Nash

CHAPTER 8 Saint

I paced around my apartment like a neurotic mess the rest of the night. I couldn’t believe what I had done, or the way I had left him like that. I was mortified and stupefied at not only my actions but that I had actually managed to get off with him. That had never happened to me before, and all the foreign goodness and startling knowledge that it was him that could get me there had me nearly blind with panic.

I spent all the next day cleaning and finding anything to keep my whirling mind busy until I had to go in for my shift. I barely pulled it together to go in for my rounds, but considering my phone was blowing up with an equal mix of angry text messages from my mom, and disappointed ones from my dad, I had to get out of my apartment. I called Faith to tell her and the rest of her brood family Merry Christmas, and even though I tried to keep it brief, I think she could tell I was upset and something was really wrong.

There was nothing she could do or say to stop me from feeling like I was a lunatic. I don’t know what happened to me when I was around Nash, but something about him and me in the same room and I turned into an unpredictable mess.

Things had been all right. I didn’t love not having my own car in case I wanted to escape the wedding and my own nerves, but his friends and all of the wedding party had been really nice, and his dad, or Phil, as the older man laughingly told me to call him, was delightful. Had I not known any different, I would have thought he was healthy as a horse. The nurse in me wasn’t certain that being around so many people in his fragile state was a smart idea, but I could tell there was no way he would’ve missed the big event. This group was tighter than any band of friends I had ever encountered.

All of Nash’s friends were gorgeous and covered in defining marks that made them an unforgettable group. It wasn’t the tattoos or the fact that the groom was sporting a purple Mohawk that made me start to hyperventilate—it was the palpable love, the care, the respect and genuine admiration they all had for one another that made my skin feel too tight, made a longing I had never felt before start to stifle everything else inside of me.

The only person I had ever had that kind of bond with was Faith, and now that she had her own family and husband to take care of, I felt more and more on my own. Watching this mismatched group of men and women, seeing the bride and groom who were so clearly determined to overcome everything just to be together, made me feel out of sorts, achingly jealous, and as it throbbed in my blood I felt like I needed to go. I couldn’t take it anymore. And just like Nash said, I knew, had no doubt that he would have brought me home without complaint, and I just couldn’t get my head and my heart to line up on what they thought about that. On one hand, I wanted to take his nice-guy facade at face value, but I had been burned by my misconception of him before and I didn’t think that was a risk I wanted to take again. I didn’t know that I could handle being disappointed by him again now that I was just starting to get to a point where I wanted to think he was different than he had been all those years ago.

As I watched him walk down the aisle, so big and handsome, so colorful and distinct, there was no question that I wanted him. I felt desire, was unquestioningly aroused whenever he touched me, whenever he looked at me with those unforgettable eyes. I wasn’t used to that, and to all the heat and confusion that Nash Donovan had once again brought into my life. The buildup was coiled so tight inside of me that it was like a spring ready to snap … and snap, it had taken me right along with it.

If my colossal freak-out at the wedding wasn’t bad enough, my confusing reaction only seconds after the only orgasm given to me by another person was enough to make me want to change my name and move to an island nobody had ever heard of before. Bursting into tears after sex was nothing new for me, even if these had been tears of gratitude rather than disappointment. But the way I freaked, the way I had run away like I had never run before, and maybe most shameful, the way I had callously left Nash with an unmistakably unsatisfied erection made me question my own sanity.

Obviously the other guys were wrong. There wasn’t anything wrong with me sexually. I wasn’t frigid or cold … if Nash had gotten me any hotter last night, we would have melted together. Apparently I just needed the guy to be covered in ink, pierced in some unusual places, and tied to my past and the heart of my lack of confidence in the most devastating of ways in order to have an orgasm. He was beautiful, all dusky skin, corded slabs of hard muscle, and strong planes and valleys of sexy perfection. He was not a small guy, anywhere, and where I thought that would be intimidating, it just made me feel slight and exceedingly feminine next to him. It made me want him more.

