Seeing is Believing (Cuttersville #3)(46)
Author: Erin McCarthy

She was right. As she dangled her feet over the edge of the cab, watching him, he dug into the nylon encasing and pulled out the sleeping bag.

“Piper?”

“Yes?”

“Have you ever wanted to move out of Cuttersville? Live in the city? See something of the world?”

“No.” She didn’t even need to think about it. The branches of the apple trees stretched out towards her as she sat on her truck, on Tucker land.

“Why?” He sounded frustrated, and she wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t like he was considering a future with her.

Was he? She wouldn’t dare to let herself even consider the possibility. Wanting him to want that was disastrous, because he never would, and she couldn’t go to Chicago anyway.

“Because my family is here. Sure, I’d love to travel and see some of the world, but I don’t want to live anywhere else.”

“But the city has excellent food, museums, shopping.”

He sounded like the Chamber of Commerce. “High rent, crime, pollution.” She laughed, still unsure what he was getting at. “None of which would bother me if my family were with me.”

“Really? You don’t want the experience of living somewhere else?”

“I don’t want the experience of being lonely. I want to know that I’m never more than a couple of miles from someone who loves me.”

There was a heartbeat when he just stared at her, then Brady stretched his hand out to take hers. “I can understand that.”

Did he really? He would never know what it felt like to have no one else in the world, no one who cared whether you lived or died. That’s what Piper had lived with as a kid, and once she’d found her family, she had no reason to ever want to leave again. She put her hand in his larger one. “I’m happy here,” she said. “It’s where I belong. What about you? Did you find that sense of belonging in Chicago? The place you know you’re meant to be?”

She expected him to say yes. To say that he had to go back because it was where he belonged.

Instead, he just said, “No.”

Piper slid down into the bed and stood in front of him, looking up into his handsome face. “No? I’m sorry.”

He gave a soft laugh. “You’re very sweet, which is why I can’t resist you. I should, you know. I should walk away from you. Hell, I should get in my car and drive back to Chicago tomorrow.”

“To the place you don’t belong?” she asked, because it seemed so utterly illogical to her.

“Yes. Because I’m being selfish with you.”

So that’s what was bothering him. Piper was oddly flattered. “How are you being selfish?” She wanted to hear him spell it out.

“By doing this with you and then going home.”

“I think they call this an affair. People have them all the time. We both understand it won’t be more than a few weeks.” Piper squeezed his hand. She wasn’t going to be denied this because he was having a moral pang, probably brought about by her father’s threats. “And if you remember, I’m the one who threw myself at you, so I don’t think you need to feel guilt over loving and leaving me.” She didn’t really want to be having this conversation, but she wasn’t one to be anything other than perfectly honest and direct.

Brady studied her, and the intensity of his scrutiny almost had her asking him what else was wrong, but she didn’t want to be that girl, the kind who questions a guy every five minutes. Are you okay? What’s wrong? Why are you quiet? Are you mad at me?

Piper would stab herself in the heart with a butter knife before she ever became that pathetic around Brady. She’d done that in college, and she would rather be alone for the rest of her life than let someone, or let herself, be reduced to a level-five clinger.

Her words seemed to have the effect she wanted. Brady shook his head a little. “Damn, you’re right. You’re totally right. You did throw yourself at me.” Brady grinned at her. “As long as we’re on the same page, hussy, I guess I shouldn’t be worrying.”

She supposed she’d walked right into that tease. “Ha-ha. Yes, we’re on the same page. Though right now it’s kind of a blank page.”

Brady gave her a smile that had probably charmed many a resolute woman right out of her underwear. “So let’s fill it up.”

That worked for her. “With what?”

“Nothing you’d write home to your mother. But something that will set your diary on fire.”

“I don’t have a diary.”

“Tomorrow you just might start.”

Piper suspected he just might be right.

           Chapter Ten

HOW WAS IT THAT THIS WOMAN COULD DISARM HIM THE way no other could? Brady had fully expected her to go ballistic on him when he reminded her that he was going back to Chicago. Or to try to talk him out of it. Or suggest she come with him. All responses he would have gotten from other women. Or the most likely one—defiant disinterest. The who f**king cares? You’re just a notch, baby—the attitude of a lot of women he’d dated. The attitude that he was never really sure was legit. Like was it that they really didn’t give a shit or were they just trying to make it seem that they didn’t?

But Piper didn’t react in any of those ways. She just shrugged and smiled and told him they were having an affair.

My God. They were having an affair. He wasn’t sure he’d ever done that. It was like traveling to Italy and meeting a local and spending two weeks sightseeing with her and making love and eating gelato, then going home. A wonderful and passionate interruption of life with a person you really connected with. That was exactly what he was doing, and now that she’d spelled it out for him, he was going to stop feeling guilty about it and dive right in and eat some gelato.

He spread out the sleeping bag and stripped off his T-shirt and bunched it up at the top of the bag like a pillow. Only a country girl would agree to do this, and he was feeling a whole new appreciation for farmers’ daughters. Kicking his boots off, he sent them sailing into the corner so they wouldn’t trip on them. Taking his cue, Piper stepped out of her sandals.

“Come here,” he murmured, then didn’t wait for her to follow his instructions. He couldn’t let another minute go by before he felt her skin against his, had her in his arms. Burying his head in her hair, he said, “You feel good.”