Summer's Temptation (25 page)

His smile never breaks, and his dimples grow deeper. “Yeah, I know. That’s one of the reasons I like you so much. You see straight through my shit.”

I see through everything with him, straight through his arrogant façade to the sweet guy underneath. Oh, God, why am I smiling at him like a lunatic? This conversation is only headed in one direction, and it doesn’t involve a heart-to-heart and gushy feelings. We’re having the moment I dreamed about in the hospital when I was ready to open my heart to him, and now that it’s happening, it means nothing. I shake my head. “I can’t believe this.”

“Okay, I take it back. You’re totally not smarter than me. How could you have not known? You’ve turned me into a freakin’ girl. All I want is to spend time with you. Do you know how many times I went to the hospital and tried to talk myself into going in? At least a dozen. I wanted to see you so badly…”

“But it wasn’t enough.” Not enough to make him visit me. Not enough to keep him out of another girl’s arms.

His smile dims a little but not enough to remotely erase it. “Trust me, I feel like a failure. If you’re ever in the hospital again, I’ll have Josh knock me out and carry me up to your room.”

I go quiet, retreating into myself while I try to figure this out. He wants to be with me. He’s grinning like a fool, and he’s telling me he cares about me. I can’t speak; my emotions are all over the place. Happy. Sad. Exultant. Hurt.

“Say something, cupcake.”

His eyes are so blue, so full of promise and revelations. And this is a revelation, these feelings we share. Maybe he can be mine. Maybe these feelings he has for me didn’t grow gradually. Maybe they were as much a shock to him as they were to me. I hadn’t known how deep my emotions ran for Tyler until Mr. Westbrook kissed me. Maybe he didn’t know how much I meant to him until some outside force—like a snake—made him acknowledge it.

My stomach folds in on itself as I clutch my comforter. I’m so scared to ask him. What if he doesn’t answer right? I don’t want to lose him, but this is my last hope of keeping him.

“When did you know you cared for me?” I take a shaky breath, praying he understands what I’m asking. “When did you realize you wanted to be with me?”

Tears pool at the corners of my eyes.
Please tell me you didn’t know until I was bitten by the snake. You realized you couldn’t bear to live without me. You realized you were falling for me the same way I’m falling for you. Please let that be the truth.

Chapter 25

T
yler’s smile slowly disappears as if he realizes something serious is going on, and this moment isn’t all about sweet declarations of love. “Why are you crying?” He wipes my tears with his fingers.

“Answer me.” My fists are clenched so tight, my nails bite through the comforter and into my skin.

“I don’t know, Cassie.” He trails a fingertip over my cheek and stares at me as if he’s trying to deduce what I want to hear. “ Sometimes I think I’ve felt this way forever.”

“But when did you know for sure?”

He moistens his bottom lip. “The first time we made love.”

The way he says it sounds so sweet. I can almost pretend it’s the right answer. We hadn’t fucked; we’d made love. He’d felt it too. So why did he have to screw this up irreparably?

He presses his forehead to mine. The heat of his breath whispers across my lips. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve waited for you to tell me you’re falling for me? Three months is a long time, cupcake.”

Tears cascade down my cheeks.

He must think I’m crying out of happiness because he keeps going, even though he’s only driving the knife deeper. “I worked my ass off trying to make you forget Wyatt. I wasn’t even sure if we’d get past your stupid rules. Then we seemed to be making some headway, and you went ballistic on me for following you to the lake. Do you know how many times I nearly gave up? But I couldn’t, cupcake. You’re the best thing that’s happened to me in… well, ever.”

He bridges the inch between our mouths and kisses me. I feel his eyelashes flutter as he closes his eyes and surrenders to a moment that’s a sweet union for him. His hands thread through my hair, tilting my head so that our lips meet at the perfect angle. His mouth moves softly against mine, not hesitant but not aggressive. It’s a perfect kiss for what should be a perfect moment, but my eyes are open, and my lips are hard and firm against his. My mouth refuses to move and take what he’s offering.