On top of everything else I was kicking myself over, I still didn’t get a look at the rest of that tattoo. I knew my thumb and forefinger barely fit around the circumference of his erection when he was aroused, that the metal he sported was blazing hot from being so close to his body, that he looked way better in white boxers than black because of his darker skin tone, that his eyes turned purple not just when he was mad, but also when he was turned on. That damn tattoo was still a mystery, though, and all the while I was lambasting myself, calling myself every foolish name in the book, I was still trying to piece together what it might look like.

I managed to get through the holiday shift with no incidents, and aside from Sunny asking me what was wrong every five minutes, it was preferable to listening to my mom scream and moan about her life and the way the holidays were playing out for the Fords this year. I was dodging Dr. Bennet left and right because even though I promised to go out with him and I didn’t want to disappoint Sunny, my instincts were screaming at me to cancel my date with him. I was too unnerved, too off-kilter after what had happened with Nash, to think I could get through the date unscathed.

When it was time to go home I looked at my phone and winced when I saw I had a missed call from Nash. He didn’t leave a voice mail, but there was also a text that simply said:

Merry Xmas Saint.

I owed him an explanation. I knew it, but I just didn’t think I could do it. I had a difficult time expressing myself clearly when the subject wasn’t embarrassing and undignified. How was I supposed to tell him that not only was he the first guy I had ever been with that made me feel that good, he made me want to actually have sex? How was I supposed to explain that I didn’t want him to be the guy that made sex fun, made me want it, because of the awful things he said a lifetime ago and the way they made me feel? How did I go about explaining that I didn’t want to like him, didn’t want to feel anything for him after the abysmal way his flagrant disregard for me in high school had left me feeling for a lifetime? Would he even understand that because of the younger him, because of those painful moments tied directly to his actions, I normally hated the idea of being naked around another person, loathed being exposed and vulnerable, so sex for me was always confusing and awful?

I couldn’t explain it to him when I couldn’t even get it to make sense to myself. When had all my dislike for him morphed into something that had me jumping him the first chance I got? And did that mean I was ready to forgive him for the sins of the past? I didn’t have answers to those questions and thinking about them made my head hurt.

I didn’t text him back that day, or the next, when he asked if I was okay, or the next, when he asked if we could talk. I straight up ignored him. Phil had decided that if he was well enough to attend Rule and Shaw’s wedding, he was well enough to try his luck moving his care home, so I didn’t have to worry about running into Nash at the hospital anymore. That thought made me want to cheer and howl in frustration at the same time. But by the weekend he wasn’t texting me anymore, and I resigned myself to the fact that whatever symphony of self-destruction I had created had played its last note. Since I was the composer, I had nowhere else to lay the blame.

Time flew and all of a sudden it was the beginning of the following week and my date with the good doctor had arrived. I wanted to go even less now than I had when he first asked me. I would have backed out, made some kind of excuse and played dead if only Sunny hadn’t been hounding me about it every chance she got. I’d also made the mistake of telling Faith about it, more for her support than anything else, but she was tickled pink about the prospect of me dating anyone, so she was nudging as well. I was stuck and all I could do was power through it.

I had a similar argument with the doctor that I had with Nash about wanting to take my own car, only instead of being Nash and using gentle persuasion and unflappable logic to get me to ride with him, he looked at me disapprovingly and pointed out how odd it would appear to his friends if we showed up not together. It wasn’t an argument I wanted to rehash with someone so concerned about appearances, so I reluctantly agreed, and he told me he would pick me up at my apartment. I told him we should just leave from the hospital since the party was in Cherry Creek and it was closer, but again he gave me a look like I was silly and didn’t know how dates worked.

So there I was at nine P.M. on New Year’s Eve, it had been exactly seven days since my disastrous date with Nash, and instead of trying to make polite conversation, or figuring out how to make the most of my time with Dr. Bennet—Andrew—I found myself in the passenger seat of his very nice SUV pondering what Nash was up to. After all, it was New Year’s and that meant kissing at midnight.

I sighed heavily and started when Andrew stopped the steady stream of conversation he was having with himself about himself. No doubt about it: the doctor was his own biggest fan.

“Everything all right?”

I forced a smile and fiddled with the ends of my hair, which I had left down and put into giant, loose curls.

