the emotion tightening her throat. “That’s why I said you were too boring. To hurt you and make you hate me. It was never true. I loved you and wanted to be with you. But I didn’t know how. I’m sorry. I was cruel and I regretted what I did immediately. I knew the outcome was right, but how I did it was horrible. And I apologize for that.”

Del’s expression tightened. She braced herself for the well-deserved explosion, only there wasn’t one. He reached out and gently stroked her face.

“Well, damn,” he said softly. “I wouldn’t have thought it would matter to hear that, but it does. I get it. What we had was intense.”

“That’s one word for it.”

He smiled. “You were my first time, too.”

Her eyes widened. “What? No way. There were other girls.”

“Not like you. Not like that. I was shaking, Maya. Couldn’t you tell?”

“I was too nervous. What if I was horrible in bed?”

“Not possible.” The smile returned. “I came in eight seconds.”

She laughed. “I was a virgin. I didn’t know any better. Besides, you made up for it later. Over and over again.”

“To be that young again.”

Their tones were light, but she was feeling a lot of subtext. Maybe it was just her, but it seemed the cloudy morning had just gotten a little warmer. Del seemed to be standing close. Closer than he had been.

Danger signs flashed, but she ignored them all. Because this was Del, and maybe a girl was always supposed to have a special place in her heart for that first guy.

“I did love you,” she told him. “I hope you know that.”

“I loved you, too.” The sexy smile returned. “Talk about a lot of confessions for a very early-morning shoot.”

With that, he stepped in and kissed her.

Maya had about two seconds to brace herself, but instead of retreating, she leaned in. Maybe it was closure, she thought, as his mouth brushed against hers. Maybe it was simply something that had to happen so they could move on. Maybe it was the perfect light of a cloudy morning.

His lips were warm and soft with a hint of firmness. The kiss was exactly right. Not too demanding, not too sweet. There was a dash of heat and plenty of promise.

She put one hand on his shoulder. He rested his fingers on her waist. There was no reaching, no tongue. Just the perfect, wonderful I used to love you kiss.

They drew back at the same moment and stared into each other’s eyes.

Wanting was there, along with regret, she thought. But also a sense of rightness.

“I take it that means you accept my apology,” she said.

He chuckled. “Sure. Because I’m one of the good guys.”