Just One Night Together (Flatiron Five Fitness #3) - Deborah Cooke Page 0,37

he noticed that, too.

“Passionately,” she admitted, the eggs tasting like dust to her.

“You still do?”

“Absolutely. He was The One, but he married someone else.” Haley shrugged. “That takes me out of the game of spotting mermaids forever.”

Damon didn’t say anything.

She risked a glance his way to find his eyes dark. She felt the urge to warn him. “I’ll never love anyone the way I loved Garrett.”

“Maybe that’s a good thing.”

“It doesn’t matter. I knew better, but I ignored what I knew, so the lesson is learned.”

“And now there’s only work,” Damon concluded. “And sex.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

He slanted a bright glance her way. “Maybe I like you enough to want you to have more.”

“I don’t want more.”

“Maybe you should.”

Haley felt defensive. “No. I like this. It’s simpler and it makes me stronger.” She spun to her feet and carried the dishes around the counter to the sink, needing something to do with her hands. “It’s sensible. As long as I don’t surrender my heart to any one person, I can police my boundaries. I can decide when I’ve given enough and I can stop, and I can protect myself from the kind of hurt my mom still experiences to this day.” Despite her words, Haley felt raw and vulnerable, as if she’d shared too much. She cleaned the dishes quickly, unable to even glance Damon’s way.

She didn’t know what she’d do if he touched her.

Yes, she did know.

But it was just sex.

“I’m sorry,” Damon said quietly. “Garrett was an idiot.”

“No, he’s brilliant. Handsome, brilliant, he has it all.”

Damon snorted. Haley glanced at him, her heart skipping at the heat in his eyes. Their gazes held for a long moment, one that made her breath catch in her throat.

Then Damon got to his feet and turned away. He reached for his jacket and Haley understood. After he walked out the door, she was never going to hear from him again. A lump rose in her throat, one that challenged her own claim that it was just sex, but she ignored it.

She still wanted more.

Damon came around the counter, moving with that feline grace that made her knees weak. “Thanks for the eggs and the conversation.”

“Don’t go,” she said, her voice a mere whisper.

“I can’t do this anymore, Haley,” he murmured in reply.

“Just keep your promise and say thanks,” she replied. “Just one last time.” She saw him hesitate, but stretched up to touch her lips to his. Her heart fluttered at that fleeting contact, but he didn’t kiss her fully.

He was going to turn her down.

He was going to leave.

But then he sighed and lifted a hand to her cheek, sliding his fingers into her hair. He looked at her as if she held the keys to the universe and the corner of his mouth lifted in a tentative smile.

“I’ll have to do it twice,” he murmured, his breath across her lips. “Given the eggs.”

“Of course,” Haley managed to say, relief flooding through her, before Damon claimed her mouth in a hungry kiss.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and wished for the night to last forever.

Even though she knew it wouldn’t.

Six

It felt wrong to leave.

It would be even more wrong to stay.

Damon left Haley’s bed and her apartment without waking her. He walked home, across the park, not caring if it was safe or not. All he could think of was Haley’s fierce conviction that she didn’t want love or commitment in her life.

What kind of an asshole had Garrett been?

Haley was the kind of woman who would give everything to a partner, the kind of woman who wouldn’t back down from a challenge, the kind of woman who would be devastated to lose the love of her life. Damon only had to look at how she defended her mom to see the truth of her nature.

And he didn’t believe that with so much passion inside her, Haley could be happy with half-measures. She might be trying to protect herself, but it was another way of cheating herself from everything she deserved to have.

Just sex was a compromise. It was less than it could be, because the emotional connection was lacking. It wasn’t making love. It was physically fulfilling but not emotionally so. People could trick themselves for a night or maybe two, but after three nights together, Damon knew it wasn’t just sex for him anymore.

He was falling hard.

But he knew that taking their relationship to the next step would make him worse than Garrett.