Say You Love Me(47)

“You’re hanging out with me and we’re having a fun relaxing time.” I said and leaned back and pulled her into my arms. “Is there anything wrong with that?”

“No, yes, I don’t know.” She settled her head on my shoulder and sighed. “Why is this so hard?”

“I don’t know why I’m hard.” I joked. “Maybe because you’re here with me.”

“Cody!” She looked at my angry face for a few seconds and I froze wondering if I’d gone too far. Had I pushed my luck? Why had I let myself get too comfortable around her again so easily? I wasn’t sure why I always felt the need to touch her and have my hands on her, but I just needed to feel that connection with her. My body craved hers and not just in a sexual way. It just wanted to be close to her. I just wanted to be close to her. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I was going to be really pissed with myself if I’d ruined the moment already.

“Sorry?” I gave her my most innocent sweet boy face and she laughed.

“You’re not sorry.” She gave me a beguiling look, her face radiating happiness and I laughed along with her, everything suddenly right in my world again. “And I don’t know if I want you to be sorry.”

“You enjoy my kisses.” I teased her and she blushed. “Don’t worry, I enjoy your kisses as well.”

“You’re the most confusing man, I’ve ever met in my life, Cody.” She shook her head. “You drive me crazy.”

“In a good way I hope.”

“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “Is there a good kind of crazy?”

“It depends.”

“On what?” She asked with a curious smile and I let my fingers play with her hair.

“How good the sex is.” I started chuckling. “If the girl can rock my world, then she can be a little crazy. If she’s not saying much, she better be sane as hell.”

“Cody, that’s horrible.” She shook her head and twisted her body around to look at me. She folded her legs up onto the chair and poked me in the chest. “You’re really really a bad guy, you know that right?”

“Nah, I’m not.” I said and grabbed her fingers and held them. “I’m really not.”

“You are.” She smiled at me. “You really are.”

“I like to think I’m just honest.”

“We all like to think we’re honest. That doesn’t mean we can say whatever crap we want to and think we’re not going to offend anyone.”

“I’m not trying to offend anyone.” I said, and then I looked at her for a few seconds. “Is that why you ignored me for the last couple of weeks? Did I offend you?”

“Cody.” She rolled her eyes at me. “I already told you I wasn’t ignoring you.”

“Liar.” I said to her, my eyes boring into hers with a challenge. “You were totally ignoring me.”

“I wasn’t. Would I be here if I was?”

“I don’t know. Maybe? Maybe you couldn’t resist me after seeing me at Mila’s today.” I joked, but I could see something in her expression changing. I felt warning bells in my ears and I knew I needed to change the subject again swiftly before I brought the mood down. “So what have you been doing with yourself since I last saw you.”

“Not much.” She shrugged. “Working. Dating.”

“Ugh, I don’t need to hear about loser Luke again.”

“He’s not a loser.” She shook her head at me and smiled slightly. I wanted to tell her that yes he was a loser, or at least the loser. He was a loser because she was here with me right now, letting me kiss her and touch her and he was somewhere in his bedroom or bathroom wondering where he went wrong.

“Anyways, next. What else? Any good gossip?”

“What good gossip would I have?” She giggled. “Nothing much is going on with me.”

“Aww.” I gave her a rueful look, but inside I was happy. Nothing much going on meant that she wasn’t doing much, which meant that maybe she’d been thinking about me too, at least a little bit.

“Aww, nothing.” She laughed. “What about you? What have you been up to?”

“Oh, not that much. A few dates.” I almost groaned out loud as the words slipped out of my mouth. SHUT IT, Cody, I screamed inside.

“Just a few?” Sally teased me, though I couldn’t tell if she was masking her hurt. I’d spoken to TJ a few days before and he’d called me a fool for talking to Sally about other women. Even if I thought of her as just a friend, or a friend with benefits, or a special friend with benefits. He said he knew I wasn’t looking to get married, but that it was insensitive of me to think I could be with Sally and talk to her about other girls; especially because we’d been intimate now. I’d been annoyed at his words, but I knew he was correct. We were past the ‘just friends’ stage now. And even though I’d gone on a few dates, all I’d been able to think about was Sally.

“Ha-ha, they weren’t really dates.” I lied, trying to backtrack.

“What were they then?” She looked at me curiously and I could see that her eyes were more intense than normal.

“Nothing.” I said softly, not knowing what to say, how to get her to understand that I was in an awkward space. I was feeling things I didn’t really comprehend or want to comprehend. She was making me feel things and I didn’t know how to define what we had. I didn’t want to define it. I didn’t want anything to change between us; yet, I didn’t want to let her go.