He stops kissing me, and his eyes open, showing a depth of confusion that twists my gut. How can he think this is okay? He’s hiding a truth to get what he wants. My tears have stopped, my emotions hijacked by an anger that’s only possible when you know just how much you’ve lost.

His hands slip down to my neck, and using his palms, he tilts my head up so he can stare directly into my eyes. “Cassie, what’s wrong?”

I don’t see any guilt in his expression. I still feel guilty over Aiden—mortified that I could have thought for one second that Aiden was more important to me than Tyler—and we only kissed. It’s as though Tyler can push aside his conscience when it suits his purposes, and his moral disregard only makes me madder.

I push against his chest to force him out of my space. “You fucked another girl. That’s what’s wrong.”

He doesn’t budge. He peers down at my hands that are pushing against his pecs then back up at me. He has a deer-in-the-headlights look, the same one I saw on Jeremy when I’d confronted him about his little liaison with Lori.

He blinks once, twice, three times, mouth slightly ajar. “What are you talking about?”

I cringe away from him, pulling my hands into my chest and covering my heart as though I can shield myself from further hurt. If I weren’t in so much pain, I’d roll my eyes. He’s using the same stalling tactic as Jeremy, so he can figure out how to come out blameless.

“What do you think I’m talking about?”

“I haven’t had sex with anyone but you all summer,” he says.

“What about the night Mr. Westbrook came over and you got pissed at me?”

He rears back as if I’ve slapped him, eyes so wide, they look too big for his face. “Oh, fuck.”

His chest goes still, and I’m pretty sure he’s not breathing. He shakes his head, mouth open. I think he’s trying to form words, but they don’t make it past his lips. But what do you say after you’ve been caught red-handed?
Sorry, it won’t happen again?
Yeah, we both know that’s not going to fly.

After what feels like an eternity but is probably only a few seconds, he fills his lungs with air. “Jesus, Cassie. How did you know about that?”

His confession is akin to a knife through my ribcage, but I’m oddly relieved he’s admitting guilt. I don’t have the energy to go around in circles the way I did with Jeremy, whose motto had been deny, deny, deny. At least Tyler isn’t playing that game.

“Hannah saw you bring a girl back to your room,” I say.

He leans back on his knees, still straddling me. One arm folds across his chest, and his free hand pinches the bridge of his nose. “I didn’t know Hannah was there.” He shakes his head slowly, his fingers pinching his nose harder. “I should have known.”

My knee is precariously close to his balls, and it’s so damn tempting to make him feel the physical side of my pain. But it’d only be an echo of the emotional anguish I’m experiencing, and it’d be all too brief. “Yeah, you need to do a better job of hiding your whores next time.” I try to keep my tone even, but it comes out more like an exploding grenade.

The shrapnel of my words must hit their mark, because he winces. “That’s not what I meant.” He grabs my hands, pulling them from my chest toward his. “We didn’t have sex.”

He looks desperate, his eyes shifting over my face. He must be able to see my disbelief. Why should I believe him? Jeremy told me the same thing. He kept denying he’d slept with Lori until I’d convinced him we were through for good. Then he’d purged his guilt, and it had all come pouring out.

“I’m telling the truth,” Tyler says.

I say nothing. This is one of those moments where silence is the best choice.

He presses my palms to his chest. His heart beats fast beneath my hands. “Christ, you have to believe me. We went to my room, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

I dig my nails into his cotton T-shirt, stopping short of clawing him. “Why should I believe you? Your track record isn’t exactly stellar.”

“I swear nothing happened.”

I want to believe him so badly, but I know Tyler too well to play stupid. Maybe he didn’t have sex with her, but that doesn’t exclude other things. “Let’s say for argument’s sake you didn’t screw her. Let’s say you brought her into your room, and you didn’t have sex. What did you do?”

His jaw hardens. “Cassie…” The shame on his face says something happened. Maybe not sex, but it definitely wasn’t innocent.

