Chaos & the Geek (Grace Grayson Security #1) - Elizabeth Stevens Page 0,60

keep my tone light and casual as I walked towards her.

She nodded and pressed her lips together. “Uh, good. Yours?”

I nodded as well, an uneasy trepidation filling me slowly. “Fine. I spent all day being teased mercilessly, but it was worth it.”

Those violet eyes flew to me. “What? Why?”

I gave her a crooked smirk. “Apparently I’m capable of smiling.”

Amber licked her lip, but it was a nervous action. “Oh. Well, that’s good… I’m…” She cleared her throat as she looked at the floor. “Uh… I should–”

“Is everything okay?”

She looked at me like she thought I should know that, no, nothing was okay. Then she almost smiled as though everything was perfect. But then we were back to the wrinkled nose and biting lip of, no, nothing’s okay.

Amber coughed as she pushed her glasses up her nose. “Look…about last night…”

She paused like she expected me to say it was a mistake, like she didn’t want to be the one to say it. But I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. I didn’t think it was a mistake. I felt guilty as fuck about what Hawk would think, but it wasn’t a mistake.

“I’m not going to be the one to say it was a mistake, Amber,” I said carefully.

“You don’t think it was?” she asked.

I shook my head slowly. “No.”

I couldn’t tell if she was elated or annoyed by that. Both emotions flickered over her face. “But Patrick?”

I nodded and swallowed. “Yeah.” I raked a hand through my hair. “That… The situation’s not ideal, but that doesn’t make it…us a mistake.”

I could see she wanted to believe me, but she was having trouble. And her eyes were imploring me to understand.

“I don’t want to have to move out, Kit…” she said softly.

I had to swallow again against the sudden heat in my throat. “What are you saying?”

She sighed heavily. “I’m saying it can’t happen again. I… It’s not just Pat. Okay? I don’t want to mess up what we’ve built this last week. I mean, we’re friends now, aren’t we?”

Now was decidedly not the time to tell her that I had no interest in being her friend. No, that wasn’t right. If she was going to insist that was all we could be, then I was going to do my best not to fuck it up. But I wanted more. I wanted everything. I wanted to be her friend, her lover, her confidant. If she didn’t want any of that though… Well, I’d live with it.

So, I nodded. “We are.”

“Right. And…and maybe that’s all we can ever be?”

Amber wanted me to say she was right. She wanted my permission that that’s all we could be. I didn’t want to risk driving her away, but I wasn’t going to let her think the night before meant nothing to me.

“If that’s what you want.”

“You don’t want?”

“I want us to be friends.”

“Just friends?”

“Amber, I’m not going to lie to you, but I want you to know I don’t expect anything either…” I paused to make sure she understood what I was saying.

She frowned but nodded. “Okay. No. I want you to be honest.”

“Last night wasn’t a mistake for me. It never will be. Hawk can beat me black and blue, and I’d stand by our choice. But if you only want to be friends, then I accept that and that’s all we’ll be.”

She pushed her glasses up again, then rung her hands in front of her. “I just…” She took a deep breath. “Pat means the world to me. You know how he’d react.”

I did. I could handle it. We’d fall out for a while maybe, but I didn’t want her to suffer for it. Hawk had been deadly serious in his threat to the team. He was fiercely protective of his little sister and he knew all us too well to think we’d be any good for her. But I wanted to be good enough for her and I was going to prove I could be, even if we were only friends.

“Yeah. He’d rip me a new one.”

She nodded. “Exactly. And even if he didn’t, what happens when…?”

She looked at me quickly, almost an apology, and I knew what she was thinking. She was thinking about what happened when her envisioned inevitable end of us occurred. If she wanted to be friends, telling her that I never wanted there to be an end was going to be incredibly unwelcome and, if I was honest, I wasn’t sure I could promise her that just yet. My heart was