Hell, did she not know what kind of willpower it took to walk away from her?
They had a lot to talk about.
Starting with Charlie.
Michael stared back at him with masculine sympathy. He’d come down to the gym to tell Jai how late it had gotten. “I try to never keep anything from my wife. I learned fast that secrets come back to bite you in the ass.”
Jai sighed heavily, stepping back from the punching bag. “I don’t want her in the middle of this.”
“She’s already in the middle of this. You can’t protect her from that. Plus, you’re the one person she trusts in this whole world. Don’t take that away from her.”
Feeling a rush of fierce protectiveness, Jai nodded gratefully at Michael. Michael and Caroline had to be two of the strongest people he’d ever met. The loss of their daughter, Fallon, still hung heavy in the air, in their eyes and even in the almost drugged movements of their bodies. Yet they carried on protecting everyone and taking time to help out. Jai didn’t know how he could ever repay Michael for letting him start his life over again away from the incredibly poisonous influence of his so-called family.
Knowing Michael wouldn’t want thanks, Jai clapped him on the shoulder as he passed and steeled himself to return home to Ari to figure it all out.
Jai walked into the low-lit sitting room, his heart beating a little faster than usual. Trey would laugh at him if he were here to see Jai Bitar of the great Bitar Ginnayes anxious and nervous about facing a girl. Not just any girl, though, he reminded himself. The girl he loved.
Ari sat in the armchair near the large window, only the table lamp beside her illumination against a darkening sky. Her long legs were draped over the chair’s arm and she watched him warily, her book now closed on her lap.
He hated the uncertainty in her expression.
“We need to talk.” To his surprise, he saw her mouth tremble as she nodded, gracefully bringing her feet to the floor. Her eyes were wide and wounded, and Jai cursed. “Dammit, Ari, don’t look at me like that.”
He saw a flash of anger as her spine straightened and he immediately felt better at the sight of her fire.
“Like what?”
“Like I just killed your cat.”
“I don’t have a cat,” she sniffed haughtily.
He rubbed a hand over his close-cropped hair and sat on the sofa nearest her, his eyes boring into her very angry ones. “Why do I feel like I’ve been a bad guy for days now? I don’t even know what I’ve done except be a gentleman.”
Ari stared at him incredulously. He had a feeling he was about to get another lesson on the mysterious female psyche. “For two months, Jai? Look, I appreciate you giving me my own room and letting me know that you weren’t pressuring me into anything. But stretching it into two months of nothing but kisses and a patronizing nod to tell me it was my bedtime is not about me. It’s about you and what Michael and everyone else here thinks about you. About what you think about you. I get it.” She stood, face flushed with frustration. Jai felt his own blood heat at her accusation.
“You’re Jai Bitar. Honorable, responsible, guardian Ginnaye. God forbid he ever sleep with his eighteen-year-old girlfriend!”
“Ari, stop.”
“No.” She huffed. “Do you know how bad you made me feel about myself? Do you know how worried I was that you thought this was a mistake?”
“You?” Jai snapped. “What about me?
Rather than tell me this stuff, you treated me like crap. I thought you thought it was a mistake.”
But he might as well have stayed quiet. She was on a roll. “And it’s not just the sex thing. You don’t talk to me.”
Well, that was the biggest load of BS he’d ever heard. “Bullshit.”
“I ask you about your dad. What he did to you … and you shut me down.”
“You asked me if I was okay with it, and I told you I was.”
“But you’re clearly not.”
He squeezed his eyes closed, willing himself not to lose his cool with her. “I think I remember telling you when we first met that when a guy says he’s fine, he means he’s fine!” So much for keeping his cool.
“Don’t shout at me!”
Disbelieving at the insensible, illogical fight unfurling out of control, Jai grimaced. She was shouting at him. “You’re nuts.”
Definitely the wrong thing to say.
Hurt settled into her features before she drew herself up. “Thanks for the talk. Dick.”
She moved to hurry past him but Jai wasn’t done. Frustration, longing, lust, love, anger, it all mingled together in a need to have her see the truth. In a need to just … have her.
His arm shot out quick as lightning, his hand curling around her bicep as he yanked her down over him. He fell back against the sofa cushions, rearranging her as she huffed and fussed so that she was straddling his lap. She tried to bat away his hands but he grabbed her wrists, restraining her so she was pressed flush against him, their faces not even an inch apart. Jai stared into her unusual eyes, eyes that searched his frantically. “Did we make a mistake, Jai?” she whispered, her breath teasing his lips. “Did we move too fast?”
