Her Hidden Falls Bodyguard Billionaire Cowboy - Taylor Hart Page 0,6

“That’s amazing.” A broad smile split her face, and she came at him with open arms. “Such great news for you.”

Sean hugged her, but he was frustrated. “I don’t think you understand.” He reached out, taking her hand.

She stared at their joined hands like she wasn’t sure how she felt about it.

“I have feelings for you, Angela. I have for a long time, and I’ve tried to tell you.”

“No, you don’t, Sean.” She tried to pull her hand back, but he held fast.

“Yes, I do.” Frustration coursed through him. He dropped her hand. “I don’t know why you insist on denying anything between us.”

“Because it doesn’t exist.” Her tone had risen an octave.

His heart raced. He thought of the mustang Beau had spent months breaking last year; he saw that same spirit in Angela’s eyes. “Yes, there is something between us. And don’t tell me there’s not. I was there when you kissed me last night, right there.” He pointed back to the door.

“You kissed me,” she said, looking exasperated.

He grinned at her, not denying it. “You kissed me back.”

Angela pinched her lips into a straight line. “I’ve told you before, Sean. There is no marriage, no husband, no babies in my future.”

“Why?” he countered.

She threw up a hand. “I just like adventure, moving, having freedom.” She turned away from him and stalked over to rearrange a little table filled with jewelry.

Every time she spoke of wanting adventure and freedom, something just felt off to him. “Where would you go?”

She repositioned more jewelry. “What?”

He moved to the table and put his hand over the jewelry. “If you want adventure, then fine. Where do you want to go?”

Confusion clouded her face. She shook her head. “So many places.”

Once again, there was no umph in her tone. He didn’t believe her. “Where?” He placed his hands on her shoulders and pulled her close to him. “Maybe I’ll go with you if you want me.” He’d never seen himself leaving Hidden Falls. It had always been home. That had been important to him, but maybe she could be more important.

Her eyes became misty with tears. “The beach. The sand. Surfing. Parasailing. Building sandcastles.”

Why would thinking about her dream adventure make her want to cry? “Then why do you seem sad?”

“I’m not sad.” She scowled at him and pushed him back.

For a moment, neither of them spoke. Eventually, Sean ventured, “Maybe I could go with you to the beach.”

“No. Don’t do this, Sean.”

That made his heart sink. “So it’s not the beach. It’s just me you don’t want.”

She seemed stricken by his answer, and she reached for his hand. “Sean, don’t do that.”

Her touch surprised him. If they ever held hands, it had always been him reaching for her.

She seemed to realize what she’d done, because she pulled her hand away. “Sean, it’s not you, it’s—”

“Are you really saying that to me?” He let out a sardonic laugh and ran a hand through his hair. “You’re really giving me the ‘it’s me, not you’ line?”

“Sean, you have been a good friend to me.”

“Friend-zoned after one kiss. Wow.”

She scowled at him. “You don’t understand. If I could take a relationship to the next level, any relationship, it would be with you. But I can’t.”

Another ping of unrest hit him square in the chest. Something really was not right here. He squinted at her. “What does that mean, ‘if you could’?”

“Nothing.” She turned away from him.

He moved around her. “What does a next-level relationship look like?”

She held his gaze but didn’t speak.

An epiphany occurred to him. “I’m a stalker like Nathan.” He put a hand to his head, unable to believe it.

“What?”

It was making more sense to him. “Yep. I’m Nathan.”

“You mean the guy who’s serving time for helping frame your father for a crime he didn’t commit?” She shook her head. “What are you talking about?”

He waved a hand of dismissal through the air. “Nathan was a stalker. Especially after he admitted to what he’d done and we began investigating more about him, it was easy to tell that the man was a noted stalker of Charlotte. There were pictures of her on his walls. He’d kept a journal about her. The fact he even confessed to the crime he’d kept silent about for years was all because he thought he was helping her. That he was saving her.”

“O-kay.” She still seemed confused.

“Am I your stalker?”

Her brow furrowed and she said, “Nooo.”

“I think about you all the time. I wait for you.”

“Yeah, but we’re friends.”

That