Dare to Resist (Wedding Dare, #0.5)(12)

Forcing away that question, Colton released a long breath. Not only was she right in this situation, she’d been right three years ago, too. He hadn’t seen the real her. He hadn’t seen a strong, independent woman. He did now, though. In spades. Damn if it didn’t make her even more appealing.

“Okay. You’re right. Though my gut instinct is to beat down any * who harasses you, I know you’re tough enough to handle it and I’d never want to make things worse. But if you ever want my help—with anything—all you have to do is ask. And if you ever want to blow off steam, I’m here to listen.” He pressed his lips into a line, hoping she wouldn’t turn this into a joke per their norm, because this was important to him.

She stared at him as if evaluating his offer, and the seriousness in her expression mirrored what he felt in his gut. The pounding drumbeat of the rain on the roof above them drowned out all other sound, giving the moment an almost suspended quality. “Okay. I’ll try,” she finally said. “But I’m used to holding all this in, so it’s not easy. I don’t like to be seen as weak or incompetent.”

Satisfaction roared through him at her serious reply. He felt like something important was happening here, something real, something—for once—not hidden behind layers of snark and humor. Colton didn’t have anything real or even particularly meaningful with a woman—nor had he ever before. And that made what was happening between them right now stand out.

Not that he didn’t have plenty of opportunities for casual encounters with women interested in dabbling in the rougher stuff with him, but none that made him want something more, something deeper, something real. Mostly, that was a good thing, because his parents’ miserable marriage had seriously damaged his belief in the institution. His mother excelled in passive-aggressiveness and guilt trips, while his father was a master of actual aggression and yelling. Most of the time, they’d directed their venom at each other, but he and his sister Sophie had gotten caught in the cross fire plenty of times. Even after his parents had divorced and his father had moved to Tennessee, Colton had continued to get trapped in the middle of their disputes during the summers he spent there. If it hadn’t been for his good friends Reed and Brock, those summers in Tennessee would’ve been miserable. So, Colton hadn’t even been eighteen before he vowed he’d never spend even a minute as an adult putting himself in the situation he’d been forced to live through as a kid.

His gaze scanned over Kady’s beautiful face. The woman standing in front of him was the only woman who’d ever inspired Colton to consider anything more than a one-night stand or being f*ck buddies, and that made Kady both incredibly dangerous to his world order and one of the most important people in it.

“I don’t see you that way. Not even a little,” he said. Allowing himself the pleasure of her skin, he brushed his knuckles down her cheek. So f*cking soft.

Her head tilted into his hand and she smirked up at him, one eyebrow arched.

“Okay, ‘little’ was a bad choice of words, wasn’t it?” he said, cupping her cheekbone in his palm and running his fingers into the edge of her hair.

She nodded, but the smile that played around her mouth made it clear she’d understood his intent. Licking her lips, she stared up at him.

Arousal shot like an arrow through Colton’s body, spiking his pulse and sending blood south. As if Kady picked up on the shift in his mood, her lips parted and her skin flushed where he still held her. The air suddenly crackled with heat and tension and promise.

Colton’s gaze zeroed in on her mouth, and an urgent need had him wanting—no, needing—to taste her. To claim her. To devour her. Without telling his body to move, he leaned down and his fingers slid into the silk of her hair. He met her gaze and he nearly roared in victory when she tilted her head back to receive him. Closer. And closer yet.

Her fingers fell on his lips. Her eyes bored into his, the beautiful green filled with desire and something else. Challenge? Determination?

“Don’t do this unless you mean it, Colton,” she said in a voice so low the beat of the rain nearly drowned it out.

The words pierced through his desire and kick-started the thinking part of his brain. Unless you mean it. Colton froze. What would “meaning it” mean to Kady? Something intentional. Something that might go somewhere. Something serious.

Regret and longing settled like an anvil on his shoulders. He slowly dropped his hand from her hair and pulled back. Need throbbed through his body, but his heart protested the lost promise of this moment even louder. Because he knew with Kady, sex would never just be about bodies and actions, it would be about feeling, connecting, sharing.

Kady was tough and brilliant, and she was also a happily-ever-after, two-point-four-kids, white-picket-fence kind of woman. Unlike his, her parents’ marriage had been fantastic, and the Dresco house had served as a home away from home more than once for him and his sister Sophie. So Colton totally got why Kady would want the same. More than that, she deserved it. Which meant she deserved more than him.

“Like I said”—Kady’s voice jolted him from his thoughts—“let’s not let this conversation make things weird. Okay? I just needed to say that stuff.”

He nodded. “Right. Of course,” he said. Did she hear the grit in his voice? And what would she think it meant if she did?