Hottest Mess (S.I.N. #2)(66)

I clear my throat. “If you go, I’ll end up drinking the whole damn bottle by myself.” I pour him a glass and set it on the pass-through. I nod at it. “You can stay for that long.”

“All right, then.” He takes a tiny sip. “I’ll drink slow.”

I almost laugh, but I manage to hold it in.

I stay in the kitchen and he stays on the other side of the bar. I like it that way because the longer he’s here, the more I want him to hold me. I’m hurting—and even though it’s Dallas who hurt me, he’s still the one I crave to give me comfort. Whose arms I want around me while I close my eyes and draw strength.

I’m not sure what that says—am I that screwed up? Or am I just in love?

I take another sip of my wine and busy myself with wiping down my already clean counter. “So go ahead,” I say. “You have an explanation. Tell me.”

“It’s f*cked up,” he says, and this time I have to laugh. Because honestly, where he and I are concerned, when isn’t it?

“When I met her not long after she and Colin got married, I was feeling so empty. You were out of my life, forever I thought. I was raw. And I was attracted to her.”

I wince, and he sees it.

“I screwed up by not telling you the truth before. I’m not going to pull my punches now.”

“No,” I say. “I don’t want you to. I just—she was married.”

“Nothing happened. But we both felt it.”

“Well, something happened eventually.”

He nods. “After they broke up. We—well, yeah. I slept with her.”

I feel my insides twist. Because this isn’t like Fiona or Christine or any of the others. With Adele, there was more. And I’m jealous. I’m so incredibly jealous.

“I thought you only did one-or two-night stands.”

His smile is thin, and I know he can hear the jealousy in my voice.

“Adele was an odd exception, that’s for sure. She—oh, hell, Jane. She knows about us.”

My eyes grow wide. “You told her?”

He shakes his head. “No. But she’s a therapist, remember? She heard the way I talked about you. And because of Colin she knew that we’d both been kidnapped. She figured it out. She knew I was still in love with you. And she—she was edgy.”

“In bed,” I say. “She—”

“Understood what I needed, probably even more than I did.”

My mouth is dry, and I’m not sure if I feel sick or if I feel relieved that he had someone when he couldn’t—wouldn’t—have me.

“Did you love her?”

He looks at me as if I’ve completely missed the point. “Love her? Oh, god, Jane, no. She was the only one I could be honest with. The only one who knew my core truth. There was sex, yes. But sex with Adele was never about her.”

His eyes lock on mine. “Don’t you get it? Sex with Adele was always about you.”





City of Angels

He watched her face, uncertain if he was doing the right thing by revealing so much. But he couldn’t keep it from her. Now that he’d made the decision to tell her, he had to go all in.

“All about me?”

“I wanted you. I craved you. And I was so damn frustrated that I couldn’t have you. She got that.” He ran his fingers through his hair, knowing he had to tell her the rest. “She knew that I hadn’t really been with a woman since you. And she’s the reason that I thought it would be different with you.”

She nodded, but didn’t say anything.

“Jane? Jane, I really need to know if I’m making a huge mistake telling you all this.”

She blinked, looking a little shell-shocked, but she shook her head. “No. No the mistake was not telling me before. Keep going.”

He wasn’t entirely sure he believed her, but he knew he had to get it all out. “After a while, Adele wanted to—I don’t know. Role play, I guess. Pretend to be you. Have me—take you.”

Her brows rose to her hairline. “Like what I suggested. About the Woman. Oh, god.” She hugged herself, her brow furrowing. “She thought if you did that, you’d get over me?”

“No. No, it wasn’t like that. Just the opposite. She thought it would get me off. That I’d be able to, well, f*ck her if I pretended it was you.”

“Oh.” She dragged her teeth over her lower lip. “And did you?”

“Jane, come on. You know I didn’t. I told you. You’re the only woman I’ve—”

“No. I mean, did you try.”

“Hell no.” His words were harsh as he remembered his disgust with Adele. With himself. “That was when I ended it.”

Her relief was so visible he would have laughed if he wasn’t already so twisted up inside. “And that’s it,” he said. “That’s the story on me and Adele. And I didn’t tell you before for two reasons. It’s done. Over. So I didn’t see the point. But more than that, the thought of you was so wrapped up in my entire, screwed up relationship with her that I didn’t—I don’t—want you to feel like everything between the two of us ties back to sex.”

She shook her head and came around the island with the bottle of wine. She moved to him and topped off his glass. A perfectly simple, perfectly normal thing to do, but it filled him with so much hope he could feel his heart expand.