“It does.” As he touched her hand, she brightened.

  “Tell me a high school story. Something you did with your friends.”

  “You’ve heard all the sports stories, probably more than anyone wants to. Including me.”

  His friends had visited a lot in those early days, telling way too many nostalgic stories about being on the football field. Talk about rubbing his nose in it, though he knew that hadn’t been their intent. They just hadn’t known what else to say, and reliving their glory days seemed the best option. He’d known she listened from her room sometimes, the door cracked.

  “Something other than sports,” she said.

  “Girls?”

  She frowned. “No.”

  That gave him a boost he’d needed. “Sure?”

  Her eyes narrowed. “You’re teasing me because I don’t have a skillet.”

  He chuckled. “Trying. What I really want to do is rip off Joe’s legs so I can have a fair fight for your interest. I don’t have any cool books about the history of the Constitution.”

  She looked as if he’d dashed cold water in her face. “What?”

  He waved a hand. “I’m kidding.”

  “You think he was…”

  “I think you’re a beautiful woman who’s really interested in what he’s teaching. He’s going to test the waters. He’s an adult, you’re an adult.”

  “No. I’m going to go give this back to him.”

  “Hey, Daralyn.” Startled by her reaction, he managed to snag her wrist before she jumped up. “You’ve done nothing wrong. Neither has he. It’s just normal guy-girl stuff. If he asks you out, you just say—”

  “I’m with you. I belong to you.”

  Talk about being caught off balance. He hadn’t seen that one coming, let alone the force with which she blurted it out.

  She stopped at his reaction, took a breath. “I’m so sorry. I interrupted. What were you about to say?”

  “I was about to say…” He was neck deep in treacherous waters, with no clue about all the dangers that lay within them, so he spoke carefully. “That if you were interested, you’d say yes. If not, you’d tell him you’re not, that you just really like his class and what you’re learning in it.”

  She stared at him. “You… I don’t belong to you?”

  “Daralyn, why do you think you belong to me?”

  “Because you touched me…that way. You’ve kissed me.”

  “Yeah, but you can choose to be with me. When a guy kisses you, it’s not like a brand or something.”

  Even if it had felt exactly that way to him.

  Her gaze dropped back to the book. She traced it with nervous fingers. He had no idea where she’d gone in her head until she lifted it, looked at him with that unflinching honesty he’d just praised.

  “Do you want me to belong to you?”

  He did. He wasn’t sure if he should say so, yet it came out of his mouth before he could stop it. “Yeah. But I want—”

  “Then that’s all that matters. I need to get to my next class.”

  Before he could get out another word, she’d shouldered her backpack, grabbed the book and fled.

  Chapter Five

  He decided the best course of action was to behave as he had before that baffling conversation. He sent her more emojis for the next class, received some tentative ones in return. She didn’t come back between her second and third classes, though she texted him and said she was going over the homework assignment with the professor, because she had some questions.

  At five minutes until nine, he’d put away his laptop and paperwork, satisfied with the amount he’d completed. When she emerged a few minutes later, he was relieved to find she’d reverted to the excitement she’d displayed after Joe’s class.

  On the way home, she talked about the things she’d learned, the people she’d met. No more Joes, but he was sure she’d been noticed by all her instructors. She’d kept the teachers hopping with her questions.

  As he was pulling into the driveway at Marcus and Thomas’s, she at last broke off, giving him a sheepish look. “Sorry. I was jabbering like the mockingbirds.”

  “Not even close. Those noisy bastards could win medals.”

  When he put his hand over hers, folded in her lap, she adjusted her double grip and wrapped it around his hand. The chain bracelet pressed into his skin, and her fingers were light, like bird bones. While they were never warm, they weren’t cold, like they became when she was upset.

  “Thank you,” she said seriously, looking at him. “You were right. It made all the difference, knowing you were there. I won’t need it for long, I promise.”

  “I’ll be there however long you need me. Don’t worry about that. It worked out good. That end-of-day paperwork I always put off got done.”

  “I can help more with that.”

  “You do plenty already. And you’re an investment. Mom says you’ll learn stuff, probably put us on some high-tech system that will eliminate paperwork altogether.”

  He grinned at her, and she smiled back. Her fingers played over his, and he shifted to capture them, hold them still with a firm grip.

  She met his gaze, lowered hers. “If you don’t need to get home…would you like to come in for some coffee or hot chocolate?”

  “Yeah, I’d like that. You can keep telling me about the school stuff. If you’re not too tired.”

  “I’m not sure if I’ll sleep at all tonight.” Her eyes went bright again. “I’m just so full of everything I saw and heard…”

  As she spoke, he smiled some more and swiveled around on the driver’s seat to transfer himself to his waiting chair.

  He rarely had to tell Daralyn anything twice, and when they’d returned to the school parking lot, he’d told her to wait for him to open the car door for her, coming or going. Now she didn’t stir until he came around to do that.

  When he gave her a nod of approval, that light in her eyes got a different kind of shine. She took the hand he offered and, delicately as a deer, slipped out and onto her feet next to him.

