want to talk about it?”
It was on the tip of my tongue to tell him no, I didn’t. That I preferred to handle this as I did most everything else—by keeping it bottled up inside and left alone to wallow in my misery in my own personal, private way. But that would be a lie.
So, instead, over takeout and tea and candlelight and wine, the words began to spill out, and once I started, I couldn’t seem to stop.
Jace listened. He let me go on and on, and then he continued to listen as we wrapped up the leftovers together and put them away. We carried the candles into the living room where he convinced me to sit between his legs while he used those incredibly skilled fingers across my shoulders and neck until my words became sluggish and my eyes started to close.
~ * ~
I didn’t open my eyes at first. It was one of those rare, intensely blissful moments when nothing hurt or ached. I feared that if I moved, the moment would be lost.
I lay there like that for a while, my thirty-something body appreciating each detail of the reprieve in a way my younger self never could have. The warmth and coziness of my bed conforming perfectly to my body. The high snuggle factor of my blanket cocooned around me. The soothing, steady background rhythm in my ear along with that delicious, masculine scent.
Wait. What?
My eyes popped open, my lethargic brain scrambling to catch up. That soothing background pulse wasn’t my heartbeat, but his. The incredible warmth and coziness came not from a blanket, but from being held snugly against a hard male body. I wasn’t in my bed, but fully clothed on the couch in my living room.
With Jace Logan.
My client.
Also, the man who had come to my house because he was concerned about me. The one who’d insisted I take a relaxing bath while he made me tea and ordered an insane variety of food because he didn’t know what I liked. Who’d listened to me drone on for hours and then held me through the night, keeping the nightmares and loneliness at bay, giving me the best sleep I’d had in years.
Ever so carefully, I turned in his arms to face him. He growled softly in his sleep, adjusting his hold and trapping my legs with one of his own, like I was some kind of life-sized teddy bear.
That made me smile.
As he sighed and settled back down, I took the opportunity to study him. He really was a handsome man, his masculine features roguishly boyish in slumber. Locks of tussled dark-brown silk tumbled over his forehead. Sinfully long lashes made angelic crescents along either side of his straight nose. A strong but not overly prominent jawline was dusted with a scruff of dark growth, which made me want to rub my face against it, curious to discover if it was scratchy or soft.
Also, I wanted to kiss him again. Badly.
Giving in to the temptation, I pressed my lips to his. He growled again, a soft, low sound that came from the back of his throat and resonated through my body. He shifted, pulling me into his hardness, one part conspicuously more so than others.
“Do that again,” he whispered.
My rational, logical self tossed up plenty of reasons why I shouldn’t. It was wrong. He was my client. I was vulnerable. That initial physical attraction I’d felt was already blossoming into something more, and I needed to apply the brakes before things went too far.
I ignored all that, and instead, I gave myself over to what I wanted, what I needed, in that moment. I’d deal with everything else later.
I brushed my lips over his, relishing the moment. He groaned, making me chuckle.
“That bad, huh?”
He opened one eye and peered at me. “That good. Which means I’ve either died in my sleep and gone to heaven or I’m having one of the best dreams of my life, neither of which pleases me as much as the possibility that this might actually be happening.”
I grinned at his goofiness and shook my head. “You are a strange man, Jace Logan.”
“An incredibly lucky man,” he corrected. “I’m waking up with an angel in my arms.”
I felt the heat rise in my face, conscious of the hard length pressed against my hip. Technically, we had slept together, but we hadn’t slept together.
“Most guys would say, you definitely didn’t get lucky.”
“They’d be wrong,” he countered, his voice deliciously deep