Cuff Me(43)

She sat back and smiled, happy with herself. “So I’m not driving you nuts?”

Damn. He’d walked right into that one. “You are.”

She sighed. “I can’t win with you these days. You gripe if I talk about the wedding too much. If I don’t talk about the wedding at all, you make snide ‘trouble in paradise’ comments. It’s like—”

“Don’t move to Chicago.”

Jill broke off and stared at him in shock. “What?”

Vincent wiped his mouth with the paper towel doubling as a napkin as he finished chewing his pizza. “You heard me.”

She let out a little laugh. “Yeah, I was sort of hoping I heard you wrong.”

He forced himself to meet her gaze steadily. “Don’t leave, Jill. You belong in New York.”

You belong with me.

She set her beer carefully on the table. “It’s not that I want to leave New York, Vin—”

“Then don’t.”

“It’s not that simple,” she said, her voice rising a notch.

“Well, make it that simple.”

She snapped her notebook on the table. “You’re impossible. Just because you’ve got this whole lone wolf thing going on doesn’t mean that the rest of us want to be alone forever.”

Now it was his turn to toss his notebook aside. “Who said shit about being alone forever? That’s why you’re moving to Chicago? You think you’re alone?”

“No, I just—” She reached up and tightened her ponytail the way she did when she was stressed. “Come on, Vin. You knew things were going to change when one of us met someone. We can’t just keep doing this forever, being each other’s everything.”

He knew she didn’t mean her words to hurt, but they cut like a knife all the same. “I’m not asking you to be my everything,” he said quietly. “I just hate that this guy swoops into your life for all of a couple months, and you’re ready to throw it all away.”

Vin didn’t look at her as he said it. It was the closest he’d come to admitting… something, and he couldn’t bear to see what might be laughter on her face.

He heard the sound of her chair scooting backward before she moved closer, dropping into the chair right next to his.

Her hand found his knee. “Is that what you think? That I’m throwing you away?”

He said nothing.

Her fingers squeezed and she leaned down, trying to catch his eye. “I’m always here for you. Even if I’m in a different time zone, you can call me anytime and I’ll come running. You know that.”

He swallowed. He did know that. Knew that he’d do the same for her.

He also knew that if he kept on with this push-pull thing, he’d risk losing her. He’d put a rift between them that couldn’t be fixed with a doughnut.

Vin forced himself to meet her eyes. “I’m sorry about the kiss.”

Her head snapped back a little. “Oh. Don’t apologize. It was… nothing.”

Burn. “Right. I know. But I was out of line. I mean, if Tom found out.”

She gave a small smile. “Relax. It’s not like you slipped me tongue and copped a feel.”

Good God. Even her joking, off-the-cuff comment made him horny.

“Yeah, right,” he said, forcing a smile.

There was a moment of silence before she gave his leg a little squeeze. “We’re okay, right?”

“Sure.”

She pulled back, looking frustrated. “Would you talk to me? Please. I feel like there’s so much going on inside your head, but the second we get anywhere, you pull back. It’s almost like—”

“Almost like what?”

Their eyes clashed for several long tense moments, until she finally shook her head. “Nothing. Almost like nothing.”

Vincent felt a brief stab of disappointment until he reminded himself that it was for the best. That this was a conversation they could never have.

He pushed back from the table, grabbing at their empty plates so he had an excuse to walk away.

Vin heard her sigh of frustration and ignored it. He didn’t know what the hell she wanted from him. Sure, she thought she wanted honesty. She thought she wanted him to spill his guts.

But if she had a clue—even the tiniest clue—as to what had been going through his head for the past few weeks, she’d probably find a way to escape to Chicago early.

He dropped the plates noisily into the sink to be dealt with later and then braced his hands on the counter, letting his chin drop, just for a second, willing himself to get it together.

Vin was so lost in his dark thoughts that he didn’t realize Jill had approached until her arms wrapped around him from behind.

She squeezed his waist hard, and he felt her cheek nuzzle against the center of his back. Vin wasn’t particularly tall, but Jill was downright short. Perfect.

She’d always been perfect.

“We’re gonna be okay, right?” she asked, her voice muffled against his shirt.

Vin closed his eyes as his hand closed over clasped arms, his head tilting back so that the back of his head rested lightly on the top of hers.

And because he cared about her—cared about her so damn much—he did the only thing that he could.