It was a problem.
Last night, we’d not only crossed the line of friendship, but he’d crossed the line into my heart—the one place I was certain, the one place I swore, was safe from him.
Returning inside, I checked the mirror once more, approving of the long, light blue dress I’d chosen for tonight. Sleeveless with a turtleneck and open back, it was both concealing and revealing.
Kind of like what this night with Sam was going to bring.
Grabbing my things, I headed to the door, my deep breaths already concealing my unease.
“What the—” I gasped, smacking a hand to my chest, when I opened the door and Sam stood on the other side. “You scared the—”
“Peyote out of you?” One corner of his lips turned up in a heart-stopping smile.
It was always heart stopping, but now, seeing those lips that had completely devoured me last night, brought a whole new rush of emotions through me that a human body wasn’t built to withstand.
“Not funny,” I grumbled, grateful that our first words after the passion of last night were in jest.
No matter what I worried about with Sam, he somehow always managed to make me feel comfortable. Even when I loved him in secret. Even when I hated him for hurting me. And even now, when we’d stepped into a world that had only ever been a dream.
“Thought I’d swing by and give you a ride,” he murmured.
I planted a hand on my waist. “Where’s Mee-Maw? If she abandoned me for Nico, I’m going to—”
Sam chuckled, drawing my attention to the rumble of his muscled chest as it pulled on the fabric of his shirt. From there, it was an easy slide down to the waist of his pants and the memory of what I’d felt there—what I’d almost felt there.
“She’s stuck at work.”
My gaze snapped back up, heat flooding my cheeks when I realized I’d been caught staring at his junk.
“Oh.” I gulped. “Well, I guess I can forgive her.”
Biting my lip, I stepped into the hall, my pulse picking up when Sam didn’t move completely back, making the space between our bodies shrink.
“Actually, she’s not quite stuck,” he admitted once I locked the door. “I might’ve asked if I could drive you.” He paused. “So we could talk.”
Talk.
It was like an unidentified object dropped between us, and I couldn’t be sure if it was a present or a bomb.
I could only nod, trying to organize all the thoughts I’d collected throughout the day from the scramble they’d just been thrown into.
I’d been prepared for him earlier. For him to show up in my room first thing in the morning. And then, I’d prepared myself to see him at the exhibit. To wade through the evening until we were alone again.
I wasn’t prepared for right now.
Silence built as we descended the stairs to the building exit, and it stayed constant as I climbed in the passenger side of the truck and buckled in when Sam started the engine.
“I don’t regret last night.”
My stomach bottomed out, and my head whipped to stare at him.
He hadn’t pulled out of the lot. He hadn’t even taken the truck out of park. Determination crackled in his gaze, and I could tell by the steady weight of his tone, this was the only thing that mattered.
I licked my lips, my mouth feeling drier than the Arizona desert when I replied, “I don’t regret it either…” And before I could stop and think, added, “Except the end when you left.”
The words were out before I could filter them. Before I could choose a different variation of explanation.
His chin dipped and, catching sight of the time on the dash, he put the truck in reverse, needing to continue the conversation but not wanting to make me late.
“I don’t regret it, but I won’t—I can’t go on without telling you the truth, Tally,” he said in a low, strained voice. “I need you to know. I need your forgiveness.”
My breath cemented to the inside of my lungs, hard and inextricable. My forgiveness.
I glanced at him, seeing it written plain as day on his face that whatever had happened was nothing like what I thought. Before it had been anger and stubbornness that kept me defiant, now, I didn’t know if my heart could handle knowing there was a reason—a good reason—for why it had been broken.
“But first, I have to know…” He let out a low groan, clearing his throat and then demanding, “What did you mean last night when you said you never stopped wanting me, and I never started?”
I jerked against the seat in surprise. “What?” I exhaled, reliving the embarrassment in order to understand why he was confused. “I never stopped wanting you, Sam. From when I wrote that note… well, before then… until now.”
He remained silent for long, torturous seconds. “What note?”
My head turned with the kind of languor you saw in horror movies right before a character was about to realize their imminent demise.
“The note I sent you with your birthday present that last year,” I spoke with measured tenor. “The note where I told you I was in love with you.”
Once again, I didn’t realize a dangerous L-word had snuck past my lips until it was too late. I should’ve known by now that my defenses were no match against Sam Deschenes.
We were already approaching a stop sign, but the tires screeched when the truck came to a halt. His grip tightened on the steering wheel, frustration darkening his features and whitening his knuckles. Sam didn’t look at me though. He stared ahead, his eyes seeing something—someone else. Someone who was deserving of rage.
“That bastard,” he bit out.
“What?” I turned in the seat. “What are you talking about?”
Looking partially away from me and partially at the road ahead, Sam confessed harshly, “I never got your gift that year, Tally.”
I blinked. Disbelief. Shock. Confusion. I couldn’t tell which emotion had me in knots or if it was all three. “W-What?”
His lips tightened into a thin line. “My dad wasn’t… doing well. Hadn’t been for a few years. But that year it was immeasurably worse—irrecoverably worse.”