“Sure. It’s just been busy at work and with the holidays. I’m a little beat.” And I’m obsessing over a guy I shouldn’t be, but I didn’t think he wanted to know that part of it.

“Did you always want to be a nurse?”

“Yep. I like nursing, like the rush of the ER, but mostly I wanted to help people.”

“Ahh, you’re one of those.”

I lifted an eyebrow and looked at him out of the corner of my eye. We had stopped in front of an opulent town house in one of the wealthiest suburbs of the city. My stomach dipped. I could already tell this was going to be dreadful. We had been doing just fine when he didn’t need me to join in on the chatter.

“One of what exactly?”

“Those people who went to nursing or medical school based on ideals and fuzzy feelings of giving back.”

What? People went into these fields for reasons other than compassion and concern for the well-being of others? Since when? I was dumbfounded, so I had to ask, “Why did you go?”

He chuckled and made his way out of the car to open my door. He offered me his hand, which I begrudgingly took. I didn’t like how soft, how perfectly manicured it felt next to mine. Those were hands that handed out plain white business cards all day long.

“I went because I wanted a good job, something that was secure, something that had status and prestige attached to it. Don’t get me wrong; I love medicine, love healing, love being in the hospital all day, but honestly, if I could do the same thing and not have the same level of interaction with patients, I would. It gets old after a while, you know? Treating people that are often suffering from nothing more than their own dumb choices. My long-term plans involve going into private practice. I think that has to be the way to go so I can pick and choose the types of patients I want to treat. There won’t be any more cheating husbands with vindictive wives or kids falling off of bikes for me.”

That attitude was ridiculous, and if I was someone else, maybe I would have had the right words to tell him that. Instead I waited until he turned around and rolled my eyes at the back of his perfectly styled head. It was a good thing he had his job and his looks going for him because it was pretty obvious to me this man was shallow as a rain puddle. He might be nice to look at on the outside, but I was starting to see his insides were pretty unappealing, which had me thinking of Nash yet again.

His looks were so dynamic, so in-your-face. Yes, he was good-looking, but it was in a really complicated way; you had to look past all the things on the outside that made him stand out from the norm to see how beautiful he truly was. His insides, though, I had long thought were devious and nasty, but what shined out of his periwinkle eyes was nothing but forthrightness and sincerity … that was the most beautiful thing about him. If anyone saw the two men I had agreed to dates with together, I knew instinctively most would look at Andrew and ask why I wasn’t trying to snatch him up, but Nash … to me, he was the real prize … he was something unique and special in a way that I was having an impossible time letting go of, even twisted up about the past like I was.

“I hope it won’t make you uncomfortable, but some of the young ladies attending this soirée are women I’ve had relationships with in the past. Typically, all the relationships ended well, but you never know what showing up with a beautiful new woman on my arm will inspire.”

I wanted to kick him in the shin, or maybe mess up that ruthlessly gelled hair.

Seriously, not only was I going to have to spend the evening in a room full of strangers, but I was also going to be used as live bait for him to dangle in front of his exes. Oh boy, didn’t that sound like fun?

“I’m pretty quiet. I don’t exactly mingle well.”

“Just smile and look pretty.” He winked at me and I had to clamp my teeth down on my tongue to avoid telling him I thought he was superficial and all-around icky. He was making my skin crawl, and when I recalled the way Nash made it burn and quiver, I wanted to find the nearest exit and find my way back to the Victorian on Capitol Hill. I was such a mess.

It was apparent as soon as we walked in the door that my role for the evening was to be Bennet’s show pony. He never once told people I was a nurse, never mentioned where I went to school or how we really knew each other. He just flashed me around and kept telling me to have a drink and smile. For the most part, everyone at the luxurious shindig seemed just as self-absorbed and fake as the good doctor was, so my only saving grace was that no one expected me to say very much. I just nodded and muttered noises that made it sound like I was interested and tried to remember it was just one date and it would be over soon. Sunny would be happy and I could move on with my life.