  A light was on in the living room at Marcus and Thomas’s, and he could see Thomas stretched out watching TV. Rory didn’t see Marcus, but his Mercedes was there next to Thomas’s classic Chevy Nova, so he was elsewhere in the house.

  Rory opened the screen door to Daralyn’s patio and followed her into the house. She shifted one of the two kitchen chairs to the wall, giving him a spot at the table, before she moved to the pantry.

  “Coffee or hot chocolate? I can do the chocolate with skim milk.”

  “Hot chocolate sounds good. Tell me more about the science class. You didn’t finish talking about that one.”

  He propped an elbow on the table as he watched her. He listened, responding and asking questions, yet he suspected her awareness of how he was looking at her was growing. Could she sense the energy coming off him, building in the small space between them once again as he inhaled her scent, followed the sweep of her hair over her shoulder? He studied the little bumps her bra strap made under her shirt, the way the denim stretched over her backside when she bent to pull out the saucepan. The capable movements of her hands as she made hot chocolate with milk, using the stove instead of the microwave.

  Listening to the sound of her voice, those breathy syllables, he wanted to close his eyes, let it soak into him. But he wanted to see her too. He liked that she could feel the intensity of his gaze. He liked seeing her get a little nervous for good reasons.

  When the hot chocolate was ready, she put his mug on the table and sat down beside him with her own. She took a breath. “You look like you might want to talk about something,” she said.

  “Yeah. I do.” He reached out, cupped her face, and laid his mouth on hers.

  She made a surprised and pleased noise, but it was nothing next to what surged through him. The strength of it told him how much he’d thought about doing this, all night, ever since he’d kissed her throat when they left for the school. How he’d denied himself for those few hours was a miracle of deprivation. He wanted to pull her on his lap, but he didn’t. He kept it right there, elbow on the corner of the table, his hand hooked with hers on the edge.

  She wanted more, was pressing into it as she made a little sound in the back of her throat. Tension shivered through her as she struggled between giving into the kiss, giving him what he seemed to be demanding from her, and leashing her natural response, reining it back. What she thought wasn’t allowed.

  He wanted to tell her anything was allowed with him, anything she wanted, but he knew the dangers of going down that path with her. Daralyn never framed things in terms of her own wants and desires. Asking her what she wanted, pushing her to express that, was a sure way to send her into a panic attack. They’d all learned that the hard way.

  With effort, he broke the kiss, keeping it easy but lingering, running his thumb along her delicate jaw. She was staring at him. When he dropped his hand to the table, palm up, he noted she put her braceleted wrist, not her hand, in his grasp. As he gripped it, she settled, resulting in a surge of feelings hard to describe. He just knew they were the exact right ones for the moment.

  “What’s going on in your head?” he asked. “Tell me.”

  “No one looks at me the way you do. Like I’m something in an art gallery, interesting and special, and almost too beautiful to touch.”

  “I want to touch you. A lot. Tell me more about what you’re thinking. You can’t say anything wrong.”

  She pressed her lips together. “There’s this feeling when you look at me, like I’m about to feel something I’ve never felt, and I’m scared. But excited, too. Happy. I feel like I can talk to you, say these things in my head that don’t make sense, they’re so jumbled, but when you look at me the way you’re looking at me, there’s this steady calm in your eyes that comes inside of me. It unjumbles those thoughts, makes sense of them.”

  He considered himself decently experienced with girls. He’d lost his virginity as soon as he could take the beat-up truck down one of the many back roads that all the teens knew. He hadn’t been naturally smooth with females, but being a football player had helped improve his fumbling tongue-tied state. He’d learned the basics, how to navigate the often awkward signals and baffling clues men and women dropped for one another in the dating game. The things they struggled to say or not say.

  Not in a million years would any of them have opened their hearts this baldly, spoken such simple, emotional truths about what they were feeling. She had no experience with playing coy or being worried about what he thought of her. Not that way. It was a humbling gift of innocent trust.

  And heartbreaking that she’d managed to express it so well, without crossing into the territory they all knew was dangerous for her.

  Thinking about what Marcus had said about watching for cues, Rory knew she’d taught him to do that early on. Uniquely preparing them for the direction this relationship seemed to want to go.

  He brought her into his lap, her hair tumbling over the arm he had around her back, holding her securely. He gathered all those thick locks in one hand and twisted them, his knuckles pressed to her neck.

  He liked knowing she’d put herself in his hands. What she’d said about Joe and belonging to Rory, he knew there was something wrong there. But he wanted the words to be wholly, perfectly true. Because the gift of her giving herself to him on every level, wanting to belong to him, whether she could say it with words or not, was what he wanted.

  Slow. Easy. He was in love with a woman who was unable to say what she wanted. Talk about a minefield.

  But he wasn’t going to deny her pleasure because of how her uncle and father had fucked up her head. He slid his thumb beneath her neckline and hooked it under her bra strap to discover cool, soft skin. He caressed her shoulder and collar bone as he met her gaze. “Take off your shirt.”

