I huffed, crossing my arms. “I’ve told you, like, twice.”
He chuckled. “You told me the first two times we met, then several times this week whenever I’d tease you about how you were obviously in love with me.”
I kept quiet, thinking back to our conversations over the last week.
He was right. I told him several times this week, usually when he was teasing me. But I had only told him that simply to remind me.
“I know you’re not mine, Fallon,” Emmett whispered, taking a step toward me. “But I can’t stop thinking about last week.”
I swallowed, knowing my voice would be more like a rasp when I spoke. “What about last week?”
He took another step toward me. “In the dressing room.”
I snickered. “You mean when I embarrassingly got this dress stuck to my piercing, and you had to literally crawl up my legs to detach it?”
Another step. Now I was pressed along the wall, Emmett an inch away. His breath fanned out over my face, and it smelled minty with just a pinch of husk intertwined. “What are we doing, Fallon?”
I looked up at him through my long eyelashes, my heart literally seconds from beating right out of my chest. My breaths were barely escaping my mouth. I could have passed out looking up into his stormy eyes.
“We’re… we’re doing what friends do. We talk, we joke. We get to know each other and eat tacos. Isn’t that what friends do?” I wanted to look away. I didn’t like feeling scrutinized underneath his stare. His look was treacherous. I’d never wanted something so badly in my entire life. And I knew, feeling what I was feeling in that very second, that it wasn’t a matter of wanting something you couldn’t have, because I was pretty sure I’d want him no matter what. I bit my lip before letting the truth spill out into the darkness. “Okay… I don’t know what’s going on, and it might be wrong because… things are complicated and they won’t change.” I darted my eyes away, just for a second, to get myself in check. “I just… I don’t want to stop doing this until I have to. Until I’m forced to. And that’s asking a lot from you, because this could potentially hurt you… I know it’s going to hurt me.”
“But…” he said, voice low. He scanned my face, wondering what I was going to say next.
“But I don’t care if I ge
t hurt, and I don’t care—for once in my life—that I’m being totally selfish right now. I’m being selfish with you, and I just don’t care, because there’s just something about you that pulls me in, Emmett. You make me feel alive. You make me feel like me. Calling you a friend is just a way to keep you at bay, but it’s the complete opposite of what I’m feeling. I know I sound crazy.” I tried to let out a small laugh. “We’ve spent a few nights together, and we’ve talked on the phone, yet I feel something. Something strong.”
Emmett placed his arms along the wall, right beside my head, caging me in. I stood up a little straighter, angling my head upward. I wanted him to kiss me so badly. I wanted him to kiss me so badly that I thought I might actually die if he didn’t. If his hands didn’t touch my body. The one kiss we had in the musty bar hallway a week ago was nothing but a tease.
He was like a drug that took my inhibitions and threw them right on the ground.
“There’s something you should know about me, Fallon.”
I sucked in a breath, waiting for whatever it was that he was going to say to change my mind.
“What?” I whispered.
“I don’t like to share. So when you’re…” Emmett clenched his teeth together and looked away before bringing his attention back to me. “When you’re married or engaged, I’m out. You’re not mine for the keeping, and I’m not yours, either.”
My heart was slowly falling to the ground. I could walk away right now and never look back with my heart fully intact.
I could walk away, and marry Derek, and try to love him, and try feeling the same things I felt with Emmett’s body this close to mine, but I knew better.
I wanted to feel those things.
I wanted to feel all of them, and I wanted to feel them right now with Emmett.
He wanted the okay.
He was giving me an out. He was giving me an ultimatum.
“So… you’re saying the second a ring lands on my finger, you’re out. We cut ties. Not even friendship.”
His nostrils flared. “Right.” Emmett’s mouth moved closer to mine, and suddenly, my legs were becoming shaky, a painful throb forming in between them. My nipples were tightening; everything was spiraling out of control. I wanted Emmett Lanning to take me like he had never taken anyone before.
I wanted to have mind-blowing, never-forgotten sex with him. I wanted something with him that I had never had with anyone else. Friendship was flying out the window. See ya!
“I get it.”