“What I want is answers,” Meg said.
“Really?” he said between gritted teeth. “Appears to me you think you’ve got it all figured out.”
“I want to know why you stopped calling. One day we were the perfect couple. The next day you acted like you didn’t know me.”
The perfect couple? This time it was his turn to laugh. She hadn’t even wanted anyone to know they were dating.
It had been the first of many clues he’d missed. She’d insisted they keep their “relationship” from her family and friends. She’d given him some bull about it being more special when it was their little secret. He realized now that she’d been embarrassed.
He came from the wrong side of the tracks. He hadn’t been in the accelerated classes like all her friends. Honor roll? He’d been lucky to maintain the C average he needed for football.
Perhaps Cole should have told her that he knew she’d betrayed his trust and told Ed he couldn’t read well. Yet, merely recalling that time brought back a flood of painful memories and feelings he’d done his best to forget. The past was the past, he told himself. It couldn’t be changed.
For Charlie’s sake, they needed to move on.
“We were young. We made mistakes,” Cole said when he realized Meg was waiting for a reply. “I don’t know about you, but I look back on that time with a whole litany of regrets.”
Regrets like he wished he’d set out for Texas the day he’d gotten his driver’s license. Meeting and moving in with his uncle had changed the course of his life. If only he’d done it sooner.
He wished he’d slugged Ed Rice. Though he firmly believed violence was rarely the answer, wiping that smirk off Ed’s lips with his fist would have been worth the fallout.
Most of all, he wished he’d never gotten involved with Meg.
With his hand on the small of her back, he steered her with gentle caresses to the beat of the music. Considering his knee, he made a surprisingly good dance partner.
“I have regrets, too,” Meg admitted after a long moment.
She thought about her parents and how she’d lied to them about her relationship with Cole. She hadn’t wanted anyone to know they were dating because deep in her heart she’d known the relationship wouldn’t last. He was the handsome football star every girl wanted to date. She was the red-haired science geek who’d never even kissed a boy.
She wished she hadn’t believed Cole when he said he loved her. Most of all, she wished she’d never gotten involved with him.
“We could start over,” he said in an offhand tone as if it didn’t matter to him one way or another. “Pretend we’ve just met.”
Meg could see where he was going with this. He was asking a lot. Yet, he had been only a boy when he’d treated her so badly. Since she’d been back in Jackson Hole, she’d seen no evidence of that callous youth in the man he’d become. Though he hadn’t openly apologized, at least he had admitted he had regrets over how he’d behaved.
“I’m game if you are,” she said finally.
For Charlie’s sake, she told herself. She was doing this for Charlie’s sake.
Meg prayed that was true. Because if it wasn’t, she could be headed for big trouble.
Chapter Eleven
“Now that we’ve settled one aspect of our relationship, I want—” Cole took a step back and held Meg at arm’s length “—to talk about the proposition still on the table.”
Meg could feel her face warm even as her eyes, which seemed to have suddenly developed a mind of their own, zeroed in on the area directly below his belt buckle.
“I’ve thought about it,” she said quickly. “I don’t think us becoming physically…intimate would be wise.”
She lifted her gaze. The eye contact quickly turned into something more, a tangible connection between the two of them.
“Then I’ll settle for another dance.” He tugged her back into his arms, placing his hands on her hips while she reluctantly twined her fingers behind his neck.
To be so close didn’t seem prudent, especially considering what had happened on his bed earlier. Yet to refuse seemed…childish. After all, it wasn’t as if she was afraid of him.
More like afraid of myself, Meg thought with a wry smile.
“It’ll be like we’re dancing at prom,” she murmured, finding comfort in the words. After all, kids went to such events in high school all the time. Those nights rarely ended with the couple having sex. “Dancing should be safe.”
Even as she reassured herself, Meg shivered with desire. The mere feel of his body against hers brought a fresh rush of longing.
“Safe?” Cole chuckled, a low, pleasant rumbling sound. “If you say so.”
“I can’t deny that your offer is tempting,” she said slowly. “But we have to be smart about this.”
His hand, which had begun to caress her back while they moved in time to the music, stilled. “You think I’m stupid?”
There was an edge to his tone that she didn’t understand. Meg tilted her head back and met his gaze. “I was simply saying that becoming physically involved when we’re trying to find our way in our relationship with each other and with Charlie could be problematic.”
Chuckling, Cole kissed the corner of her mouth. “It’s such a turn-on when you talk like a schoolteacher.”
Though warning bells went off in her head, Meg had to laugh. “What am I going to do with you?”
“Kiss me,” he whispered, the tip of his tongue circling her ear. “One kiss.”
A smoldering heat flared through her at his suggestion, scaring and thrilling her at the same time.
“One kiss?” She spoke then paused, not sure what she wanted.
“That will be the plan,” he said in a nonchalant tone. “But if you change your mind and want more, we don’t have to stop at one.”
One little peck on the lips. What would be the harm?
Still, Meg hesitated.
“You want to kiss me,” he said, his voice a husky caress. “True? Or false?”
“True,” she reluctantly admitted.
“I want to kiss you. In fact, right now I’m finding it hard to think of anything else.”
Time seemed to stretch and extend. The music took on a seductive beat. Do it. Do it, the pulsating rhythm urged.
“C’mon, Meg,” he murmured, twining strands of her hair loosely around his fingers. “One little kiss for your prom date.”
After the tiniest hesitation she nodded. Anticipation fluttered through her.
One kiss, she told herself, maybe two.
He caught her hand in his, brought it to his mouth and pressed a kiss in the palm.
She pulled her brows together. “That’s it?”
Cole laughed. “You are so demanding.”
He lowered his head and kissed her softly, gently, while Richard Marx began to sing in the background. Cole’s lips were warm and sweet and Meg let her eyelids flutter shut, savoring the closeness.
The music transported her to a high school gym decorated with crepe streamers and balloons. Cole was in a tux and she was in a slinky dress that made her look beautiful and they were kissing on the dance floor.