Page 47 of Drive Me Crazy
“Kidding.” He chuckles. “Gabriel said not to worry about it. His housekeeper is coming early tomorrow morning.”
Flour hits my face without warning as I finish placing myplate in the sink. It takes me a few seconds to recoup, but I grab a handful myself and blow it so it lands all over Blake’s shirt. Soon enough, we both look like we’ve failed horribly at our mission to sneak a kilo of cocaine over the border and now it’s all over our clothes instead. I admire my handiwork as Blake laughs at the two of us looking like a pair of snowmen.
“You’ve got some flour on your face,” he notes.
His rough fingers trail my cheek, unguarded desire brightening his brown eyes. I throw all caution straight out the fucking window as my mouth meets his. My body reacts before my mind can process what’s actually happening. He cups his hands confidently against my cheeks as he kisses me hard and demandingly.
His tongue meets mine, swirling and dancing around, a shameless moan escaping his mouth. It’s months of pent-up tension demolishing the carefully defined boundaries we just blurred into nothingness. He kisses me as if he were starving for me, the burning intensity of it making heat spread through my body like wildfire. It’s urgent and unrestrained. Blake’s more dominant, leading the kiss, but I do some pushing and pulling of my own. My hands wander through his hair, making their way across the nape of his neck then down his arms. He smells the way he always does—like cedar cologne and expensive leather. I’ve never been kissed like this, with such desperation and desire.
Warm lips kiss down my neck when I finally snap out of the stupefied trance I’m in. I move quickly, stepping away from the counter to put some space between us. It takes a second to find my voice. A million thoughts are running through my head, the most obvious being what the hell just happened.
“Blake,” I breathe out. “What are we doing?”
“Exactly what we should be doing.”
He steps forward to continue where we left off, but I gently push him back. The full impact of his hungry stare is almostenough to let him keep kissing me, but I stand my ground. I need to stop this before it goes too far. The tension in the air is so thick, it may suffocate us both.
“Seriously. What’s going on?”
My hand motions to the scene around us. The straps of my sundress hang off my shoulders and Blake’s shirt is halfway unbuttoned. Our lips are both swollen and red. He looks as mystified as I feel. His normally messy hair is on a new level, sticking out funny. I swallow back the lump in my throat as my eyes fall down to his lips—why do I want to feel them against mine again so desperately?
“We’re obviously attracted to one another. You can’t pretend we don’t have insane chemistry. I’ve been thinking about kissing you again since Spain, so why deny what we both so clearly want?”
He runs his thumb over my bottom lip, pulling it down. Those dumb teddy-bear brown eyes of his are soft and I know what he’s trying to do, but it won’t work. It can’t. I turn my head away, forcing his hand to fall back to his side.
“Because maybe I want more than just that.”
Right as the words leave my mouth, I want to pull them right back in and then swallow them so deep that they never see the light of day. The look on Blake’s face is so painstakingly tormented and panicked that I know his answer without having to hear it. I’ve not only committed the worst sin of all, but I’ve also said it out loud. I knew falling for Blake was a bad idea long before he ever kissed me, but that doesn’t make the rejection any less painful.
“I’ve said since day one I don’t do relationships, Ella.” He rakes his fingers through his hair. I watch as the locks fall back into place almost immediately. “I can’t give you more than this.”
“What? Fuck buddies?”
His voice is tight as he says, “I didn’t say that.”
“Ah,let me rephrase. Friends with benefits, casual, slam piece, another notch in your belt. Should I go on or do any of those work?”
“Jesus, Ella.” He glares at me, eyes dark with frustration. “You know it’s not like that. Not with you.”
He doesn’t get to be pissed; I get to be pissed. Fuck that. Who makes someone a homemade Italian meal with a famous pasta person and doesn’t understand how that’s not leading someone on? I know people who have been proposed to in less romantic ways than this, for God’s sake. This is Kardashian-level shit.
“Then what’s it like, Blake? Please, enlighten me.”
“I don’t know.” He kicks the toe of his shoe into the floor in aggravation. “Forget it.”
The embarrassment and hurt coursing through my body are blinding. Suddenly, the room feels like the walls are closing in. We both stay quiet and the silence is deafening. Not that anything else he could possibly say would make me feel like less of an idiot. There’s no one to blame but myself for the situation I’m in.
“I think we should head back,” I say, my voice painfully awkward.
Blake licks his lips, staring down at me as he registers what I just said. He pulls his brows together tight, narrowing his eyes a bit while he shakes his head. He’s upset. I don’t have the time or energy to worry about how he’s feeling. All I want to do is cry and I refuse to do that in front of him.
The car ride back is excruciating. Only the radio cuts through the tension, the silence stretching out further than the twisting roads ahead of us. I press my knees against the car door, angling my body as far away from Blake as I can. The door can’t open fast enough when we pull up to the hotel.
“I can’t give you what you want, Ella,” Blake says quietly as I get out of the car. “I’m sorry.”
Ifight back the tears that threaten to spill onto my cheeks. “What I want is you. You’re just too scared to see that I’m what you want, too.”
I want red roses and clearly all Blake thinks he wants is theFifty Shades of Greyred room. As much as I’m a hopeless romantic, I’m also a realist and it doesn’t get much more real than this.
