Getting His Way: Sapphire Falls Book Seven (11 page)

And she turned and stomped out of the Community Center, her heart pounding, her face hot, her entire body charged up and needing an outlet and completely frustrated that it didn’t seem running would do it.

So she went home and rummaged through her cupboards.

Of course, she’d started eating healthier as well, so she had no decent snack food. The best she could do was cupcake vodka.

Tess grabbed a glass and the bottle and headed for the couch. With helping Delaney with remodels, Hope with the yoga studio, Adrianne with the bakery and TJ with running Sapphire Falls, it was rare for Tess to have time to sit and do nothing.

So she fully intended to do just that. With vodka. Though she did entertain the idea of heading to the bakery for some
real
cupcakes.

Screw good eating habits. Screw being healthy and losing those forty pounds and going down three pant sizes.

The weight loss had been a nice side effect of the running, but it hadn’t been her motivation. She’d started running purely because Bryan had said such inspirational things about it. Peyton had wanted to do something healthier and had been questioning her ability to actually make a positive change in her life, and Tess had found herself quoting Bryan. Peyton had been convinced, and Tess had bought some shoes and jogged—okay, jogged and walked, mostly walked—with her friend for a mile. Tess hadn’t missed a day since.

The healthier eating had come because of her increased distances and the need to properly fuel her body for the demand, and that, combined with the exercise, had caused a dramatic weight loss. She was still curvy and a size twelve. Hardly super-model size. But her body was toned and healthy, and she felt better about herself than she ever had. So she was wearing more skirts and dresses, more fitted shirts and jeans and more sleeveless tops.

And no matter how much she loved it, no matter how much she’d learned about herself, no matter that she’d gone out for
herself
every day after that first time, she could still trace this passion back to Bryan too.

Pathetic.

She poured a couple of fingers of vodka and took a sip. Hmm…not really like cupcakes. She tried to remember what her friends had mixed this with. They had to have mixed it. Of course, if they hadn’t, that could explain why not much of it was gone.

Peyton would know—it was guaranteed Peyton had been here for cupcake vodka.

Tess texted her friend an SOS.

She had no intention of stopping running now. She couldn’t. She honestly couldn’t imagine
not
running. But she was not doing it for or because of Bryan. And she wasn’t drinking because of him either. Dammit. If she wanted cupcake vodka, she’d have cupcake vodka.

She took another sip. The second taste was better than the first. Which was promising, because she needed to get her mind off of everything.

Glass to her lips, Tess flipped through the channels. Nothing was working for her. Typical. She finally had time to watch TV and nothing good was on. She tipped her cup again. Her sips were tiny, but she did feel a pleasant warmness starting.

She stopped at the travel channel out of habit. And because she saw a mountain.

Dammit.

Tess tipped her cup again. This was
not
the way to not think about Bryan.

She took in the sight of the mountains and valleys. She’d never been to the mountains. She’d never been anywhere with Bryan at all, yet she would always associate mountains with him. Even if she lived in Denver for years, trained there—even maybe fell in love with someone else.

Determined to
not
think about him, or how it seemed weird to even think about being in love with someone else, she focused on her goals and the things she could control—like finishing a bottle of vodka—Tessa poured another inch. Okay, so at this pace it would take a while to finish the nearly full bottle. Still, it was a goal. She stubbornly flipped to the food channel.

But only five minutes into the show about, ironically, cupcakes, she was eyeing her computer. There was something she could do, something she could take control of.

She could submit her application to Jake Elliot’s program in Denver.

She almost had the money. She’d finally have her savings account to the level she wanted when she got her next paycheck after the festival.

Tess took another sip and stared at her laptop on her dining room table. It was about five feet away. She could just get up, walk over there, turn it on and…change her life.

So why was she hesitating? Why was her butt still glued to the couch? What was she waiting for?

It was that thought that got her up. She was done
waiting
for anything.

Ten minutes later, she pressed Send. Her application had officially been turned in for Jake Elliot’s coaching program.

She shut her laptop and tipped back the rest of the vodka in her glass just as she heard a knock at her door.

Tessa bounded to her feet. Maybe it was Peyton with something to mix with the vodka. Or maybe it was Kate or Hope. Or anyone who would share the bottle. Because finishing it by herself was feeling more and more likely and she knew she would regret it deeply in the morning.

Her visitor being one of the girls wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. There had been a good number of people at the Community Center who had heard her tell Bryan not to have thoughts about her virginity. That would certainly spread around town fast enough that her girlfriends could have heard about it. She could use some girl talk.

But when she pulled the door open, it wasn’t a female at all. It was Bryan Murray, looking sexy and gorgeous and pretty serious. For Bryan, anyway.

She should have seen this coming.

A fact that was confirmed a moment later when he said, “You can’t expect me to find out you’ve been saving yourself for me and then just let it go.”

Something about the way he said “saving yourself for me” should have caused her to blush in embarrassment—he really had heard all about it—but instead, it caused her inner muscles to clench.

There was an almost possessive tone to his voice when he said it, and her stupid heart—or hormones—responded with an enthusiastic
I’m yours
.

“Tess, let me in.”

There was still a screen door between them, and Tess had the fleeting revelation that if she pushed the door open, she was in huge, huge trouble.

She did it anyway.

Bryan grabbed the edge of the screen door the moment she pushed it open an inch. He pulled it open and stepped through quickly, almost as if he was afraid she’d change her mind.

He was using his crutch again, but there was nothing that took away from his big, strong, almost domineering presence.

