Fuck. “You’re not making this easy.”

In fact, telling her not to bother coming back was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done. I told her she wasn’t going anywhere. It was her decision to leave.

“Dale…” She parts her lips. They’re glossy and pink, so ready for a kiss… “Very few things in life are ever easy.”

Don’t I know it. Nothing is easy. Nothing has ever been easy.

“But the things that matter most, that are worth the most,” she continues, “shouldn’t be easy. If they’re too easy, we take them for granted. It’s human nature.”

I stare into her vivid blue eyes. They’re bloodshot, and her eyelids are swollen. She’s been crying, and I only now notice.

Self-absorbed.

I am self-absorbed. My sweet Ashley was crying, and I wasn’t there to help her.

Damn it. She was crying over me.

I trail a finger from her temple down over her cheek, tracing the path her tears must have followed. She closes her eyes at my touch.

“Hey,” I say.

She opens her eyes.

“I’m sorry. For making you cry.”

“You didn’t,” she says. “It was all me. I have control over how things affect me.”

“But I—”

She turns her head slightly, and her lips graze the palm of my hand. “You do affect me, Dale. I love you, so it’s impossible for you not to. But I made the choice to leave when you told me not to go. I shouldn’t have. I’m not a quitter, and I’m here to make sure you’re not one either.”

“I’ve never quit anything,” I say. True words.

“Haven’t you? You already said you’re not going to the family meeting tonight.”

“Maybe I changed my mind.”

She smiles. “I hope so. Did you know Donny and Dee are driving home right now?”

I shake my head.

“Bree too. And your other cousins are coming home from school. Apparently everyone will be here. This is that big of a deal.”

“Of course it’s a big deal.”

“My point,” she says, “is that you should be there.”

“Didn’t I just say that maybe I changed my mind?”

She closes the last few inches between us and wraps her arms around my neck. “Did you?”

“No. A family meeting is the last thing I want to do tonight.”

“This isn’t just your loss, Dale. It’s Ryan’s. It’s Talon’s. It’s everyone’s. The fire hit the orchard too. Did you know that?”

Fuck. No, I didn’t. I really am self-absorbed. “I’m sorry. Is my dad okay?”

“I don’t know, but he’s strong.”

“Damn.” I rake my fingers through my still-damp hair.

“My point is that it affects everyone, not just you.”

“I know that.”

“Do you? Because I think you do, at least objectively. Subjectively is a different matter.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Nothing I haven’t heard from Aunt Mel a million times over the years.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Ashley mocks me. “Maybe it’s time to think about someone other than yourself.”

I can’t fault her logic. She’s right. The fact is that I’m not self-absorbed. Not really. Sure, I take things hard sometimes. Who wouldn’t, with my background? But in the end, I always put those I love before myself.

Except not always.

Not that one time…

That lone memory that I’ve buried so deep in hopes that it never surfaces.

But already, I feel the walls around it crumbling…

Crumbling, because of the emotion I’ve allowed inside.

The emotion Ashley emboldened in me.

The love.

And with the love comes…

Everything.

Chapter Sixteen

Ashley

Dale slams his mouth on mine.

No warning.

Not that I need a warning. I’m always ready to kiss Dale. To be with him in love and in lust.

But now? Right after I told him he should think of someone other than himself?

His response is to kiss me?

Oddly, it’s not one of his angry kisses. It’s hard and passionate for sure, but I feel no rage.

Our lips slide together, our tongues tangle, our teeth clash.

Hard, passionate, and full of desire.

Then he’s tearing at my clothes, his hands everywhere all at once. My shirt is gone, and then my bra. Then my jeans are midway down my thighs.

He lifts me and sets me on the granite countertop. I gasp at the cold on my ass.

Before I can think again, his cock is free and he’s thrusting into me. I’m wet, of course. I’m always wet with Dale. One look from him has me squirming.

It’s a fast and hard fuck, but still, not an angry fuck.

He slides one hand between my legs and massages my clit—

“Oh!”

After last night, I wasn’t sure I had any more climaxes in me, but that’s all it takes. I’m flying into orgasm, my blood boiling and racing through my veins, setting my whole body ablaze.

“Yes!” I cry. “Fuck, yes!”

“That’s right, Ashley. Come. For me. Only for me.”

He thrusts.

He thrusts.

He thrusts once more.

Then—

“Fuck,” he says through gritted teeth. “Fuck, I love you.”

His release is quick and smooth, and he stays inside me as my own subsides.

He pulls out, grabs a clean towel out of a drawer, and hands it to me while he zips himself up.

Am I supposed to say something? We’ve had fucks like this before, but they always had a precipitant. This time?

I’m not sure.

Perhaps he is angry. Angry that I said he was self-absorbed.

But I feel no rage from him.

And with Dale, rage is usually pretty darned apparent.

I slide off the counter and pull my jeans up.

“Shame to cover up that ass,” Dale says huskily.

And the red-wine cloak of his voice is back. It’s always there now, so much a part of me that I don’t notice it as often.

Am I taking it for granted?

Am I taking Dale for granted?

No. He’s promised me nothing beyond these two months.