Shameless - Sybil Bartel Page 0,83
hand fisted in my hair in a show of pure dominance. “I don’t want that kind of bullshit between us. Don’t ever apologize to me. Just give me honesty.”
“Okay.” I could do that. I would love to do that. More than he could possibly know. My whole life had been bullshit. “Simple, honest, straightforward.” That was exactly what I wanted.
He lifted his chin. “Good. And I’ll do the same.”
“Okay.” The corners of my lips curved up and suddenly I felt shy.
It was one thing to be in his arms in a darkened cabin during a blizzard without another soul around. It made the idea of us so much more tangible. But standing in his arms in a modern high-rise apartment in South Beach with each of us dressed for a black-tie affair somehow felt more real, but less concrete. Like at any moment this life, my life here in Miami, it could decimate us.
He frowned. “I missed your birthday.”
“You said you didn’t care.” I reminded him. “Do you like Miami?”
The lines between his eyes deepened. “I don’t give a fuck how old you are.”
“You did.”
The frown disappeared and tension eased out of his expression. “Now I don’t. What’s wrong with Miami?”
“I’m not sure.” Something didn’t feel right. “What changed for you?”
His eyes searched my face, then he brushed my hair behind my ear. “I like you as a brunette.”
I smiled. “I like you period, but that doesn’t answer my question.”
He smiled back, but it didn’t touch his eyes. “That, right there, is what changed.”
I didn’t understand, but for once, I didn’t push. I waited.
His gaze dropped to his hand as he traced my collarbone with a rough finger and left a wake of gooseflesh in his path. Exhaling, the smokiness of the whiskey he’d drunk drifted over me. “You want the absolute truth?”
“There’re shades of truth?” He’d said he wanted honesty. There wasn’t room for nuance in that as far as I was concerned.
He smirked like I was missing a private joke. “How old are you?”
“Twenty.” Almost. In a few hours.
“It doesn’t matter how many years you have under you.” He held me in his intense gaze for a breathless moment. “You’re the only woman who’s ever made me pause.”
Hope swirled low in my belly, but I had to ask. “I don’t know what that means.” Except I knew it was significant.
“It means we’re doing this,” he clarified.
A full body shiver spread from my head to my toes, and my smile stretched wide. “You’re gonna be my man?”
He snorted. “You see another Marine standing here?”
I grinned. “Nope. Just a surly bodyguard.”
“You’re fucking trouble, you know that?”
“Yep.” And for some reason, the fact he thought that about me made my pride swell.
He shook his head. “Wipe that grin off your face, woman.”
“Why? Afraid I’ll hysterical-laugh all over you again?”
His expression sobered. “You good?”
Insecurity crept in. “Me?”
“Yeah.”
“I thought we were talking about us,” I admitted.
Cupping my face, he swept his thumb across my bottom lip. And then he did what I was beginning to realize only an impossibly alpha Marine turned bodyguard could do. He both crushed me and impressed me with his insight and honesty.
“I’m not getting down on one knee and begging for bullshit words of forever, princess. I’m telling you I’m here. I’m saying I want this. I showed for you tonight, and I’m promising to be straight with you. I’m also expecting the same.” He held me in his captivating gaze. “This isn’t the destination, woman. This is the beginning.”
Because every little girl is poisoned with fairytales of Prince Charming and perfection that never exists, but sounds perfect nonetheless, a part of me was crushed. A part of me wanted the forever right now. I wanted a proclamation, and the accompanying security of that declaration. I wanted the promise of a ring that would tie him to me and me to him.
But the bigger part, the rational me, the woman that emerged from a shitty sixty day stint of navel-gazing rehab where I was forced to look at my own damn life—that part of me knew I couldn’t have asked for a more prefect beginning.
So I gave him the truth.
“I’m kinda partial to new beginnings now.” Then I did what I did on the side of that highway that felt like a lifetime ago.
I kissed him.
SHE FUCKING KISSED ME.
Same as the first time, she threw herself at me and locked lips. I got off on it, but I didn’t let her take the lead.
Threading my hand through her