Jake walks me to my door. I lean against it completely exhausted from tonight's events. His one hand is braced on the door next to my head while the other slowly drags across my jawline.
“You are so damn beautiful.”
He leans in kissing me and I wrap my arms around his neck. We are making out like two horny teenagers and my inner slut wants me to ask him to come inside. I don’t though. I can’t. I break our kiss knowing I don’t have much self-control left.
“Goodnight, Sparky,” he says with one last kiss.
I open the door before turning back toward him. “Goodnight, Flash.” He gives me one last smile as I head inside.
I lean against the closed door enjoying the high I get from being with him and kissing him.
“Holy shit, I never thought I’d see the day.” I look over and Tina is on the couch looking at me.
“See what day?” I pretend like there is nothing happening and that I don’t feel myself getting closer to him.
“The day that Nina Mitchell was falling for a guy.”
“Shut up, T. I am not falling for him.” I walk past her and toward the bathroom for a much needed shower.
“Tell that to the dreamy ass look on your face!” I shut the bathroom door.
I’m so screwed.
Chapter Fourteen
Jake
Thinking about Nina last night, I can’t stop laughing. She looks so cute when she is scared out of her mind, as weird as that is to say. It didn’t go unnoticed how she didn’t tell me anything about her family. I know that I’m still trying to earn her trust, and that it won’t be easy. We will be laughing and having fun one minute and then I see this wall go up.
Today I promised Grace I would take her to the pumpkin patch. Everyone else decided it sounded fun and now it’s become a big group thing.
Me: Going to the Johnson’s Orchard to pick pumpkins and take a hayride. What do you say?
Nina: I say, screw you and your hayride.
Me: Yes and no in that order…
Nina: Watch it.
Me: Grace is coming so there won’t be any murderous zombies. Let me make up for last night…Please?
Nina: Fine, but you’re getting me some apple pie.
Me: Deal.
I smile knowing that I will get to see her again. When Lacey talked to me before she passed away about finding someone, she made it seem like it was this amazing thing. I had tried to find it with numerous girls and none of them ever made me feel anything. Even with as embarrassed as I was the first day I met Nina, I knew something felt different.
She was different. She was sexy, but didn’t know it. She was closed off, but amazing in the quick glimpses of the real her I saw. She was shy, but would also give my shit back to me. I’ve seen three of my friends fall head over heels for girls in a much shorter time span than I ever thought possible. I swore I wouldn’t be one of those guys. I would never chase after a girl and make myself look like an idiot. Now I am one of those guys and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I’m not anywhere closer to being in love with her, but I definitely have feelings for her.
I text everyone to let them know Sam is coming and we all figure out the driving situation. Hunter and Sam are taking their own car today in case she gets spotted and they need to make a quick exit. I don’t know how they deal with having to hide constantly, now that Nina has given me a chance it's like I want everyone to know I’m with her.
I get dressed and the head over to her apartment to pick her up. When she opens the door she is wearing jeans that hug every inch of her. The pink shirt she has on looks great against her tan skin, and her long blonde hair is down, framing her face. I pull her to me, needing to touch her. I was determined to have her but with as much as she fought me I didn’t know if it would actually happen. “You look beautiful,” I whisper in her ear, loving the way she trembles beneath me.
“Thanks,” she says as she pulls away and starts to walk to my car. This is what she does. She lets herself be vulnerable for just minute then catches on and tries to distance herself. I know that kind of behavior is a defense mechanism. She’s trying to keep me at arms length, thinking that she can remain detached and then not risk getting hurt. I wish I could tell her I heard what she said at the cemetery but I know it would freak her out. She would run.
I follow her to the car, get in and pull out of the lot. “So last night you got to grill me for information but you never gave up any of your own.”
I look over at her and smile. “There isn’t too much to tell. My mom and dad are still living in the same house I grew up in, I don’t have any siblings. I joined the Army and that’s where I met Mason, Brian, Hunter, and our friend, Ryan. I don’t think you’ve met Ryan yet, he’s a cop so he doesn’t have as much free time to hang out with us. We all realized that we lived within a half hour of each other. When we got out of the service, we all went our different paths but stayed local. They are like the brothers I never had.”
She nods. “Friends can definitely become a part of your family. That’s how I feel about Sam in a way. We got close the first year when I worked with her. Then when she decided to move and asked me to come with her, I guess I said yes because she was the closest thing I felt I had to family. When she told me where she was moving, I couldn’t believe the coincidence. I grew up about forty-five minutes from here.”
I wait to see if she will tell me more, about her family or her sister. When she doesn’t I just grab her hand, letting her know that it’s okay to talk about it. I meant what I told her that day in her room. I will protect her, I’ll be whatever she needs me to be. I don’t want to push her too far but I dare to ask another question. “What about your parents?”
She’s quiet for a minute before she shifts uncomfortably in her seat. “My mom and dad split up when I was seven. My dad moved across the country for work and I haven’t seen him since. He used call every once in a while but after a few years the calls just stopped. My mom remarried and I gained a stepbrother. He was okay, he always seemed a little weird but I think it’s because we were all teenagers and none of us could ever agree on anything.”
“Since I was an only child I had always wanted siblings. I used to tell my dad if he and my mom had more kids I could be fighting with my siblings instead of them.” I laugh remembering the look he used to give me.
We pull up to the orchard, and I park the car. As we walk toward our group, I grasp Nina’s hand. I want her to feel more at ease with me. Let her know that she can relax, that it’s okay to let her guard down. When we reach the group, we say our hellos to everyone and Grace attaches herself to me immediately.
When her mom was dying, I promised her that I would help Mason. That I would be there for Grace whenever she needed me. Mason doesn’t have family, so we are her family. “Unkey Jake, I want a reallllllly big punkin!” She forms her arms into the largest circle she can manage. I laugh and promise her that we will get the biggest one we can carry, which I might end up regretting later.
“Everyone ready for the hayride?” Jules asks, her son Christian holding her hands and bouncing on his heels from excitement. He is about a year younger than Grace, and another integral part of our group. The kids run toward the hayride and Brian speeds up to keep up with them. I wrap my hand around Nina’s waist as we walk with everyone.
“You’re really good with her.” She looks over at me.
“Grace? It’s not as hard as I thought it might be when everything happened. She’s a great kid.” Nina leans in and kisses me on the cheek. When we reach the hayride, I climb on first then offer her my hand, but she hesitates. “You okay?”