"You were serious?" I thought he was half-joking the other night when he talked about fucking me without a condom. "You want to have sex without a condom?"
"Where's the waiter? I need a drink." He surveys the entire span of the room in mere seconds.
"Bourbon doesn't go with fruit salad."
"Bourbon goes with everything, Jessica."
I glance at the paper again. "This makes me nervous."
He scratches the tip of his nose and raises a brow. "My cock makes you nervous? You haven't been shy around it up to this point."
"What if I don't want to?" I push back. "What if I say we can't?"
He stops eating and places the spoon down on the table. "Then we don't." There's no emotion in the statement.
"Just like that? We just don't."
"Jessica." His hand snakes towards mine. "Listen to me. Jessica, listen."
I smile at his insistence that I listen. He always does that when he's got something important to say. "I'm listening, Nathan."
"I would never…" He pulls in a heavy breath and squeezes my hand tightly. "I would never do anything with you that you didn't want. Ever."
"You say that but… but I don't know." I don't know. I want to believe him. I wish I could believe him. "I feel like you push me sometimes. You want things I'm not ready for."
"Listen to me." He stands and throws his linen napkin on the table before he kneels down next to me. "Please, Jessica, just hear this one thing."
I stare down at his calm, beautiful blue eyes. His face is unshaven and his hair a mess from the wind. He's so gorgeous. He's more striking than the night I met him. "What?"
"I fucked this up more than once." He bites his bottom lip. "I am going to work every single fucking day of my life to make you want me as much as I want you. I will wait forever for you. Forever, Jessica. Don't doubt that."
I don't respond. I just stare at his face. My heart is telling me that he means it. My head wants to embrace it.
"I love you, Jessica. I fucking love you." He swallows hard just as I see the pool of tears in his left eye. "My life is nothing without you. Nothing. The day you get that will be the happiest day of my life."
I can't handle the emotion in the room. I can feel the weight of it suffocating me. "No. The happiest day of your life will be when you get to come in me without a rubber."
He licks his bottom lip. "That's going to happen sooner than you think."
Chapter 20
"How many women have you fucked in here?" I'm sitting in one of the chairs opposite his desk while he works.
"In here?" He doesn't break his gaze from his laptop screen.
"Christ, you're annoying as fuck sometimes," I tease. "Is that like a lawyer thing?"
"Is what like a lawyer thing?" He reaches for a manila folder on his desk.
"That diverting thing you do." I playfully punch my fist into the folder. "You do it all the time. You ask me the same question I ask you."
"I don't do that." He smirks as he pushes my hand to the side. "That's quite a fist you have there."
"Have you fucked that receptionist?" I nod back towards the area outside his closed office door.
"What?" His head bolts up. I finally have his full attention.
I look directly into his eyes. "Have you banged her in here?"