He stares at me.
"Right, do I even want to know how you’ll swing that?"
"It’s all legal, if that’s what you’re asking."
"I have no doubt it is," I say, and I mean it. JJ has a past that makes him morally gray, but when it comes to me, he’ll never risk putting me in danger.
His features soften. "I know you’d have preferred for me to ask you if you’d move in with me, but I’m not giving you a choice about it."
I can’t stop the surprised laughter that bubbles up out of me. "If you’d asked me instead of bringing me here, I’d have thought you’d been kidnapped and replaced by an alien."
He arches an eyebrow. "That some kind of pop culture reference?" His Brit accent deepens.
"Something like that." My grin stretches wider. "You’re kinda cute when you go all hoity-toity on me."
"You’re always cute, and sexy, and gorgeous, and beautiful. You’re the most intriguing woman in the world. The most fascinating, the most beguiling."
My cheeks grow fiery.
"Hear my soul speak. Of the very instant that I saw you, Did my heart fly at your service."He glances between my eyes.
"The Tempest,"I say softly.
"It’s true. I’m not a romantic. I wasn’t looking for love or for an emotional connection. Then you swept into my life, and it’s as if my past finally let go of me. You made it possible for me to dream, to hope, to open my eyes to possibilities. By just being who you are, you changed me. And it was sudden, but it was also so real, so natural. So much a part of me. I saw you and realized my life as I knew it was over, and for the better. I met you and knew I belonged with you. That we were going to be together. Doesn’t mean I accepted it. I fought it with everything in me, even as my instincts confirmed it was my last bastion. My last attempt to hold onto my individuality, myself, my identity, for soon it would no longer be mine."
"JJ…" I swallow. "I—"
He leans over and presses his fingers to my lips. “There’s something else you should know. Something that I’ve been meaning to tell you but haven’t found the courage to, until now.”
My heart begins to race. My throat closes. “What is it?” I swallow. “You can tell me anything.”
He takes my fingers in his. “Promise me you won’t hate me.”
“Nothing you do could make me hate you.” I turn my palm up and interlink our fingers. “Now, tell me already.”
“You know when you thought it was Isaac in your room making love to you while you were sleeping?”
“It was Isaac, and how do you—” I stare at him. “JJ, you didn’t...”
He nods. “It was me. I crept into your room, and you were there, and I couldn’t stop myself. I slipped into bed and finger-fucked you.”
I pull my hand from his.
“And the time you slept in my office when we were working on the presentation? I said I wouldn’t make a move on you—”
“But you did.”
I don’t need to see the look of contrition on his face to know, of course, he had.
I shove the car door open and step out.
The door on JJ’s side slams, and he rounds the car toward me.
“I thought we couldn’t be together, and if that was the only way I could have you, then I wasn’t going to deny either of us.”
I begin to pace. Back-forth-back.
The silence stretches.