Blurred Lines (Love Unexpectedly 1)

I put my hands on her face. I cup her head.

And I kiss her.

The kiss is rough and desperate and I pour every last drop of my feelings for her into it.

I pull back slightly, searching her face to make sure she’s getting it, but she still looks confused, so I kiss her again, more slowly this time.

“Ben?” she says when I pull back.

“You recently pointed out that I haven’t had a serious girlfriend for as long as I’ve known you,” I say roughly. “Don’t you want to know why?”

She hesitates, then nods.

I gently kiss her mouth before continuing. “It’s because I fell in love with this incredible girl my freshman year. Only I didn’t know how to be in love, so I did the only thing I could to keep her close. I became her friend. I became her best friend, and buried all of my own feelings so deep that I didn’t even recognize them, because her feelings were all that mattered, and she wanted this other guy.”

I take a deep breath and force myself to continue. To be brave like she was. “But when I touched you, Parker…I slipped up. All those long-buried feelings bubbled up and…you get what I’m trying to tell you, right?”

She wipes her eyes. Nods.

I smile at her. “Those sure as hell better be happy tears.”

She smiles back. “The happiest. I love you, Ben. I should have said it the second I came in the door.”

I laugh. “You probably should have. But I should have said it all those years ago.”

She leans against me, her finger tracing the shape of my mouth as though memorizing it. “Tell me now.”

I bend my knees a little so we’re eye level. “I love you, Parker Blanton. I’ve loved you for the longest time.”

Her answering smile is my everything.

“I love you, too, Ben Olsen.”

“New house rule,” I say. “You have to say it every day.”

“I make the house rules,” she says, tapping a finger to my mouth. “And I decree that you have to say it every day.”

I wrap my arms around her, lifting her off the floor. “Does this mean I get to see you naked again?”

She laughs, and I love the sound of it. “Depends. Are your sheets clean?”

I sling her over my shoulder, ass in the air, and move toward the stairs. She slaps at my back with her palm. “That wasn’t an answer.”

I grin as I take her up the stairs.

My sheets totally aren’t that clean.

Turns out, she doesn’t care.

Epilogue

Parker

EIGHT MONTHS LATER

“Ooh, I know!” I say, pointing excitedly at the karaoke book. “We could do this Disney song.”

Ben gives me a disgusted look. “We could. I could also hang myself with the cord of this microphone—”