the wrong guy. I'll drive you home."
"You will not." Feet planted, she folded her arms. "I'll walk when I'm ready to go, and I'm not ready. Don't even think about kicking me out or I'll-"
"What?" How could he help but make it a joke? It was ludicrous. He lifted his fists in a boxing pose. "Think you can take me?"
The temper that gushed out of her was hot enough to boil the air. "Don't tempt me. You sprang this on me. Out of the blue, then when I don't do a happy dance and fling myself into the program, you walk away. You tell me you love me, and you walk away."
"Sorry, I guess I needed a little alone time after realizing the woman I'm in love with isn't interested in building a life with me."
"I didn't say-I never meant... Hell." Layla covered her face with her hands, took several deep breaths. The anger evaporated as she lowered her hands. "I told you once you scare me. You don't understand that. You're not easily scared."
"That's not true."
"Oh, yes, yes, it is. You've lived with this threat too long to be easily scared. You face things. Some of it's circumstance, some of it's just your nature, but you face what comes at you. I haven't had to do a lot of that. Things were pretty ordinary for me, right up until February. No big bumps in my road, no particularly big moments. All in all, I think I'm doing reasonably well. All in all," she repeated on a sigh as she began to wander the room.
"You're doing fine."
"I'm scared of what's here, of what's coming, what may happen. I don't have Quinn's energy or Cybil's... savoir faire," she decided. "I do have persistence, once I commit to something I do my best to see it through, and I have a way of putting the big picture into components that I can reason out. So that's something. It's not as overwhelming, not as frightening when you have those smaller pieces to work with. But I can't seem to reason things out with you and me, Fox. And that scares me."
She turned back to him. "It scares me that I've never felt for anyone what I feel for you. And I told myself it was okay, it was all right to have all these feelings rush in and grab me. Because everything's crazy. But the fact is, it's all crazy, but it's all real. What's happening around us, what's happening inside me, it's all real. I just don't know what to do about it."
"And I added to the mix with the idea of starting a business here, making it more complicated and scary. Understood. We'll take it off the table. I didn't look into it to put pressure on you. We've all got enough of that as it is."
"I wanted to be mad, because it's easier to be mad than scared. I don't want to be at odds with you, Fox. Everything that happened today... you were there. I woke up from that nightmare, and you were right there. Then you didn't come back." She closed her eyes. "You didn't come back."
"I didn't go far."
Emotion swam into her eyes when she opened them. "I thought you might have. And that scared me more than anything else."
"I love you," he said simply. "Where would I go?"
She launched herself into his arms. "Don't go far." Her mouth found his. "Don't kick me out. Let me be with you."
"Layla." He took her face in his hands, easing her back until their eyes met. "All I want at the end of the day is for you to be with me."
"I'm here. It's the end of the day, and I'm here. That's where I want to be."
Her lips were so soft, so giving. Her sigh, as her body molded to his, like music. Her hands brushed his face, through his hair as he circled her toward the bedroom. And in the dark, they lowered to the bed. She reached out, their legs tangling as they lay facing each other. As they stirred each other with long, lingering kisses, he could see the gleam of her eyes in the dark, the curve of her cheek, feel the shape of her lips and the beat of her heart against his.
She shifted, kneeling to unbutton his shirt. Then her body bowed down as she pressed her lips to his heart. Lightly, her fingertips grazed down his sides as her mouth brushed,