Panic flared across her expression, and she tried to shake her head in denial. “Connor . . . ”
“I love you,” he told her before she could refute his claim. “I just wanted and needed you to know that.”
Her eyes were wide, and knowing she needed time to process his declaration, he drove back into her, finally allowing her body the pleasure it sought and giving her mind something else to focus on. Another demanding thrust, and she moaned at the depth and fullness of his shaft impaling her to the hilt. Again and again, he claimed her, until she started to climax and took him along for the overwhelmingly intense ride.
Over the next few hours, he didn’t give her time to think or obsess or worry about the words he’d spoken to her. Instead, he showed her how much he cared and how much she meant to him, in the way he thoroughly worshiped her body, until she was so exhausted she fell into a deep sleep in his arms.
He held her close, knowing he’d have to leave soon, and told himself that tomorrow would be soon enough to figure out where to go from here.
Chapter Twelve
“Mommy,” a soft, girlish voice whispered, weaving through Katie’s mind and tugging at her subconscious.
“Mommy, wake up,” the sound came again, this time with a gentle pat to Katie’s cheek that definitely roused her.
She blinked her eyes open and stared at her daughter, who was standing at the side of her bed. Going by the light coming in from the bedroom windows, it was morning, and judging by the heavy, masculine arm draped around her waist and the hard length of an erection prodding against her ass, Connor was still in her bed, his warm body spooned behind hers.
Crap! He’d stayed the night, and clearly they hadn’t locked the door.
A jolt of panic had Katie scrambling up in her bed, which proved to be an unwise idea since she was still naked beneath the blankets. She pulled the sheet up to make sure she stayed covered from her chest down, and her quick movements jostled Connor awake, too. She heard him release a soft, oh, shit, beneath his breath, and much more carefully, he sat up beside her, being equally strategic with the covers around his hips.
“Hey, sweetie pie,” Katie said in a cheerful voice that sounded forced to her own ears. “What are you doing up so early?” It really wasn’t early. A glance at her cell phone on the night stand showed it was 7:28 a.m., and her daughter was due to leave for preschool in half an hour.
“I woke up all by myself,” she said, then glanced at Connor curiously. “Why are you in Mommy’s bed?” she asked, her tone guileless. “Did you have a bad dream? Mommy only lets me stay in here when I have a bad dream.”
Thank God for a child’s naiveté, Katie thought, grateful that Val’s mind went to such an innocent scenario.
“Yes, princess,” he said, striving for a light tone even though his voice was still gruff from sleep. “I did have a bad dream.”
“Oh.” She leaned her little arms against the mattress, seemingly in no hurry to go anywhere, and continued her chatter. “Did Mommy kiss away your fears and hug you to keep you safe from the monsters like she does for me?”
An abrupt chuckle escaped Connor from behind Katie, but she wasn’t as amused and needed to divert Val’s attention, and quickly. “Honey, why don’t you go and get dressed for school, and I’ll meet you in the kitchen for breakfast in a few minutes.”
“Okay.” Val skipped from the room, and as soon as she was gone, Katie jump out of bed and closed and locked the door.
Grabbing a pair of underwear from her dresser, she pulled them on, and continued with a bra, jeans, and a T-shirt before turning back to Connor, who was now sitting on the edge of the bed with the sheet still draped around his hips.
“This shouldn’t have happened,” she said, unable to keep the edge of anger from her voice. “How did this happen?”
He scrubbed a hand along the stubble covering his jaw, then pushed those long fingers through his already disheveled hair. “We both fell asleep. It’s not that big of a deal, Katie,” he said, trying to placate her.
She stiffened defensively. “Yes, it is a big deal. It’s misleading and confusing for Val.”
He met her gaze and held it steadily. “Then maybe it’s time for us to renegotiate our arrangement.”
He was completely serious, and her heart pounded hard and heavy in her chest, because she wasn’t sure she could give him what he was asking for—something far more serious than an affair. The kind of commitment that she was afraid to believe in because, in the past, it always ended in pain and misery for her.
She pulled in a deep breath as everything that had happened last night came flooding back in an overwhelming wave of emotion—mainly, the honest, candid way he’d confessed his love for her. That same sentiment shone in his deep blue eyes, promising her so much if she would just take a chance and trust him.
Except her deep-seated fear of rejection, the same one that had colored her childhood and had carried over into her adult relationships, kept her from giving him what he wanted, what he deserved. For her, love never lasted, and the men who’d come and gone through her life always grew bored and moved on. That was all she knew, and it was just a matter of time before Connor did the same.
A huge, aching lump formed in her throat. The two of them had clearly come to that crossroads, where she was now forced to decide which direction to choose when it came to her and Connor . . . and for her daughter’s sake. To keep things amicable between them, Katie knew it was time to let him go as a lover, in order to keep him as a friend.
* * *
Connor stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror, a sense of dread balling in his stomach. He didn’t have to be a genius to realize that Katie had just done a one-eighty on him out in the bedroom. That having Val find the two of them in bed together had all her doubts and insecurities about them rushing to the surface.
