Kansas City.
But maybe this time it would be harder for him to leave.
“Now you can have the family you always wanted. You can have weekly dinners and shopping trips, and my dad will be here if you ever need your car worked on, and my mom will make you soup when you’re sick.”
Avery blinked up at him.
Or maybe not. Maybe this wasn’t about Avery and his feelings for her at all. He cared about her. But he cared about the whole freaking world.
He wanted to be the big-shot hero again. He’d seen someone in need—her—and figured out a way to fix it.
Dammit.
She pushed him back. “I’m not a charity case, Jake.”
He reached for her. “That’s not what I’m saying.”
“But it is. I’m this poor, needy little girl who’s sad about her dog missing.”
He frowned and shook his head. “That’s a bad comparison.”
“Is it? I lost my family. I’ve been sad and lonely. Then you show up with the power to get us back together. You’re the only one with enough influence to get us together to make up. Now it happened, and you can feel good about it and can tell yourself you’re the big hero. And you need that. Like most people need water.”
“Why is it that something that makes other people admire me is something that makes you so nuts?” he asked, advancing another step and backing her up against the bathroom counter. “Everyone else thinks my willingness to help and my heroic efforts are awesome.”
“Then why do you need me to think you’re awesome?” she asked, pushing against him again.
But he wasn’t budging this time.
He stared down at her for a long moment. Then he said softly, “I don’t know.”
Her breath caught in her throat at the look of confusion and need on his face.
“But I do,” he said. “I really do.”
She swallowed hard. “It’s because I’m a challenge,” she said, her voice breathless anyway.
He lifted his hand and cupped her face. “That’s what I thought, too. But . . .”
He leaned in and brushed his lips over hers. It was a fairly chaste touch, especially considering all the other touching they’d done, but it rocked Avery to her core.
Jake lifted his head.
But he didn’t say anything. He didn’t finish his sentence, either.
She needed to hear the rest of that sentence.
She frowned. “But what?”
“Huh?”
“You said you’ve been telling yourself that I’m a challenge, but—”
“But I don’t think that’s it.”
She stood, watching him, waiting. When nothing more was forthcoming, she pinched him on the arm.
“Hey.”
“You’re making me squirm on purpose.”
“I really like it when you squirm,” he said sincerely.
“Let me put it this way,” she told him sincerely. “If you don’t tell me what is going through your head right now, I’m never squirming for you again.”
He laughed, and before she knew what was happening, he’d picked her up and deposited her on the bathroom countertop. He leaned in and kissed the side of her neck.
She was already squirming. But she wasn’t going to show it.
“Tell me what you were going to say.”
He licked a sweet path from the edge of her jaw to her ear, then sucked gently on a spot behind her ear that definitely made her squirm.
“I did not keep coming back to see you . . . and to kiss you . . . because you were a challenge,” he said.
He kissed down her neck to her collarbone. She felt the first button on the front of her blouse open, and her shirt gaped, allowing him access to more skin. Avery tipped her head to the side and sighed, unable to control her reaction to him.
“I did not think about you all the time in Kansas City because you were a challenge.”
Two more buttons opened, and the front of her shirt separated to reveal the front closure of her bra.
Jake kissed across the upper curve of one breast, his other hand cupping the opposite one.
“I did not go out to the shed with you the night of the tornado because you were a challenge.”
Avery unbuttoned the rest of her shirt on her own, pulling it open and slipping it off.
Jake groaned his approval, opening the front of her bra and peeling it back.
“Where are your mom and dad?”
“Out for ice cream.”
“I thought you brought ice cream home.”
“We did.”
“But—”
He leaned in, his lips touching hers. “They are very intelligent people.”
She pulled back, looking into his eyes. Could she have sex with Jake in his parents’ house with them knowing she was having sex with Jake