Crazy Beautiful Love (The Martelli Brothers #1)(33)
Author: J.S. Cooper

“I did?” I wanted to step back from her. My head was starting to feel overwhelmed with emotions and realizations.

“Yeah, you did.” She grinned. “You just told me that you’re falling for me, too.”

“Too?”

“Well, you know,” she laughed. “I’ve already fallen for you.”

“Oh, Maddie.”

“We deserve to give this a chance, Logan.” She bit her lip and leaned in and pressed her lips against mine. Her lips tasted like sweet mint and I closed my eyes as I kissed her back sweetly. I pulled away from her and grabbed her hand again.

“Come, we still haven’t gotten to the field as yet.” I didn’t want to continue talking about us. I wasn’t ready to delve any deeper into our feelings. It was all too new for me, and I needed to think. We walked for another ten minutes in companionable silence and then I saw the familiar two rocks on top of each other and stopped. “My mom and I put those rocks there.” I pointed over to them. “We wanted to make a marker so we wouldn’t forget this spot.”

“Did you guys come here a lot?”

“Maybe four or five times.” My eyes glazed over. As I had gotten older, it had been harder and harder for my mother to take me anywhere with her, especially once I became a teenager. I had not wanted to come and visit fields with mother anymore. I could still remember the last time she had asked me. I had been playing videogames with Vincent, and I had been feeling particularly proud of myself because I had bought the newest game out of money my father had given me for helping him steal a brand new Toyota Camry. I had heard her arguing with my father about letting me go with him, and she had told him she didn’t want this life for her sons. She then came to my room and asked if I wanted to go on a drive with her. I hadn’t even looked up from the game; I was still annoyed with her. “I thought we could go to our field,” she had said, but I ignored her. She left the room silently and had never asked me again before she died. That was a memory that still pained me, and I felt my muscles tighten as I stared at the rocks.

“It must have been nice to come here with just your mom,” Maddie continued and squeezed my hand as if she realized how hard it was for me to be here.

“It was nice.” I nodded. “Let’s go.” I pushed through the bushes next to the rocks and held them open for Maddie as much as I could. She squeezed through and we took a few more steps and then I stopped and stared. There in front of us was the largest field of sunflowers I had ever seen in my life, it seemed to go on and on, and each sunflower seemed to shine even brighter than the next.

“Wow, this is amazing.” Maddie’s eyes shone with appreciation. “This is so beautiful.” She gazed around and gingerly touched the petals of a sunflower in front of her. “I understand why Van Gogh painted sunflowers now.”

“They all look so similar, but if you study them, they are all so unique. The yellows in their petals, the oranges of the florets, all so unique if you stop to study them carefully.”

“I don’t really know much about flowers.”

“Me, either.” I laughed. “Sad, really, but I couldn’t name half of them for you.”

“So are sunflowers your favorite flower then?”

“Why, of course. What about you?”

“Is it cliché if I say roses?” She blushed. “Red roses are my absolute favorite.”

“They are the flower of love.” I grinned at her.

“No one has ever given me roses before.”

“Not even a boyfriend?” I teased, trying to ignore the slight stirring of jealousy inside.

“Not a one of them,” she laughed. “And I gave them plenty of hints as well.”

“What sort of hints? Maybe they didn’t understand. You know how you girls can be.”

“Hints like, oh, it’s my birthday coming up. I’d love it if someone got me roses.”

“Oh.” I laughed.

“Yeah, exactly. Anyone who was listening should have known I would have loved to have received some roses.”

“Good things come to those who wait.”

“I sure hope so.”

“So,” I asked casually. “Are you dating anyone right now?”

“Is that a joke?” She gave me a weird look.

“No.” I looked away from her. A part of me was wondering why I was going down this road of questions. I didn’t want to go down this road, because I knew where it would end up. It would end up with her asking where we were going, and what did I want, and I didn’t want to answer that. Though I did want to know more about Maddie. What was it about me that attracted her? What guys had she dated before? Did she have a history of choosing bad boys? Was she one of those girls whose goal was to fix her man? I knew I didn’t want to be that guy to her, though I didn’t know exactly what role I wanted to play in her life.

“Well, no, Logan. I’m not dating anyone. I certainly wouldn’t be sleeping with you if I was sleeping with someone else.”

“So, you don’t sleep around?” I knew the words came out wrong. I knew she may interpret my tone as disbelief that she wasn’t easy. Even though that wasn’t what I meant, I really wanted to know if she was interested in anyone else aside from me, but I didn’t want to voice it that way.

“I know it’s hard for you to believe, but no, I am not sleeping around.”

“So there’s no one.”

“There’s no one.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m just a single girl, having some fun.”

“I see.”

“You’re such an idiot.” She pushed me slightly. “I like you, Logan. Don’t you understand that?”

“What?” I couldn’t stop the smile on my face. “You like me?”

“Like that is really news to you.”

“Well, you know,” I laughed, “I’m a guy, I’m a bit slow.”

“Just a bit?”

“You know how it can be sometimes.”

“So what about you?”

“What about me?”

“So do you like me as well?”

“Hmm, that’s a bit of a hard question.”

“Logan Martelli!”

“I think I can say that I like you.” I smiled at her warmly. “I think I can say that I like you quite a lot.” I laughed at the words. If my brothers could see me now, telling a girl I liked her like some pu**y.