He’d known they’d get to this point eventually, where Katie would have to make some difficult decisions about their relationship. He didn’t want to be the guy who fucked her when the mood struck. He wanted to be the man who loved her, took care of her, and was a part of her life on a daily basis, twenty-four seven.
He’d given her six weeks to come around, while doing his best to prove to her that he wasn’t like every other guy in her past, that their relationship wasn’t a replica of her parents’. Today was the day he’d find out if any of his efforts had paid off, because he couldn’t continue with this part-time arrangement with Katie and she was going to have to make a choice—all of him or nothing at all. His stomach twisted at the latter thought, which was a very real possibility.
He splashed water on his face and dried it with a towel, then walked back into Katie’s bedroom to get dressed. She was already out in the kitchen with Val, and he joined them as soon as he was fully clothed. He knew Katie heard him walk over to the coffeepot on the counter and pour himself a cup, but she didn’t look at him as she made Val a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for her lunch.
Connor sat down next to his daughter at the table, who was eating her bowl of cereal. After taking a bite of her breakfast, she scooped up more of the Honey Nut Cheerios and held it toward him.
“Want some of my O’s, Daddy?” she asked, cheerful, bright-eyed, and completely unaware of the tension between the two adults in the room. “Or some of my juice?”
He smiled at her. “I’m good, princess. You need to eat all that yourself so you go to school with a full belly.”
She set her spoon in her bowl, then lifted her shirt and pushed out her stomach with an adorable grin. “I already have a full belly!”
“Looks like we need to make more room for your breakfast then,” he teased, and gently poked a finger against her midsection, which made her suck her tummy back in and giggle.
“I like you being here for breakfast,” she said happily as she picked up her glass of orange juice. “I want you here every morning.”
God, he wanted that, too. So much. But the tense set of Katie’s shoulde
rs said otherwise, and instead of answering—because he had no idea how the next hour or so was going to shake out between him and Katie—he took a drink of his coffee instead.
Val finished eating, and after taking her dishes to the counter by the sink, she came back and lifted her My Little Pony backpack from the rung on the back of her chair and slipped her arms through the straps. Once that was done, she leaned against Connor’s leg and looked up at him with hopeful eyes.
“Will you take me to school today?” she asked, so sweetly his heart squeezed tight in his chest, because it was such a natural thing for him to do . . . if they’d been a family.
Before he could respond, Katie was next to Val and replied for him. “Daddy has to go to work,” she said, tucking her lunch into the little girl’s backpack, her voice strained. “So I’m going to take you and Leah.”
Val pouted. “But I want Daddy to take me since he’s here.”
Connor wasn’t going to contradict Katie or undermine her decision. He would never instigate a power struggle with Val in the middle, no matter what happened between the two of them. However, he hated how confused Val seemed to be, that Connor was there, yet he wasn’t able to do something as simple as drop her off at school.
He set his coffee mug on the table. “Come here, princess,” he said, and when his daughter was close enough, he lifted her so that she was sitting on his lap, a hint of sadness in her big blue eyes. “I have to go to work, but I’ll see you tonight, okay?” He’d always be there for Val. That would never change no matter what his relationship with her mother ended up being.
“Okay,” she said, but not happily.
He tapped Val on her cute nose, which he knew would make her grin, and it did. “And if you’re good for your mommy today, I’ll take you out for ice cream after you eat your dinner.” With or without Katie joining them remained to be seen.
She clapped her hands gleefully. “I want chocolate chip!”
“You got it.” He set Val back on her feet and watched as Katie grabbed her purse and car keys from the counter.
For the first time since bolting out of the bedroom before they could really talk, she finally glanced at him and met his gaze. The fear he’d seen earlier in her eyes had abated to a silent conviction, and he had no doubts that she’d already reinforced all those emotional walls that he’d spent the past six weeks trying to tear down.
“You can lock the door when you leave,” she said, her voice tight, as if she was trying really hard to keep her shit together until she was alone.
He didn’t say anything as she followed Val out the front door, because he wasn’t planning on going anywhere until she came back and he had his say, which she hadn’t yet given him the chance to do.
He spent the next twenty minutes making a few phones calls, one of which was to his partner, Kyle, whom he was supposed to meet at a jobsite this morning to discuss some renovation plans for a house they’d recently purchased. He rescheduled for later that afternoon, and once he’d checked in with one of his project managers who’d already left him a message, Connor went into the living room, sat down on the couch, and waited for Katie to return.
When she walked through the front door, she obviously wasn’t surprised to see him, since his SUV was still parked out at the curb. But everything about her was wary—her gaze, her demeanor, and the way she set her purse down on the coffee table but remained standing instead of sitting by him.
“I think you and I have some unresolved issues to settle,” he said, jumping right into the fray because, well, there was no easy way to have this conversation.
“There’s nothing unresolved, Connor.”
He arched a brow and didn’t hesitate to call her out. “Do you plan to completely ignore the fact that I told you that I love you?”