He let go of her wrists to smooth his hands down her slender hips, pulling her closer. Ari’s breath hitched, her hands coming to rest on his chest. It was rising and falling a little more quickly than normal, and she could probably feel his heart slamming against her palm. “I think we’re new at this. And I think we need to start talking to each other.”
“You’re not really much of a talker.”
Jai grunted in acknowledgement and brushed a soft kiss across her mouth. Bad idea. His mouth tingled and his skin prickled with heat. At the second hitch in Ari’s breath, he knew she felt it too. “Then I’ll start.” He pulled back a little so he could look into her face, so that she could look into his and see the sincerity there. “You’re right.
There is no getting over my father’s betrayal but when I said I’m fine, I am fine, Ari. There’s nothing for me to talk about. Nothing for me to work out of my system. What he did gave me clarity, I told you that. I meant it. I’m okay, because … I have you. Because you showed me what family really is.”
“Jai …,” she whispered, pressing closer, the clean scent of soap and vanilla causing another flush of heat to engulf him. She always smelled so amazing.
“I’m not done.” His hands flexed on her hips. “As for … sex …” He stopped. Just the word set off frustrated sparks inside of him. He tried to control the tightness in his lap and failed. Ari nudged against him, her excited puffs of breath causing the fog to start in his brain. “Ari,” he breathed, his grip on her hard. “Don’t.”
“Why?” She licked at his mouth and he groaned, pulling his head back.
“Because …” he tried to clear the fog. “You’re distracting me from what I was saying.”
“You said … as for sex …”
“Right.” His gaze fell to her mouth. Ari had the perfect mouth. He’d obsessed over that mouth since he’d kissed it for the first time when he put the trace on her. It was lush and full. It wasn’t an innocent mouth. Jai jerked his head back. “Okay. Stop.”
Hearing the determination in his voice, Ari stopped wriggling and drew back, glaring at him. “This is what I’m talking about. How can it be so easy for you to stop when it feels like I’m going to come out of my freaking skin?”
He laughed, which was so the wrong thing to do. Ari huffed in outrage and tried to climb off him, but Jai wrapped his arms around her, bands of steel she couldn’t escape. “I’m not laughing at you,” he promised. “I’m laughing at the fact that you think every time I walk away from you, it’s somehow easy for me. Do you know how many cold showers I’ve taken since we moved in together? One a day. On occasion, two.”
Ari’s mouth parted in surprise.
“Oh.”
“Oh is right. Ari, I wanted
you to know that this is more than sex. I wanted you to feel sa
fe with me.
Loved. But that doesn’t mean it hasn’t been damn hard. Pardon the pun.”
Ari grinned and nodded. “I do feel loved.” Jai sighed inwardly as she reached up to stroke his cheek. That warm, overwhelming feeling was back in his chest for the first time in days. It was the feeling he got knowing Ari loved him like no one ever had. “But when you love someone as much as I love you, sex is a part of that. A big part of that.
I don’t think wanting you, or you wanting me, diminishes all the other parts of being in love. It makes it whole.”
Jai rested his head back on the couch and stared at her from under his lashes, wondering how he got so lucky.
“I keep forgetting you’re smart.”
She hit him playfully, a smile tugging the corner of her mouth. “Tell me you love me back, dumbass, or I’m getting off your lap and never getting back on it. Ever.”
Jai grinned up at her. “Well, I can’t allow that.” His hands on her hips drew her toward him and he pressed a soft, lush kiss to her waiting mouth. When he pulled back, he looked deep into her ever-changing eyes and whispered roughly, with more feeling than he could possibly contain, “I love you. And I’m sorry I ever made you think I didn’t want you. You’re right. Part of me was keeping up appearances. I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t talk to you about it and instead acted like a huffy, immature teenager. But in my defense,” she added quickly with a saucy smile, “I am a teenager.”
Jai groaned. “Don’t. You’ll make me feel even more debauched than I already do.”
“Debauched? Why, Mr. Bitar, have you been reading historical romances again?”
Serious love ripped through him and he laughed, his regard adoring. “God, I love you.”
He saw her smile and dip her head, trying to hide the spring of tears in her eyes at his words. Relief coursed through him and Jai wrapped his arms around her until they were hugging each other tightly. After a moment of warm reconciliation, he heard her sigh heavily.
“What is it?”
“We have more to discuss, I’m afraid. And none of it good.”
When she pulled back, Jai nodded. “I have something to tell you too.”
Ari cupped his face in her hands, her expression grave. “You’re not going to like what I have to tell you.”
“Baby, you’re not going to like my news, either.”
***