“Sam…”
“When your gift came, he got so angry. He’d been drinking. Work was bad. Other things were bad.” Sam paused, taking a strained inhale. “He’d started to hate the summers I spent here, off the reservation. Thought I was losing my connection to the Navajo… to him. And your gift… it just came at the wrong time, and he chucked it into the fire.”
My head swayed, partially shaking, partially unsteady with the realizations that tumbled like dominos in my brain.
He’d never gotten my note.
He never knew how I felt.
I gasped for air.
And he’d still left me.
I rubbed a hand on my forehead, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “You never got it,” I repeated dumbly. “But I messaged you…”
When I looked to him again, I realized we were parked a few feet away from the gallery. I didn’t know how long we’d been there, but there wasn’t much time before obligations meant I had to get out of the truck.
“I know.” His jaw vibrated. “I didn’t know what it said.” Slowly, he met my gaze. “I thought it was just a birthday note with the gift, and I didn’t want to worry you. I didn’t want you to worry about my dad.”
My heart slammed against my ribs when he cupped my cheek, his thumb rubbing over my blush like he could soothe the heat from my skin.
“All this time, Tally?” he choked out. “You wanted me all this time…”
“Sam…”
“And you”—his hand slid around my neck, pulling my lips toward his—“I wasn’t lying when I said I wanted you before I even knew what that meant. I wanted you then. I wanted you when you were too young to want me back. And I wanted you when you weren’t too young, but I didn’t know how to tell you.”
Air stumbled down into my lungs.
I was going to be late for the exhibit, b
ut I didn’t care. I wouldn’t end this moment for anything—the moment when I realized I hadn’t been the fool. I hadn’t misread the signs.
My best friend had wanted me all this time.
His lips touched mine, tender and sweet. His tongue slipping into my mouth with aching determination to make right everything that had gone wrong. I sighed into the kiss, letting myself sink closer to him, ignoring the way the shifter dug into my leg.
“Sam.” I drew back, breathing shallowly. “If you didn’t get my note, then why did you leave?”
Whatever he was about to say was cut off by the demanding rap on my window. Jumping, I caught Sam’s muttered curse as I turned. He’d seen who was demanding my attention before I did.
Carlos.
I stared at both the face on the other side of the door and my face reflecting in the window, recognizing neither the man I’d been attracted to nor any remains of the woman who’d been attracted to him.
My exhale rumbled coarsely from my chest with frustration. My and Sam’s conversation would have to wait. Again. There was no way Carlos was going to leave me alone now, not to mention, the exhibit was mere minutes from starting.
“What, Carlos?” I huffed, opening the door and sliding out of my seat, attempting to stay as close as possible to the vehicle since Carlos refused to give me much room to maneuver. “I said you could put the additional piece wherever you want.”
“Tally, we need to talk.”
Great. Two men who needed to talk to me, but the one I wanted to hear wasn’t the one speaking.
“Carlos—” I was cut off by Sam’s low growl, his large form appearing possessively by my side.
He reached out, his fingers finding their home at the small of my back and his touch, while hotter, burned with the same intensity it had every other time he’d touched me, and that was when his honesty really hit me; he’d felt this the entire time.
And he’d held back because of me.
“Unless you’re going to apologize to her, I think you’ve done enough,” Sam warned, his body as tense as a statue, his threshold for physical force much lower than it had been the previous night.
Many of the walls between us were gone. He wouldn’t hesitate to level Carlos to the ground now.
“And I think I’d like to speak to Tally alone, please,” the other man insisted, folding his arms and holding his ground.
“And you decided to ask this time? Or do the drugs come after?”
“Sam.” I turned and planted a hand on his chest, feeling the rapid vibration angrily humming underneath my palm.
His attention snapped to me, his distrust and disapproval of the other man blowing off his body like steam. I understood. I agreed.
With a loud sigh and an exhibit about to open, I ended the pissing contest with a soft plea, “I’ll be fine. You go ahead inside. Let me just talk to him and be done with it.”
The muscle in his jaw clenched in tempo with the thump against my hand.
“Not going inside,” he informed me, but before I could argue, he conceded, “I’ll wait by the door.”
He gave Carlos another leveling stare, one that made the smaller man flinch as he walked by.
“What is it, Carlos?” My voice was beleaguered, and I folded my arms across my chest.
“I did… want to apologize for last night,” he started, and I was surprised by the sincerity. “But you know I didn’t make you eat one of those brownies.”
“I know. It’s fine. I didn’t realize what was in them… or what it would do. I’m sorry for throwing up on you.” If he was apologizing, the least I could do was the same for dousing him in vomit. “Is that it?” I asked when he didn’t immediately reply. “We should probably head inside.”
My small step in the direction of the gallery was halted, my path blocked when Carlos moved in front of me, reaching out and gently staying me with a hand on my arm.
“Carlos…”
His gaze darkening with a storm I didn’t want to get drenched in. “That’s not what I wanted to talk to you about, Tally,” he said, his voice quieter now, and I was hit with the memories of when we first started dating—the tone of his voice, the steady sway of his body closer to mine, the intimate tuck of his head.
