Since You've Been Gone (Welcome to Paradise) (18 page)
Read Since You've Been Gone (Welcome to Paradise) Online
Authors: Elle Kennedy
He grinned. “Maybe because you never stop talking.”
“I’m not talking now,” she pointed out.
“Which leads me to believe there is something very wrong, ergo my willingness to listen.” He dipped another chip and offered it to her.
She shook her head. Her stomach was queasy and trembling, and though she and Seb always shared a plate of chips after seeing a movie together, she suspected fried food would do no good whatsoever. “I’m full.”
“Full of shit, maybe. C’mon, Lucy-Loo. Out with it. What’s bothering you? You fidgeted the whole way through the movie and haven’t been able to hold a simple conversation since it ended.” He gestured to the people sitting around them, enjoying a meal or a drink in the trendy little café in Newtown. “Everyone else here is chatting away. The only one not talking is you.”
“Okay, so you talk to me. Tell me how your hot date went the other night.”
The strange look was back on his face. “I spent the last five minutes telling you about it.”
She stared at him, dismayed. “You did?”
Seb nodded. “I did.”
Lucy gave him an apologetic look, staring into his eyes, willing him to forgive her.
Seb said something, but Lucy missed it, mostly because staring into his blue eyes dazzled her senses and once again took her breath away. A feverish flush seeped into her skin, heating her flesh. Just like that, Lucy was lost in a haze of desire, lost in the realization that her body was responding to Seb’s proximity. Being this close to him made her heart pound and her pussy clench. She wanted him fiercely. In a way she’d never desired another man. In a way she’d never desired a friend. In a way she had no place desiring a friend.
She had to say something, had to tell him how she felt. She couldn’t exist like this anymore, couldn’t go on living this way with him. Forever friends, nothing more.
“Lucy!” His sharp exclamation snapped her back to attention.
“I love you, Seb.” It was out before she had a chance to think twice.
“I love you too, babe, but if you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’m taking you to the closest medical center to have you checked out.”
“No, I mean
I love you
. Like, really, love you.”
He grinned his beautiful grin. “So you tell me every time you get trashed on red wine. You love me and you think I’m the bestest friend in the whole widest world.” He tapped her half-empty wineglass. “Although you surprise me tonight. You haven’t even had one glass. Usually you have to have three or four before you start getting this sentimental.”
She bit her lower lip, sucking it into her mouth before releasing it. “I’m not drunk.”
His grin told her how much he believed her.
“I’m not,” she said again. “Truth is, I’m stone-cold sober. And the reason I haven’t been concentrating is because I’ve been trying to figure out a way to tell you how I feel.”
Seb’s smile began to fade, and his blue eyes widened as he stared at her.
“It’s changed, Seb. Everything’s changed. I’ve changed. My feelings for you have changed.” She took a deep, fortifying breath and the words tumbled out. “Y-you’re not just my friend anymore. You’re…more. I dunno what happened. And I dunno how I never felt this way before, but I…I…” She pressed her hand to her chest. “I have all these feelings for you, just sitting here, pressing on my heart, and I can’t ignore them. Can’t pretend they’re not there or they’re not real.”
Sebastian’s jaw dropped open.
Now that the words had started, she couldn’t hold them back. Didn’t want to. This was Seb she spoke to, and she could tell him anything. Had always been able to, and now was no different—even though everything was different.
“I dream about you at night. And at work, when I’m not sleeping. Dirty dreams. Filthy, really. Dreams a girl shouldn’t dream about her friend, but there you have it. And when I see you, I wish, just wish, the dreams were real. I wish you’d kiss me the way you do in my imagination. Wish you’d tear my clothes off and do filthy things to me. I wish,
wish
that you felt for me what I feel for you, and we weren’t sitting here at this very moment, drinking red wine and Earl Grey tea.”
Lucy paused to draw breath, her heart beating frantically, her cheeks burning.
Seb just gaped at her.
“I lay in the bath earlier, thinking about you. Fantasizing about you. I touched myself, wishing it was your hand. Couldn’t stop touching, until…until…” Lucy closed her eyes, mortified that she was voicing all of this, yet unable to stop. After months of keeping it to herself, the confession felt liberating. “I came thinking about you. And it wasn’t the first time. But the thing is, I don’t want to just fantasize anymore. Don’t want to just dream about you. I don’t just want to be your friend. Can’t be your friend, ’cause what I feel for you goes way beyond friendship. I’m like, wildly, crazily in love with you.”
“Lucy…” Seb’s voice sounded hoarse, scratchy. He looked dazed. “Geez, I don’t know what to say.” He drew a shaky hand over his shaved head.
Her breath caught in her diaphragm and she hiccupped. “Say you feel the same way. Or at the very least, tell me there’s a chance you could feel this way.”
“I love you too. You know I do.” Again he drew his hand over his head. “You’re my gal, my friend, my mate. ’Course I love you. Just…”
Lucy’s heart stopped beating. Or maybe her lungs stopped working. She couldn’t tell. “Just…?”
His blue gaze held hers. “Just…not like that.”
Since You’ve Been Gone
Elle Kennedy
What happens on the road can follow you all the way home.
Welcome to Paradise, Book 4
Austin Bishop is going home to face some difficult truths, but that doesn’t mean he can’t take the long way home. So rather than hop on a plane, he accepts a photography assignment that requires a cross-country drive.
The road can be a lonely place, though, and when he spots a cute redhead leaning against a broken-down car, he stops to offer the stranded damsel a ride.
Mari Smith has lost her job and her apartment, she’s moving back in with her parents, and now it looks like she’s without a car, too. When a sexy, dark-haired stranger stops to help, she’s utterly grateful. And utterly tempted to explore their sizzling chemistry.
The fresh-faced Mari is so sweet, so smoking hot, so easy to be with, Austin finds himself spilling a shocking secret he’s been holding onto for the past year. But passion doesn’t fix everything. And Austin realizes he has some personal demons to vanquish before he and Mari can hope for a chance at forever.
Warning: This book features a hero who knows exactly what he wants between the sheets and a redhead who isn’t scared to give it to him!
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This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
11821 Mason Montgomery Road Suite 4B
Cincinnati OH 45249
Since You’ve Been Gone
Copyright © 2013 by Elle Kennedy
ISBN: 978-1-61921-475-0
Edited by Jennifer Miller
Cover by Kendra Egert
All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
First
Samhain Publishing, Ltd.
electronic publication: October 2013
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