Knight in Blue Jeans (18 page)

To her surprise, he drew her face back to him and kissed her. Deeply. She fell into it, into him, lips to lips, soul to soul. Yes…

Only when they stopped, just to catch their breath, did she blink at him in sleepy surprise.

“I love you messy,” he explained, punctuating his words by kissing up her jaw. “I love it when you let down your prize-winning comportment and I get to see the real you.”

“The comportment is the real me.” But she couldn’t make a terribly convincing argument, lifting her chin to grant him delicious access to her neck—and sniffing back more tears.

“I love her, too. But the messy Arden is the you under even that. The one not everyone gets to see.”

She arched into his lovemaking, which reminded her of other things only he got to see. And how much she’d loved having him back in her life.

And how much it would hurt to lose him again. But she had to.

It was the one thing she had to do for him. The one sacrifice that was truly hers to make.

If she let this—oh, yes, especially that bit with his tongue—go on much longer, she would lose her nerve. So she wove her fingers into his hair and somehow, instead of drawing him to her, managed to push him away. “You need to go.”

He blinked sleepily at her. “What?”

“Please.”

“For how long?”

She’d expected him to behave like a gentleman and simply accept her decision…but this was Smith. “Long enough. I don’t know. Forever, if that’s what it takes to keep you out of the way of the Comitatus.”

Slowly, Smith’s agonized expression relaxed. He seemed to sag in relief—relief!—until his drooping head came to rest on her shoulder.

“Please, Smith. If we wait much longer, I won’t be able to say goodbye.”

“Darn,” he said, and kissed her cheek.

Arden felt herself stiffen. Darn? Here she was, trying to do the honorable thing, and he said
darn?

She tried to push him back from her, palms on his hard shoulders. “I asked you to leave, Mr. Donnell.” But she couldn’t manage quite the arch tone she normally did. Maybe because of the congestion.

“Now it’s Mr. Donnell?” He was laughing at her! Well, his eyes were laughing. His mouth seemed to fight a losing battle against a grin. “No.”

“No?”

“I’m not leaving you.” Apparently he did a mental double check at that, because he quickly added, “Not unless you’ve got a much better reason than protecting me.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re excu—Oof!” Arden herself wasn’t sure if she’d
hit him on purpose or by accident as she stood from his lap. Well, he’d said he liked seeing her without her social niceties.

So she said, “If I remember correctly, you left
me
for
my
protection, you ass!” This time, she managed exactly the right note of disdain.

“Well, I was wrong.”

She stared at him. “Say that again.”

He tipped his head back, his brown eyes more honest than she’d ever seen—except maybe when they’d shared a bed. “I was wrong, Arden. I was stupid, and proud and chauvinistic. I shouldn’t have been such a coward as to break up with you over the phone.”

She swallowed, hard. “Drunk,” she reminded him. But the outrage was gone, leaving only worry. Only…hope.

“Drunk. No matter what I maybe couldn’t tell you, I should have tried harder to tell you
something.
” Now he stood, and stepped close, almost against her. Brave man. Her foolishly brave Smith. “I should have told you how incredible you are. I should have told you that any man would be downright blessed to have you. I should have told you that I would be miserable every damned day without you.”

She would be miserable every day without him, too. “Well…then I would have wanted to know why you were leaving me, if I were so special.”

“And I would’ve said, ‘Just one of those things.’”

She rolled her eyes, ladylike or not. “And I would probably have hit you.”

“And I would have enjoyed it, because I love it when you’re not being a lady.” He put a hand on each of her shoulders, held her safe. “Dad gave Greta’s house safe status, Ard. Mitch and I are going to stay here, make Dallas a kind of base, see if we convince more secret-society members to see the error of their ways. Maybe we can help turn them honorable again. Now, if you honestly don’t want to be with me, I’ll understand. I might whine and complain and stalk you a little, maybe, but I’ll un
derstand. We’ll all be taking some risk, standing up to the society elders. You’ve already got one loved one in the hospital, so if you just can’t take on the stress of worrying about me…that’s your call. But if you want to do the best thing for me?
Don’t leave me.
Don’t make me leave you.”

“I…don’t want you to get hurt because of me.”

“Yeah, and I don’t want you or Jeff hurt because I’m not there to help. But we all get to decide what to risk our lives on, right? A certain secret society—let’s call it the Schmomitatus—once gave me something to believe in.” He studied her, up and down, and finally she didn’t worry about what she looked like. She had the feeling he was seeing past that, anyway. He was seeing her.

He found her beautiful for more than her appearance.

“Now
you
give me that,” he said simply. And her heart cracked—not with misery, but joy. She felt too much joy to hold it all in. “Look, Ard. It’s not like I have much to offer. Not even complete safety—”

“Shut up.” And she kissed him.

“Yes, ma’am,” he murmured, sexily, against her lips. Then he scooped her into his arms. She squealed, then clutched around his neck and held on for dear life. She had a feeling she’d be doing that—really and metaphorically—quite a bit around Smith and his secret-society exiles.

But it was, she consoled herself, most
definitely
the right thing to do.