When she started to step back, he grabbed her upper arm with his free hand and stopped her. He turned her so her back was against the open front door and crowded close.

Tessa’s heart thudded.
Oh my God, yes
was the only thought she had.

“Have you been saving yourself for me, Tess?” he asked, that low, gruff voice rumbling through her again and setting all her nerve endings on fire.

She wet her lips, trying to decide how to address this. For some reason, she really thought confessing might
not
be the way to go. But her thoughts weren’t exactly clear. There was something about feeling the heat from Bryan’s body, inhaling the scent of him, and the way he was looking at her, that combined to make her feel very…stupid. Or it could have been the vodka.

“I don’t really want to talk about my sex life,” she said.

His pupils dilated, and he leaned in, putting a forearm against the door by her ear. “That’s not a no.”

She sighed. “Everyone knows how I felt about you,” she finally said. “Even you.”

“That is also not a no.”

She closed her eyes. That was better. Easier. She could think
a little
clearer without looking into his eyes.

But she could still
feel
him.

“Do you have any idea how fuck—how
very
hot it is to think that you’ve been waiting for me like that?” he asked.

Tess felt heat suffuse her body. He was turned on by the idea that she’d been saving herself for him? That she was a virgin? Then she thought about
all
of his words. And the word he’d
almost
said.

She opened her eyes and frowned. “Did you almost say how
fucking
hot it is?” she asked.

He winced slightly. “Yeah, sorry. It’s just that—”

“Dammit, Bryan!” She put her hands on his chest and pushed him back.

He wouldn’t even
swear
in front of her? Really?

He stepped back, his crutch steadying him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, clearly surprised she’d pushed him.

Tess stepped away from the door and into the living room, where she had more room to move and more space between her and the hard body she’d wanted to get up against since her hormones had told her that being up against someone might be fun.

“You stopped yourself from saying fuck to me?” She crossed her arms.

“Yes. I’m sorry. I’m working on my language.”

“Then you might as well just turn around and go home,” she said.

He blinked at her. “What?”

“You’re not going to be very good at dirty talk if you won’t even say fuck to me. And that’s definitely one of the words I would want to hear. Not to mention cock and pussy and clit and—”

He was practically on top of her a moment later. “Stop.”

Damn, he could move fast even with a crutch.

She lifted her chin. He hadn’t shaved today, and she suddenly, desperately wanted to feel those whiskers scraping over her skin. She put a hand against his cheek and rubbed over the sexy scruff. “Stop what?”

“You don’t know what you’re starting here.” But he leaned in slightly.

Tess lifted an eyebrow. “I don’t?”

“I know you don’t. Virgin, remember?”

She rolled her eyes. “Yes, Bryan, I’m a virgin. That doesn’t mean I don’t know
anything
.”

His voice dropped and he rubbed his jaw against her hand. “Do you know what it does to me to think that you’ve never been with anyone and that you want to be with me?”

Feeling sassy suddenly, Tess let her eyes drop to his crotch. There was definitely some rigidity there that told her a thing or two. “I have an idea.”

He made a little growling noise in the back of his throat. Then he sucked in a breath through his nose. “I think we should talk about this. And how I’m making your life complicated. Because, honey, you’re making a few things hard for me too.”

Tess couldn’t help it. She gave a little giggle at that.

A smile curled one corner of Bryan’s mouth too. “Seriously,” he said.

She wanted to keep playing. She wanted to tease and flirt and see what she could get Bryan to do or say. The way he was in her personal space, the deep timbre of his voice, the way he was looking at her, all made her hormones start jigging. But, yeah, the complicated thing. She needed to keep that in mind. And she should probably explain herself to him. Maybe he’d back off then.

Of course, at the moment, having Bryan move back even an inch made her feel desperate.

That was
not
a good state to be in.

Tess dropped her hand and took a breath, but Bryan grabbed her wrist. He lifted it back to his face and pressed her hand against his cheek. “I like you touching me.”

Her heart squeezed and thirteen-year-old Tessa rejoiced deep inside her. “Maybe it’s
you
who doesn’t know what he’s starting,” she said softly.

Chapter Five

Bryan frowned slightly. “What’s that mean?”

“The girl inside me who’s been in love with you all my life is thrilled right now,” she admitted.

“Good,” he said sincerely.

She shook her head. “But that girl is a romantic dreamer.”

Bryan smiled at that. “And you’re not a romantic dreamer?”

She sighed. “What you’re starting is a conversation I’m not sure you really want to have,” she told him honestly.

This time when she dropped her hand, he let her. But he didn’t let up on the intense gaze he had pinned on her. “Okay, start talking.”

“Maybe we should sit down.”

Bryan hesitated, and Tess could practically feel what he was thinking. He wanted to pace. That was Bryan, always on the move, always with too much energy to be still for long.

She moved to the sofa and sank onto one end, pulling a throw pillow into her lap and hugging it tightly.

But Bryan surprised her. He stayed standing—and paced.

There was a crutch, but honestly, that didn’t slow him a bit. And it took none of the tightly wound vitality away from the picture he presented.

She felt her body heat just from watching him move. As it had so often in her life. She’d become a baseball, basketball and football fan simply because Bryan played and she’d loved watching him. He was one of the best players on all the teams, no question, and it had seemed, even from a very young age—and to a very biased observer—that he was just made to
move
. It didn’t matter if he was jumping or twisting, shooting, throwing or swinging a bat, it was a beautiful sight that demonstrated all of the amazing things the human body was capable of.