Not You It's Me (Boston Love #1) - Julie Johnson Page 0,15
a date with him is pretty much out of the question.
As for sleeping with him... well, that’s either the worst idea I’ve ever had… or the best.
“Gemma.”
My eyes fly up to meet his, and I realize I’ve spaced out for several moments.
“Sorry.” I clear my throat. “I’m ready now. I think. Almost.”
He looks at me, recognizing the sudden shift in my mood from playful to pensive.
“Okay, here goes.” My voice is wavering; I make a conscious effort to steady it. “I broke my leg when I was seventeen, when I fell off the back of a motorcycle, and it still aches whenever it rains. I’m left-handed. And the only thing in my refrigerator at the moment is wine, some expired orange juice, and a really old onion.”
He’s quiet for a long time, just looking at me, and the silence grows between us until it’s so heavy, I can barely breathe. There’s indecision in his eyes, but I can’t decide whether it’s there because he doesn’t know the answer… or because he does, and he can’t figure out whether he wants to use it.
“Gemma…”
My eyebrows lift at the medley of emotions in his voice — longing, reluctance, lust, restraint — and though all he’s said is my name, I intuitively know what’s coming.
Rejection.
For some ludicrous reason, I feel tears threatening to prick at my eyes. Which, honestly, is the most absurd thing in the history of things, because I don’t cry. Ever.
Not at the end of The Notebook. Not at funerals. Not at weddings or baby showers or any other sob-inducing events.
I dismiss the unfamiliar sensation, chalking it up to temporary insanity, which has pretty much been the theme of my night.
I don’t like-like boys. (Men. Whatever.)
I don’t get butterflies.
I don’t cry for no reason. (Heck, I don’t even cry for good reasons.)
And yet…
I know it’s crazy, stupid… but sitting here, waiting for him to speak, I almost feel like he can see straight through me, down to my soul. As though, somehow, amidst this game of lies, he’s pushed though and found the heart of me, beating too-fast inside my chest — a wild, frothing animal trapped in a cage of ribs, made of flesh and blood and vulnerabilities I’ve never shared with anyone.
Like any good predator, he has an innate ability to root out weaknesses. He senses my wild, wounded heart with the ease of a shark smelling blood in the water from miles away, or a spider feeling the vibrations of its victim in a web long before it ever sets eyes on it.
It’s an uneasy feeling. Edgy, uncomfortable, inexplicable. Like my skin’s gone see-through, and he somehow knows all my secrets before I’ve ever voiced them.
His mouth opens, then snaps shut again, as though he’s searching for the right words to let me down easy. As though I don’t already know what he’s going to say.
“Just say it,” I whisper, unable to wait anymore. “The suspense is killing me.”
“I can’t do this.”
“You can’t guess the answer?”
“You’re right handed, Gemma.” He sighs. “But that’s not what I mean.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I can’t do this with you.”
My brow wrinkles in confusion as I wait for him to clarify.
“One night. No strings.” He casts his eyes to the ceiling. “God help me, but I can’t do it. Not with you.”
“You’re the one who set the terms.” My voice is affronted, angry. “You’re the one who put that idea on the table.”
“I know. Christ, Gemma, I know that.”
“So, what? You changed your mind? Decided I’m not hot enough for you?”
His eyes return to mine, narrowed with emotion. “You’re gorgeous.”
“Then what’s it about?”
“I thought I could… But with you… It’s just… I underestimated…”
He’s tongue-tied.
This smooth-talking, Sun-Tzu-reading, control freak is actually at a loss for words, because of me. It should be endearing, but I’m too pissed to be endeared.
“Thanks,” I drawl. “That really clears it up.”
His eyes flash. “Gemma, this isn’t about you — don’t make it. It’s all on me.”
I snort. “Wow.”
“Excuse me?”
“I didn’t think you were the kind of guy who’d use the it’s-not-you-it’s-me line.”
“It’s not a line,” he counters.
“Don’t tell me — you’re also working on yourself. Oh, and you’d like to still be friends.”
“Gemma.”
“What?” I snap. “It’s not polite to get a girl all hot and bothered with the promise of a night of endless orgasms, and then back out. In fact, it’s downright rude.”
His gaze drops to my mouth as it fires angry words at him, and I see his eyes are dilated with desire and anger and