I might have been able to pull myself together right then. If I had been alone. If I’d been able to process and tuck away the trauma myself.
But something about having someone there, having them be calm and sweet and understanding seemed to make it impossible to fight through the lingering feelings of fear and pain and despair.
So what did they do?
Bubble up and burst out.
All over Cary.
When I tried to pull away, intent on rushing off into the bathroom and getting a grip, he only pulled me closer, held me tighter, murmured more soft and sweet words about being okay, about him being there for me, about him making sure nothing ever happened to me again.
All that kindness, well, it just made the tears keep coming. Until my cheeks felt raw. Until my eyelids felt puffy. Until I was sniffling pathetically in an attempt not to leak all over him.
“You needed that, huh?” Cary murmured after I finally started to be able to pull myself together. “Lot of survival, not a lot of processing,” he went on. “Seems like we need to convince that subconscious of yours that you are safe now,” he added. “Then maybe you can kick those bad dreams once and for all.”
“Sometimes they’re not so bad,” I admitted. “Tonight was really bad,” I told him.
“I guessed so since you jolted like I’d jabbed you with a hot poker when I touched you. He’s not going to get a chance to do that again,” he told me, voice a solemn vow. “Not while I’m here,” he finished as he shifted me up on his lap, letting his arm loosen around my back just enough to lean me back so he could look down at me. “Okay?” he asked as his free hand lifted, wiping the lingering wetness from my cheeks.
“Okay.” I barely recognized the sound of my own voice even as it came out from between my lips. It sounded as breathless as I felt as I looked up into those dark blue eyes of his.
“He won’t touch you again so long as I’m around to make sure of it,” he went on as his finger moved over the apple of my cheek, down to my jaw, then over. The pad of his thumb traced across the outline of my lower lip.
It sounded crazy, but I swore electricity sparked from his barely-there touch.
I wasn’t even aware of lifting my hand. But I felt it as my palm grazed up the strong, corded muscles of his forearm, then his bicep. It didn’t stop there, though. No, it kept moving over his shoulder, up the side of his neck, then finally, moving behind, sinking in a little.
I realized my intention a moment too late.
I was trying to draw him down toward me, toward the lips his gaze was focused on.
There had to be some sort of other reason for him to be looking at them like that, though. Because he’d made it pretty clear that he had no interest in me that way.
Even so, though, there was no talking to my arm. It had a life of its own at that moment as my hand applied pressure to the back of his neck until I started to pull it down.
I was sure he was going to pull away, that he was going to toss me off of his lap and onto the mattress, then storm away from me while mumbling about how he was just helping me because of an old connection, not because he wanted a new one.
But then his deep gaze slipped from my lips to my eyes, making my breath catch in my throat. Because, while no one would consider me a professional on such matters, there seemed to be no mistaking the heat in his gaze, the intensity of his stare as he kept letting himself be drawn down closer to me.
At the last possible moment, some form of insecurity or self-preservation had my hand loosening the pressure on the back of his neck.
I’d brought him ninety.
And I sat there immobilized by both desire and the fear of rejection, as Cary took one long, slow breath.
Before closing the last ten.
His lips sealed over mine.
I guess I’d been expecting soft and sweet and careful, since that was the way Cary had handled me since I’d shown back up in his life. With kid gloves. Very aware of my trauma, and not wanting to trigger me in any way.
But this wasn’t that kind of kiss.
No.
Oddly enough, it seemed to have the same uncontrolled passion as a man who’d just gotten out of prison, who’d been denied human contact for far too many years, who was desperate for the feel and taste of a woman.
His lips bruised into mine, creating this sort of aching need that started at the contact then ballooned outward until it filled me completely.