My back snapped straight. “What then?”
“I want you back, Tally,” he confessed with a whiny groan. “Kendall was a mistake. It was a mistake to let you go. I was carried away in New York, searching for a new kind of inspiration.”
My mouth gaped wide. For a beat, I wondered if there was a previously unabsorbed morsel of peyote that had just made its way into my bloodstream and I was hallucinating this.
“Carlos…”
“Just listen to me.” Now, he held both my arms, not forcefully, but like a beggar. “I was wrong. Completely wrong. And I want you back—need you back, Tally. These last few weeks have made me see that. I want you—”
“Because now you can’t have me?” I interjected, gently wrenching myself from his grip and stepping back.
“No!” he insisted. “I want you because we were right for each other, and when we go back to New York, I want it to be with you.”
Back to New York.
Oh, God.
I’d barely gotten over one man confessing to wanting me for decades. Now, my ex was laying himself at my feet, pleading for reconciliation. I knew which one I wanted—which one I belonged to. But now, I was just realizing it wasn’t the one I’d be going back to New York with.
“Tally—”
“Carlos, stop!” I extended my palm flat against his chest, forcing him to stay at arm’s length.
I’d have to think about New York—and any future with Sam later. I could only deal with one pitfall in the present—one shock to my system at a time.
“No, Tally. We belong together.” He wouldn’t give up. “I don’t know what it is, but there’s something off about you and Sam. He’s just the rebound because of what happened between us, Tally, and I understand; I deserved it. But you two obviously aren’t meant to be.”
“Rebound?” I half choked out.
“Of course. I know seeing me with Kendall was a shock and clearly drove you to jump into some kind of relationship with Sam just to prove you weren’t hurt,” he rambled on. “I know I hurt you, Tally. I know you’re still struggling to get over that hurt and get over me, and that’s why I had to talk to you.”
My body shook like I’d been struck, and I glared at him.
Whatever feelings I’d had for Carlos had died a very messy death that afternoon back in Brooklyn, but if there was any ember of our relationship remaining, it was destroyed by his complete inability to not be a self-centered prick.
I was on the edge of letting him know that he’d been the rebound—the first man I’d considered dating because he was the exact opposite of Sam—but I held back, not for his sake, but for mine. My complete indifference to Carlos hit me like a bucket of ice water. I didn’t care what he thought anymore, I didn’t care to think about him, and as soon as this exhibit was over, he wouldn’t be a part of my life moving forward.
“Carlos.” I stepped back again, keeping my hand raised in separation. “You are crazy, and we are done.”
“What—Tally—”
“No.” I shook my head frantically. “I have zero feelings for you anymore. I honestly don’t even know what I was thinking when we dated before. You are… you. And that is someone I’m not interested in.”
He recoiled, the pleading persona washing off his face. “Are you joking?” He looked around. “Is this some sort of sick joke? To really make me beg? I already apologized, Tally. I know you were just trying to make me jealous. It’s time to let it go.”
My nostrils flared with searing anger. “No, this isn’t a joke,” I bit out. “What Sam and I are is none of your business, and what I am is most definitely not yours.”
His expression twisted—deformed. Like an abstract painting, it went from anatomical shapes that were recognizable
into an angry mélange of emotions.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen when this exhibit is over, but I know it won’t include you.” I notched my chin up, daring him to say one more word about how I really wanted him. “Now, I’m going inside, and we are going to finish this work engagement, and after that our role in each other’s lives will be done.”
Carlos fumed—his anger to the point where I took a few steps back before sidestepping around him, afraid I’d get caught in the blast when he blew. This was the side of him I’d never liked—the one that came out when he didn’t get exactly whatever his whims were. Before, it had been a rare circumstance, but it had never involved me.
He might have the ever-flowing creative well of a child, but he was also petulant like one and spiteful. He wanted what he wanted when he wanted it. And I’d just given his egotistical ass a verbal slap in the face.
I shivered, afraid of what the repercussions might be, and beelined straight for Sam who’d know something wasn’t right. But with one look, he understood we’d have to talk about it later once the exhibit was over; I wouldn’t let Carlos ruin this for me too.
“I know how to bury a man,” Sam whispered in my ear as we walked inside.
Instantly the tension riding up my shoulders and making my back ache partially evaporated with a laugh. I glanced over my shoulder at him, grateful. And wanting.
“Don’t worry,” I replied with a smirk. “So do I.”
She stood tall for most of the evening, carrying herself with steady and measured steps. Everyone else saw the composed curator; I saw a woman walking on eggshells.
I didn’t have any details of what Carlos wanted to talk to her about, but judging from the body language during their conversation—and the numerous times I’d had to force myself not to intrude when he touched her—it wasn’t a good talk. And now, she was worried what repercussions would come from it.
Every conversation, every loop we took through the room, they were all dotted with distraction—her focus flicking to Carlos like he was about to ruin the entire exhibit.
Remember Arizona: A Second Chance Romance (Country Love Collection) Page 14