About an hour in and not only was I sick of spectacle and showboating, but I was completely bored out of my mind. I had had two glasses of champagne that I’m sure was expensive but tasted terrible and decided to go find a bathroom. No one seemed eager to point me in the right direction, so I went off wandering alone. The town house wasn’t massive, but there were a lot of rooms, and as I was making my way down a hallway I heard high-pitched female laughter coming out of one of them. I was going to stick my head in and ask if I was getting close to my destination, when déjà vu kicked my ass right back to my high school days.

“What is up with that girl Andrew brought? I don’t think she’s said one word all night.”

More laughter and I felt something lodge in my throat and my hands curl into fists at my sides.

“Maybe she’s slow … you know, special. Clearly he only brought her because she’s young and pretty. He wanted to make Heather jealous, I bet, since she got engaged and Tommy gave her that gigantic rock. I don’t think Tommy knows Heather went to Aspen with Andrew a couple weekends ago.”

“Like anyone would be jealous of her. She has the conversational skills and IQ level of a hedgehog. What was he thinking?”

A delicate female snort followed by, “She’s probably easy, so he was thinking it’s New Year’s Eve and he wants to get laid. She’s a sure thing, I bet.”

I couldn’t decide if I was more furious or offended. This wasn’t how grown people were supposed to act. It was juvenile, it was way too akin to what had made me so quiet and reserved in the first place, and if my date had bothered to treat me as a person rather than an accessory, maybe these strangers wouldn’t have any ammunition to lob around like gossipy schoolgirls.

I had reached the end of my tolerance for nonsense. I kept walking down the hall and fished my cell out of my bra, where I had stashed it. Sure, a healthier, more mature response would have been to confront those women, to tell Andrew he was a conceited jackass, but I was just over it. I was not going to let strangers make me feel bad about myself. I did a bang-up job of that all on my own and at least I had real reasons for not cutting myself any slack. I made a call I should have made over a week ago.

The phone rang and rang and I remembered it was a big party holiday and he was probably out. Out with someone who wasn’t me. I held my breath and was about to hang up and call a cab when his deep voice came over the line. He sounded like salvation and temptation all in one word.

“Saint?” He was obviously at a bar or some other place that was loud. There was noise and revelry in the background. Voices screaming, people partying, but the noise was fading as he moved away from it.

“I … I need a ride. Can you come get me?”

He was quiet on the other end of the line. Hell, if I was him I would say no to the crazy lady that had left me high and dry and then ignored me all week, but once again Nash was out to prove what I thought I knew and what was actuality were worlds apart.

“Where are you at?”

“I’m at some awful party filled with awful people in Cherry Creek. I’m sorry, I wouldn’t ask, but I didn’t drive and I’m sort of stuck. I have to get out of here … please.”

He sighed and I could almost see him running his hands over his supershort hair like he did when he was aggravated. His eyes would also be dancing between purple and lilac. I sighed at the mental image involuntarily.

“Text me the address and I’ll be there in fifteen.”

I let out a relieved breath and pushed my hair off of my face.

“Thank you.”

He muttered a dirty word that made me wince and then he sighed again.

“Anything, Saint. Anytime.”

The line went dead and I shot him the address. I fully intended to hide in the bathroom until my rescuer showed up, only my none too brilliant plan was thwarted by a knock on the door and my lackluster date calling my name questioningly through the barrier.

“Saint? Are you in there?”

I guess I had been gone long enough for him to notice, or maybe everyone else had grown tired of his monotonous discourse on how amazing he was and he needed me around to feign interest. What a weasel.

“Uh, yeah, give me a second.” I washed my hands and gave myself a quick once-over in the mirror. I was paler than normal, but there was no missing that my eyes were glittering back at me with anticipation. Shit. I wanted to see Nash. Wanted to be near him, wanted to touch him, and he hadn’t even questioned why I needed him, so I also wanted to hug him out of pure appreciation.

I pulled the door open and met Andrew’s questioning look.

“Everything okay?”

I cleared my throat. “Actually no. I don’t feel so hot. I think I need to go home and get into bed.” Preferably with a darkly hot guy that had eyes the color of the state flower and abs that should be on a billboard for men’s underwear right alongside Beckham.

“What? No way. It’s not even close to midnight yet. We can’t leave.”

I gritted my back teeth.

“You don’t have to leave, Andrew, but I’m not staying.”

