Charity Case - The Complete Series - Piper Rayne Page 0,160

way. Just clicks through the channels.

“You heard me, right?” I ask.

“I heard you.” He brings a forkful of Lo-Mein noodles to his lips.

“But?”

“But nothing.”

“Fine. Don’t tell me.” I stab a piece of meat in the carton.

He chuckles. “I’m not going to waste my breath. You’re not there yet.”

“Not where?”

His eyes are still focused in on the television, never veering to me once. “Ready to see us.”

“Speak English, Dean.”

He swivels in his seat and places his container down on the table. “You’ve let me in and I’m not going to scare you, but Chelsea, I won’t give up until that ring is back on your finger.”

“Dean,” I sigh trying to ignore the flipping and flopping of my heart like it’s screaming he wants us, he wants us.

“See.” He points to me. “This is why I wasn’t going to say anything. You’re not ready for that declaration.”

I laugh. “Are you sure we didn’t warp back to the seventeen hundreds? Maybe you want to go ask Barb and Ted for my hand. Do you have a dowry? Or is it me who is supposed to have the dowry?”

His lips tick up. “Relax, Chelsea.” He winks again. “I’m not going to push you into something you don’t want.”

He’s so smug. He thinks because he landed me in bed that he’s going to convince me I want to get re-married? Who is he kidding?

“I have to go to the bathroom.” I stand, leaving my fork in the Mongolian beef. He had to go and ruin that for me by talking about the future. I’m still processing that I’m even here right now. That I just slept with him.

Deciding on his en suite bathroom instead of the one in the hallway, I step in and turn on the lights.

Again with the dreary black, gray and white. Who decorated this place?

I shut the door and head to the toilet, but a flash of color on the monochrome canvas of his bathroom walls draws my attention. In slow motion, my feet move forward and my need to use the bathroom suddenly vanishes.

It slides off the towel rack when I clutch it in my hands. The Moroccan style towel my grandma sent us after she heard the wedding news. I thought I took them all. They weren’t the most beautiful things in the world. More colors than a kaleidoscope, but it was the only domestic wedding gift we got.

Bringing it up to my nose, I inhale and smell Dean. Memories float through my brain of the happy times I’d pushed as far back as they could go. Placing it back down, I open the bathroom door, ready to tell Dean he’s right, I’m not there yet, but yet doesn’t mean never.

He’s sitting on the edge of the bed watching me with a schoolboy look to him. As though, I’m the principal and he’s been sent to the office.

“I shouldn’t—”

“No. Don’t say anything,” I say, stepping into the opening of his legs.

His hands run up and down my thighs, sneaking under the back tail of his button-down.

“Let’s just let this play out, okay? I know it’s hard, but date me all over again,” I say. I place one leg on either side of his waist and straddle him with my hands around his neck. “I’m not saying no.”

His lips touch my collarbone, his hands growing more firm on my ass.

“Deal.” His tongue slides up my neck. “To think it was only weeks ago you said I’d never lay a hand on your body again.” A light chuckle comes out of him.

“Watch it, Bennett.” I do nothing to refute him. He’s not lying. I move my head down and he doesn’t miss a beat, smashing his lips to mine.

My mind says I’m playing with fire, but my body overrules it. I always liked the danger that came with Dean Bennett.

Chapter Twenty-One

The following Saturday, I’m watching a little girl dancing to some YouTube-gone-viral movie in my living room.

“You must be thirsty, Jade.” I put the root beer on the table.

She falls into my couch, catching her breath. “Thanks, Aunt Chelsea,” she sips it.

My heart warms at her use of the word aunt, because I’m not. But I look at it as a term of endearment.

“That’s an interesting dance.” I look at the kid on the television swinging her hips and her arms. I don’t really understand it, but whatever.

“It took me a long time to figure out. My friend Henry still can’t get his hips right.” Jade sits on the edge of