He saw a flicker of emotion in her eyes that resembled heartache and regret. “It’s not so much that I’m ignoring it . . . I’m really trying to think of Val and do what’s best for her.”
“And you think that ending our personal relationship is what’s best for her?” he asked, unable to keep the incredulous tone from his voice. “Or is it best for you because ending things means that there is no risk of you getting hurt?”
She visibly stiffened, as if his words had hit their intended target. “It’s best for both of us,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest defensively. “I don’t have a great track record when it comes to men, Connor. In fact, they always leave because I either wasn’t worth the effort for a long-term relationship or I wasn’t enough in some way to keep them interested. Even my own father didn’t stick around, unless he needed to use me as some kind of leverage against my mother.”
Her chin lifted a few determined notches. “So yes, in that regard, I’m being proactive, because if something happens between you and me and it ends bitterly, that will directly affect Val. She’ll get caught in the middle, and I refuse to put our daughter through what I endured growing up because my parents grew to hate each other. I . . . I can’t take that risk,” she said, her voice pained. “You and I are better off just being friends, instead of complicating things with sex and . . . emotions.”
Connor exhaled a deep breath, remembering that night after they’d visited his parents for the first time, when Katie had opened up and told him about her childhood—her parents’ nasty divorce, the constant custody battles that no young child should ever have to suffer through, and all the rejections that had left her unable to trust in any relationship.
Without a doubt, her emotional scars and insecurities ran deep, and while he understood that in her mind she was truly trying to protect Val, she was doing so at the cost of her own happiness. And all he could do was put everything out in the open between them and reinforce how he felt about her. The rest would have to be up to Katie.
Standing up, he walked over to her, ignoring the way she eyed him so guardedly because there was nothing she could say or do that would change the fact that he loved her. Given the chance, he knew he wanted to marry her, but she wasn’t there yet . . . and quite possibly never would be. The realization made him feel as though someone had stabbed him in the chest with a sharp knife and given it an extra twist for good measure.
He uncrossed her arms from where she’d folded them in front of her and took her hands in his. Her brows creased in sudden confusion, because his gentle actions contradicted the heated argument they’d just had. All he had left to give her was the truth, so that’s what he did.
He tenderly rubbed his thumbs over the backs of her hands. “When I met you over three and a half years ago in that Denver airport, I saw a vulnerable woman who’d been hurt by some asshole who clearly hadn’t appreciated how beautiful you are, inside and out. His loss was my gain, and I was lucky to have that one amazing night with you that I’ll never forget, because we created the best thing that has ever happened to me. Our daughter.”
She swallowed hard, clearly affected by his words, but remained quiet, so he continued because he didn’t need a response from her. He just needed her to hear what was in his heart.
“I thought about you constantly during all those years, because what we had in one night was stronger than anything I’ve ever felt for any other woman . . . and still is,” he said, meaning it. “If my feelings for you can withstand three and a half years of not even being with you physically, and all based on one night together, then you can bet that I’m the kind of guy who can go the distance. I don’t give up when things get tough. I believe in love, and I believe in what we have together. I want to fight for you, for us, but you have to give me something to fight for.”
She shook her head and blinked back the tears he saw forming in her eyes, not giving him what he desperately needed from her—some kind of affirmation, or a kernel of hope that she wanted to at least try.
“I want you to be mine,” he said, not caring how possessive that sounded, because it’s exactly how he felt. “I want to go to bed with you at night and wake up with you in the morni
ng, without worrying about sneaking out of the house before Val sees us together. I want us to be a family, Katie, except you’re too afraid to take a chance on the real deal, and whether you want to accept it or not, that’s what we have. A strong relationship with the potential of being so much more, if you would just trust me with your heart. I promise I won’t ever break it.”
“Connor . . . I just . . . can’t.” She tugged her hands from his, and as soon as she severed the connection between them, Connor knew there was nothing else he could say to convince her that they were meant to be.
* * *
“Arghh!” Katie exhaled the frustrated sound and scrapped the graphic ad she was working on, the fourth version since Connor had picked up Val to take her to see her new baby cousin, who she was completely enamored with—enough that she kept asking for a baby brother of her own and couldn’t understand why Katie couldn’t just make it happen.
Connor and Val had been gone nearly three hours, and with the house quiet, she’d planned to get caught up on the work that had piled up over the past week and a half since she’d ended her affair with Connor. Since he’d walked out her door after baring his soul and had gotten nothing in return because she’d been too petrified to let go of all her emotional childhood baggage—and some adult issues, too—and be strong and confident and have faith in every promise he’d made.
Since that day, her creativity had been in lock-down. It was as if her mind was rebelling against the rash, short-sighted decision she’d made to push Connor out of her life, and instead was forcing her to think about everything she’d given up and lost.
Well . . . not lost yet, her brain taunted her. But she did stand to lose a one-of-a-kind man who been nothing but dependable, loyal, and the kind of father to Val that Katie wished she’d had growing up. Because despite everything he’d said to her that last morning, it wasn’t fair to think or believe that he’d wait around for her forever. Not when she hadn’t given him any reason to.
Rock Solid Page 16