His eyes narrowed at me and his demeanor switched from annoyed to slightly threatening.

“What do you expect me to tell my friends? Do you know what that’s going to look like, you leaving and me staying? And what about midnight? These are all couples, Saint. Who am I supposed to kiss at midnight?”

What in the holy hell? I stiffened up and narrowed my eyes back at him. I didn’t like confrontation, hated trying to express what was going on inside my head to another person, but this moron and his elitist friends had shaken something loose. I wasn’t a teenager anymore. I was smart. I was successful and I was entitled to be treated as an equal no matter the situation.

“It’ll look like exactly what it is. I don’t want to be here anymore. I don’t like you. I don’t like your friends, and frankly, I don’t care what you tell them. It’s not like they’ll listen anyway. Everyone here is too busy going on and on about how great they are … no one can get a word in edgewise. As for kissing me …” I moved past him and shook his hand off when he tried to grab my wrist. “No way in hell. Not at midnight, not under the mistletoe … not anywhere, ever. Good-bye, Andrew.”

He called my name then swore at me in a really ugly way.

“When the rest of the nursing staff hears about this at work, you’ll never live it down. Do you know how badly most of them wanted to be you tonight?”

That was the last thing I wanted, to be gossiped about, to be talked about behind my back, but that versus spending one more second with him seemed like the lesser of two evils.

I shrugged my shoulders and headed in the direction of the front door.

“I’m used to it.” I grabbed my coat from the hook it was hanging on by the door and gave him a final look. “By the way, tell your friends my IQ is closer to Hawking than hedgehog. I was summa cum laude at Cal State Los Angeles. Maybe if you had taken three seconds and stopped trying to tell me how awesome you were, you would have known that.”

The door clicked closed behind me and I shivered inside my coat as much from adrenaline as from the freezing Colorado air. I had on a knee-length skirt and a pair of knee-high boots that went great with my sparkly tank top. It was appropriate, cute, and not in any way suggestive, but it wasn’t made for pacing up and down the end of the driveway waiting for my getaway ride in the middle of winter.

I heard the car long before I saw it come around the corner. It was loud, distinctive, made my ears ring, and there was no missing the black-and-chrome monster, much like there was no missing the car’s owner. I barely waited until he rolled to a stop before hopping in the passenger seat. My fingers were numb and my cheeks were freezing cold, but the interior of the car was nice and warm and smelled like a mixture of Nash’s cologne, Armor All, and cigarette smoke. I put my fingers in front of the heater vent on the top of the dash as he wheeled around and headed out of the affluent subdivision.

“Thank you. I hope I didn’t pull you away from anything.”

He cast me a look out of the corner of his eye and tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. He had the Dropkick Murphys playing low on the radio and I thought it seemed like a fitting musical choice for him.

“Nope. I was just at a friend’s bar. Rule’s out of town and Jet took Ayden to New York with him for a show he was playing. Rome is expecting a baby, so he’s all about acting like a respectable adult, and Rowdy is my only single friend left, so we just hit the bar. Asa—he runs Rome’s bar for him—is the only other unattached member of our little gang and he and Rowdy both set their sights on the same cute little brunette. You called right when they were trying to outhandsome each other. It was getting ridiculous, so I probably would’ve bounced early and headed home anyway.”

He glanced over at me and I saw his gaze skim over my legs where the hem of the skirt had ridden up and my skin was bare between it and the top of my boots.

“You look really nice.”

“You didn’t always think that … I looked nice, I mean.” I hated that my voice cracked and broke. He jerked his head to look at me and the lights from the dash made the dime-sized discs in his earlobes glint at me. I muttered my address when he stopped at a red light while he was still staring at me.

“Seriously? What the fuck are you talking about?”

I looked out the window and used my finger to trace a little stick figure on the condensation on the pane. I gave him a top hat and a bow tie.

“In high school you said ‘someone would need to put a bag over her head if she wants to get laid.’” I turned to face him and he looked astonished and incredulous. “You and a group of guys that you hung out with were smoking when I came around the corner and I heard you. I heard stuff like that all the time because I was fat and had awful skin, but it hurt coming from you because I thought you were different. You said I was a mess and needed to look in a mirror and do some work.”