My fingers twist his shirt with enough force to rip the collar. “Did you kiss her?”

His jaw locks tighter, and through gritted teeth, he says, “Yes.”

Why does that have to hurt so much? Why am I so desperate to know the extent of the damage? I swallow hard. “Did you touch her?”

His jaw clenches like a vise; I don’t see how he can speak. Maybe that’s the point. Lock down his mouth, and he can’t hurt me worse.

While he grinds his teeth, I picture all the places he’s touched me. The thought of his hands on the same parts of another woman makes me want to sob and scream all at the same time. “Answer me!”

He lets go of my wrists, but I don’t release his shirt. I feel as if keeping him physically tethered to me will force the truths to keep pouring out of him.

“Yes,” he says.

“Where?”

He grabs his shirt and tries to rip it from my grasp, but I refuse to sever the line.

“I don’t want to talk about this,” he snaps.

“Too bad! Where did you touch her?”

“All over,” he barks, face red from something. Anger? Embarrassment? “Did you really want to know that?”

Of course I didn’t want to know that. It hurts like hell, and I have to use all my willpower to keep from tearing up. I let go of his shirt. The fabric’s puckered and stretched.

He slides his hands down his face and takes a shaky breath. “I didn’t have sex with her. I came to my senses, and I stopped.” He says that as though it should matter, as though I should forgive him because he didn’t go all the way.

“That’s crappy logic, Tyler. If I used that reasoning, I might as well have let Mr. Westbrook feel me up.”

Tyler’s head falls limp between his shoulders, and he stares at my knees. He’s perfectly still for a few moments except for the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest. Then he kneels back on his heels and shakes his head, closing his eyes. “This isn’t fair.”

I don’t think he means I’m being unfair. I think the situation has thrown him, and he doesn’t know how to fix it. Neither do I.

Maybe if I weren’t so jealous of this other girl, if I weren’t afraid he’d do it again, I’d chalk it up to confusion. We weren’t an official couple when he brought her home, when he kissed her, when he touched her… But at the same time, he cared about me and he did it anyway out of spite. A random drunken fuckfest would be less painful than his vindictive half-hookup.

“Do you know how long I waited for you to get your shit together?” he says. His eyes are open, but he stares down. “Wyatt did a number on you. He really fucked with your head, but I was patient. I waited three months for you to come to your senses and realize you don’t need him.” He takes a deep breath. “You need me.” He looks at me and his eyes are full of hurt. “I thought I was getting somewhere with you when you called me after your teacher hit on you. I thought maybe you were opening up to me, and then I peeked through the fucking blinds and saw you making out with the British dipshit. How do you think that made me feel? You were all over me one second and all over him the next. And don’t tell me you didn’t kiss him back. You did. I saw it. If you think what I’ve done is shitty, well, so was that.”

He’s right. That was a crappy move on my part, and I don’t fault him for being angry about it. I should never have stepped onto the porch with Mr. Westbrook. I should have told him it was a bad time and we’d talk later, but I didn’t for a simple reason: He was my fantasy, and I wasn’t ready to give him up. “I shouldn’t have talked to Mr. Westbrook that night. I should have said goodnight, shut the door, and went back to where we left off, but you should be glad I didn’t.”

His eyes burn like the lit end of a cigarette. “Fuck that, Cassie—”

I hold my hand up to stop him. “Let me finish.” I draw in a deep, steadying breath. “When I kissed Aiden, it wasn’t what I expected. I’d had a crush on him all summer. I thought he was perfect. I mean, he was smart and handsome and cared about his students. The only reason I didn’t say yes when he asked me on a date was because I was scared he’d hurt me the way Wyatt did.”

Tyler clenches and unclenches his hands. I know this isn’t what he wants to hear, but there’s a lot of that going around tonight. He can just fume away while I make my point.