  No hesitation, and no apprehension, only desire in her multi-colored eyes. She straightened in his lap, arched as she brought the shirt off, set it aside. The feel of her skin against his arm was something he wouldn’t get tired of any time soon, so he settled her back into the cradle of it and enjoyed looking at the small curves cupped in pale blue cotton. He tightened his hold to bring her close enough he could brush his lips over one quivering mound. Still steady and slow, not going for the nipple. Just everywhere near it. Her hand had hooked over his shoulder, her fingers digging into his shirt.

  He went beneath the loose waistband of her jeans to find the nip of her waist, molded his palm over it and her hip bone, his fingertips against the elastic of her panties.

  She started trembling harder as he petted her with a light touch that moved in lines and circles. Over her hip and side, up to her rib cage, around to her bare back. He unhooked the bra one-handed, pressed his palm to the ridge of her spine there.

  He didn’t give a damn about getting to the “good stuff,” as his buddies had often called it. It was all good stuff, and he wanted her to know it. He was content to spend his energy studying her every reaction, making sure they were doing all right.

  He left the loosened bra where it was and lowered his touch to slip the button of her jeans, trace the edge of her panties below her navel.

  She bit her lip, and one hand had dropped to his knee, fingers gripping the seam of his jeans in a sudden death grip, indicating the wrong kind of tension.

  “It’s okay,” he said quietly. “Don’t worry. Talk to me.”

  “When you touch me,” she said hesitantly, “it feels good. But I’m not sure about…between my legs.”

  Not unexpected. “How about taking off the jeans? I just want to hold you in my lap in nothing but your panties. That’s all we’ll do.” He didn’t want to spook her. Make her think he was going to ask too much, too soon. The way she nodded, her expression easing, settled his concerns.

  “Good,” he murmured. “I want to look. Feel how wet you are.”

  The concerns he’d thought he’d reversed snapped into a full locking of her muscles, so violent she bucked herself off his lap. He caught her before she could fall, but she scrambled away, stumbling over his feet. She was a few paces away in a jarring blink, standing in the doorway of her bedroom.

  “I’m sorry,” she stammered. “I’m so sorry. I can’t help it.”

  “It’s okay.” He kept his voice calm while his mind sifted rapidly through the past few seconds. When he’d spoken, he’d moved his touch up, his fingertips gliding along and above her navel. Because he’d moved away from the area causing her worry, back toward something she’d seemed to like having him touch, he knew it was his words, not the contact, that had caused her abrupt reaction.

  He pushed toward her, wanting to soothe, but she retreated fully into the room, so he stopped at the threshold.

  “I…” She closed her eyes, shook her head. Her hands were fisted at her sides. “I thought it would be okay. I’m so sorry…”

  “You don’t need to say you’re sorry, baby. You’ve done nothing wrong.”

  She gave him a wild, despairing look. What concerned him the most was she looked like a trapped animal. The bra was loose, showing her breasts, her jeans open and barely snagged around her hips, but she seemed unconcerned about that. Then he thought about where he was, in front of the door. All the mixed messages about choice, and the still untapped mystery of her mind on that subject in particular, told him he had to make sure she understood.

  If she could understand. That was the most unsettling thought of all.

  “I don’t want to leave, but if you need me to go, Daralyn, I can go. It’s all right.” It was the last thing he wanted to do, and he wasn’t even sure if it was the right thing to do. He’d still make sure she knew she had that option. He always wanted her to know that.

  Problem was, he didn’t think words were what would help her understand that. And he’d just made the mistake he’d warned himself about. He’d asked her to tell him what she wanted. Or needed, which fell in the same category.

  Her expression became more desperate and torn. She was rigid, and she’d crossed her arms over herself. Now she was fighting to talk and couldn’t, her breath starting to rasp.

  Fuck. A panic attack. Whatever else was going on here, that took priority.

  “We’re all right,” he said, backing the chair so he wasn’t blocking the doorway. “Breathe. Sit down on the bed for me. I need you to sit down and breathe.”

  She sank down on it, and bowed her head. Her back was to him, the stiff curve of it showing the stark lines of her vertebrae. When she shivered, he wanted to go to her, wrap his arms around her, but the opening between the wall and the bed on that side was too narrow for his chair. Whether it was intentional, so he couldn’t easily reach her, or unintentional, it accomplished the same thing. Keeping him at arm’s length.

  The helpless rage he felt was the kind he knew too well. He’d take it out on his punching bag later. For now, he kept murmuring to her, even as his heart hurt, even when she curled forward over herself, as if her own pain was more than she could bear. “Daralyn,” he said softly.

  “I’m so sorry, Rory. So sorry.”

  “There is nothing to be sorry about. We’re okay, you and me. Nothing is wrong. Nothing that can’t be fixed.”

  Her shoulders hunched. He wasn’t sure if she heard him. “I’ll see you at the store tomorrow,” she said. “It will be fine.”

  Another of her cues. She couldn’t say what she wanted, but if she said something was fine, it meant she was spinning herself up. Unless he backed off, it would get worse.

  Leaving her like this was counter to everything he wanted to be for her, do for her. But just like he’d known he should have accompanied her to her first day at school, his gut told him it was time to back off. He was going to knock that fucking punching bag off its hook.