I closed my eyes and replayed that moment over in my mind. Even now it made my chest hurt and old insecurity rise up.

“And before that … before that, I thought you were so nice. Every time you smiled at me, every time you said hi to me, I thought it made you different. I went to Ashley Maxwell’s birthday party because you asked me if I was going.” I saw it all as clear as if it was happening right in front of me, and if I had bothered to look over at him, I would have seen the stunned confusion on his handsome face as he was trying to pull the puzzle pieces of our history out of his memory.

“It was so stupid of me. I felt like an idiot. You looked right past me and then kissed Ashley like she was something special. You didn’t even know I was alive, and then you had to go and say those awful things about me. I went from thinking you were wonderful to hating you. The way you made me feel …” My voice dropped low and I could hear the old hurt, the old disappointment, in my tone. “It stayed with me for a long time, Nash.”

It was quiet save for the guitars and bagpipes on the stereo and I thought maybe he felt guilty or embarrassed, but when we got to the front of my apartment building and I was turning to tell him thanks for the ride, I was startled when he turned fully in his seat and yelled at me like he was the one who’d been wronged for so long.

“Jesus Christ, woman, you’re out of your ever-loving mind!”

I pulled back a little and frowned at him, alarmed at the vehemence in his tone. “What?”

“I never said anything like that about you. No way in hell, and if I ignored you at some stupid party, it wasn’t on purpose. I was a fucking idiot when I was a teenager, Saint. My priorities were locked firmly in my pants. If a girl was a sure thing back then, you think any eighteen-year-old guy was going to turn her down?”

I gave him a sad smile and reached for the door. “But I heard you that next week, Nash. I saw you with my own eyes. It was a long time ago, but my memory is clear, and if it was just a case of boys being boys, it still really, really hurt.”

He shook his head and threw his hands up as far as the interior of the car would allow.

“Bullshit. I never even thought that about you, Saint, so there is no way I would’ve said it. I thought you were shy … and yeah, maybe pretty awkward and a little too studious for my taste, but I always thought you were pretty. Why do you think I said hi to you every day, tried to engage you? I thought your smile was beautiful, and when you finally loosened up enough to give it to me on a regular basis, I was stoked. Your hair is awesome and wild, I love that shit … and your eyes. Fuck me, but your eyes could inspire men to go to war, to paint works of art, to rip their goddamn heart out of their chest and offer it to you without a second thought … then and now. None of that has changed over the years, so there is no way I would have said that stuff about you … no fucking way. You heard me say, ‘Saint Ford needs a bag over her head to get laid’? I don’t think so.”

He was really, really mad. I could feel it burning off of him and I didn’t know how to react. For so long I had been the one feeling victimized, had used that turn of events to justify the way I acted with other people, but now that he mentioned it, as clear as that memory was, I had never heard him say my name.

“I—”

I jumped in the seat when the side of his fist slammed down on the dashboard in front of him.

“You what? Want an excuse not to like me because you know I’m attracted to you and you can’t handle it? I heard negative shit about myself every day of my childhood, Saint. I wasn’t smart enough, clean enough, polite enough, and Lord only knows my skin color and my eye color were all fucking wrong. You really think I would do that to someone else? Yeah, I might be guilty of not seeing you real clearly when you were right in front of me back then, and I may have inadvertently hurt your feelings by acting like a hormonal idiot at that party, but if you had said something to me, told me you were going to be there to see me, I can guarantee that wouldn’t have happened. I might have been running my mouth and talking shit, but I wasn’t talking about you.”

His eyes were almost black. I had no idea what to do. For my entire life I thought I knew, was so sure, and now I felt like I didn’t know anything.

I shoved my hair back behind my shoulders and looked at him.

“If not me, then who, Nash? Who else would you have been talking about? I know you said it. I heard you and I saw you. Even if it wasn’t about me, using hurtful words like that isn’t right.”

He slammed his hands on the steering wheel and growled at me, actually growled.