“When he kissed me, I did kiss him back, but something happened during that kiss. Something changed in me. I hadn’t kissed anyone since you, and I guess I took for granted the way we are together.” I press my palm to his heart and feel it beat erratically. “You consume me. When our lips touch, when our bodies are pressed together, I’m not me anymore. I’m like this other being your touch creates. I’m fearless, I’m reckless, I’m me but on fire. You consume me and turn me into something better, someone who can give and take, and to hell with everything else. When I kissed Mr. Westbrook, I wanted to be kissing you. That was the moment I knew I was falling for you.”

He folds both hands over mine and presses my palm harder into his chest. His heart catapults against his ribs. “Shit, Cassie. How was I supposed to know that?”

“I was going to tell you. I made Aiden leave as fast as I could, and I came inside to tell you my feelings for you went
way
beyond fuck buddies. I figured you’d freak out and take off, but I also thought maybe there was a chance you’d stay. I guess I knew you might be mad over Aiden, but I really thought you’d listen and let me explain.” I guess I do have a few tears left in me. One trails over my cheek and drops to the comforter. “I never thought you’d get pissed enough to pick up another girl.”

Tyler draws in a giant breath, his chest rising. As he exhales, he tilts his head back and stares at the ceiling. “Jesus, Cassie. I was so pissed at you, and I was tired of being the only one in a relationship. This thing between us makes me feel like a fucking girl. I’m chasing you, trying to make you see me for me and not as some interim guy to throw away when you got sick of me. After you kissed that jackass, I wanted to make you feel something. I didn’t mean it when I said I was going to find another girl. I just wanted to make you appreciate me.”

“But you did find someone else.”
He drops his chin, and there’s more sorrow spilling out of his expression than I thought humanly possible. “I got shitfaced. The more fucked up I got, the more pissed I got. The more pissed I got, the more I wanted an outlet. I’m not making excuses; I’m not saying it’s right. I’m just telling you the truth.”

I want the truth. God, I’m tired of being lied to, but I just wish the truth was coming from someone with enough morals to keep his dick in his pants. “I don’t understand how you can say you care about me and then undress another girl. I still feel guilty over Aiden. I hate that I kissed him. I hate that you saw that, and it was only a kiss.”

He presses the bottoms of his palms into his eyes as though he has a headache. My head’s about to explode too.

“I thought it was more than a kiss,” Tyler says, dragging his fingers down his face. His blue eyes peer over his nails. “I thought it meant you didn’t give a shit about me.” He drops his arms, and his shoulders sag. “You have to forgive me.”

“That’s the thing. I do forgive you. I forgave you a few seconds after Hannah told me you’d brought a girl home. We weren’t together. I have no claim to you. I can’t expect you to be faithful to a nonexistent relationship.”

The bed shifts as Tyler sits up. “If you forgive me, we can make this work. I know we can.”

“This isn’t about forgiving you. I wish it were that simple. I’m afraid that what drove you to be with someone else that night is a symptom of a bigger problem. You wouldn’t even talk to me that night. You threatened me by telling me you were going to go find someone else, and then you did. I pissed you off, and your kneejerk reaction was to fuck another woman. I’m sorry I hurt you. I’m sorry this is so messed up. I do take responsibility for my part. But I can’t walk on eggshells around you, afraid that if you get mad, you’ll storm off and find someone else. I won’t live like that. I deserve better.”

He flops back on the bed, his side grazing my feet, and groans. “I didn’t hook up with her.”

“You did hook up with her; you just didn’t go all the way.”

“So you forgive me, but you don’t trust me.”

That about sums it up. “This sucks, Tyler. It really, really sucks, but it’d suck even more six months from now.”

“Maybe for you,” he whispers, staring at the ceiling. “For me, this already sucks pretty hard.” He looks defeated, making me want to run my fingers through his dark hair and tell everything will work out. He tilts his head toward me and pins me with watery crystal blue eyes. “Everything you said… what you feel when we kiss, when we touch… I feel it too. When I held that other girl, it was like wrapping my arms around a mannequin. I was totally wasted, and all I could think was how you’ve fucked me up for any other girl.”