Winning Moves (Stepping Up 3)

He tore his mouth from hers. “Let’s get out of here,” he said, taking her hand to help her up the slope to the highway, and she was far from complaining. She wanted to be alone with him, to talk to him, to be in his arms.

They ran to the motorcycle, where he wrapped his jacket around her. When he started to put his helmet on her as well she stopped him. “Wait,” she said. “To your house. I want to go to your house.” The idea of being somewhere he could walk away again was too much right now. She couldn’t deal with that tonight.

He stared at her, unaffected by what seemed like gallons of water pouring over him before he raised the helmet again. She let him put it on her this time, wishing he would have replied, wishing she could say more, but the blasted rain stifled the conversation.

Kat watched him climb onto the Harley, and then took her spot behind him. Her spot. The place she’d ridden many times before. She leaned into him and wrapped her arms around him, the warmth of his body seeping through his now wet shirt, and right through to her soul. She held on, not for safety, but on to him, to the years that had led them here, to the past few weeks that had brought them back together. She’d known when they’d begun this project together that this was it, a new beginning or the end of their path together. And those years, those weeks, had come down to now. Whatever happened tonight really was it. But he was here with her, and he’d kissed her.

She clung to those things, telling her they meant something, right up until the second when she realized that Jason wasn’t taking her to his house. He was taking her to her own home, where he would leave her and go to his. He’d meant his words back in that bar, when he’d told her he was done. She knew him and he’d never said anything like that to her.

When the bike stopped in her driveway, Jason shouted over his shoulder, “Garage door opener?”

No, she realized, with yet another kick in the teeth when she’d had too many already tonight. In the midst of the mess created by her raging emotions, she’d left her purse in the car. That meant her keys and her phone were also on the side of the road.

Kat pushed off of the bike and shoved Jason’s jacket at him, then tugged off the helmet. “Thanks for the ride,” she shouted over the engine and another loud roll of thunder from directly above them. “I’m fine from here.” She took off running.

The backyard was Kat’s target destination, and she prayed she’d left the sliding glass door open. But she didn’t leave things unlocked any more than she normally left them in places they didn’t belong, like the side of the road, so the chances of getting inside were slim.

“Kat!” Jason shouted, but she didn’t turn. She pulled open the gate and would have closed it behind her but it hung on mud and grass. She struggled with it, and seeing Jason running in her direction, she abandoned the door.

She was up the concrete stairs and under the covered patio that spanned most of the back of the house, when Jason shackled her hand. “Kat, damn it,” he growled. “What are you doing?”

She whirled on him, pulling out of his loose hold. He’d left his jacket and his T-shirt was soaked, outlining his perfect torso. “I’ll call the rental place. They’ll take care of this from here.”

Water ran over his face. “Let’s go inside and talk.”

“No,” she said, hugging herself. “We have nothing to talk about.”

“We have years of things to talk about.”

“You said you were done,” she said. “And I get that, Jason. I know you and I know you meant it. And I know why you brought me here. So you could leave when you were ready. Well, leave then. You’re really good at leaving.”

He stepped back as if she’d hit him and Kat couldn’t believe she’d said those words. She’d never, ever thrown his past choices in his face, but she’d felt those choices with a whole heck of a lot of pain.

“I never wanted to leave you,” he reminded her, “and I know you have to know that.”

“But yet you excel at it,” she said, unable to hold back. “I didn’t leave you for Marcus, Jason. You left me in yet another hotel room, alone.”

“I had no choice,” he said. “The auditions were the next day. I was contracted. We talked about this before I left.”

“We did, and like always, I knew you had to go. Denver was just a repeat of history, a look into the same future. You feel good when I’m with you but you feel really bad when I’m not. And when I sat there in that hotel room, I swore it was the last time.”