“Who knows? A teacher I didn’t like, a girl that I hooked up with, a girl that turned me down … I don’t remember because I was a teenage guy full of stupid shit and a lot of anger back then. We all said stupid stuff on the regular, but I never picked on anyone because I knew exactly how crappy that felt. Back then, all I wanted to do was get laid, party with my friends, and forget that my mom was a ruthless bitch. My life sucked, I had a lot of moments where I sucked. I was barely hanging in there most days. I’m not going to deny I was acting like a moron because I more than likely was, but I know there is no way I was verbally attacking you like that.”

“But—”

“But nothing. I wouldn’t have said anything like that about you because I didn’t think it. I thought you were pretty then, I think you’re unbelievably gorgeous now, and all along I’ve known girls like you don’t get into guys like me. Girls like Ashley Maxwell do.”

I reached out and put my hand on his that was curled so tightly on the steering wheel. I had always been into a guy like him, that’s why those awful words still haunted me.

“Nash …” The way I wanted to believe him, trust in him, was overwhelming and I had to admit he might have a point about telling him I was going to that party to specifically see him. Mostly I was caving and thinking there might be more to what happened back then because it made me feel less confused about the way I wanted him, the way he just lit me up with a mere look.

He looked at my hand and then into my eyes.

“Even if some jerk did say that about you, you should know that it was just kids being dumb and none of it was true. And I swear I never would have thrown away an opportunity to hang out with you if I knew you were offering it up. Back then, a party like that meant one thing—getting laid. I had a one-track mind. Words like that, others’ opinions of you, shouldn’t have that kind of power, Saint.”

But they did and therein lay the problem. I was always guilty of letting other people’s words and actions hurt me and dictate how I felt about myself, and it was costing me more than I ever thought. I wanted who he was with me now to be the real Nash, not the Nash that still haunted my memories with indifference and careless words.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. He shook one out and stuck it in his mouth. I gasped at him and reached over to yank it out of his mouth, which had him glaring at me even harder.

“No! I thought you quit?”

“I did, until last week.”

He didn’t need to say anything else. I knew what happened last week that would have made him start up again. I was to blame for that, but I could rectify it now if he let me.

I shoved the door open and bent down to look at him. “Come inside with me, Nash.”

He threw his head back against the headrest and shook his head in the negative.

“That didn’t work out so great for me last time, Saint.”

No, it hadn’t, but I was tired from holding on to who I’d thought Nash had been, when the Nash from now was all gorgeous and accommodating in front of me. He had dropped everything and come to pick me up without question. I threw his unlit cigarette on the ground next to me and lifted both of my eyebrows at him. It was time to make new memories to replace the old ones that haunted me.

“I’ve never wanted to have sex with any guy like that before. I couldn’t stop myself, didn’t want to stop. I want you, want to touch you, feel you, and it was amazing for me. No guy, ever, has gotten me off before, Nash. Not that there have been a lot, but you are the only one. I can’t promise you that I’m not going to freak out again. There’s a good chance I might start to cry because I don’t really have a handle on all the things you make me feel, good and bad, but I want you to come inside. I don’t want the past between us right now.” I didn’t want anything to stand between us anymore.

He looked like he was going to tell me no. I don’t know how I would have handled that, actual, undeniable, in-my-face rejection, but luckily I didn’t have to find out because he threw open his door and climbed out of the car and looked at me over the roof. He wasn’t going to disappoint me. That made my heart flutter and my tummy go all squishy and warm.

“Let’s give it ten minutes. Ten minutes, and if it isn’t going to work for both of us, let’s cut our losses and no one gets hurt or”—one of his black eyebrows shot up and a self-deprecating grin pulled at his mouth—“left hanging.”

“Ten minutes?” It didn’t sound like nearly enough time to touch all that smooth, burnished skin.

“Ten minutes.”

I could handle ten minutes without freaking out. Heck, when he kissed me the first time, it had lasted longer than ten minutes. I could do this, wanted to do this, but that didn’t mean my hands stopped shaking or the idea of getting naked with him didn’t have my stomach dipping and second thoughts trying to shove their way up from the depths. I talked a good game about letting sleeping dogs lie, but really I could feel they were always there, tugging hard on the leash.

On the plus side, getting naked with him again meant I was finally going to see the rest of that tattoo.