We lie there quietly, looking at each other before he sweeps in for another kiss.

He turns his head then and gives me another pile of long lazy kisses. “Are you going to keep your promise to me, Rachel?” Kiss.

“Hmm . . .” Lazy kissing from me to him. “Yes, Sin.”

“Good girl . . .” More lazy kissing, then he rolls around and gets up from the bed.

“Where are you going?” I sit up in confusion, pushing my hair out of my face.

“I have to go. I have something important pending at my place.” He heads to the door.

“You mean you’re not spending the night?”

He stops to turn, then lifts one dark eyebrow. Then the other.

And then, I see the twinkle appear in his eyes.

He comes back to me.

Leaning down, he buttons up the button he unbuttoned, his handsome face sober now.

He cups my breast over his shirt as he opens up his mouth and dips his head for one last taste of me. He sucks my bottom lip gently, then does the same with the top lip, then he dives into my mouth, which gets a delicious little tongue fuck before he sets one soft kiss at the corner of my mouth. He touches my body like it’s his and I’m starting to worry. God, I’m addicted.

But then he whispers, “Not here, little one.”

“Why?”

“Your friend’s here. And I want you to make noise.” He looks at me meaningfully.

“I’ll see you soon?” he husks out, easing back and once again heading for the door.

He’s leaving.

I watch him grab my doorknob.

“I planned to hit the Cubs game next weekend. I have a mind to take you there.”

“Cubs game?” I nearly leap off the bed. “Yes! ”

His eyes glimmer. Those naughty lips of his tug upward.

I blush when I wonder if it’s because he knows how I feel about him. “I’m excited because I’ve never been to a live game.”

His eyes glint. “Of course.”

I know he knows I’m excited to go with him.

I want to say I love you but before I get the courage, he’s gone. And I lie in bed, wondering about us.

The next morning, I tell Gina a little bit about the fight and how he said some bone-melting things to me and I ask her if she thinks Saint loves me.

She gives me a you’re-shitting-me look.

I reply with a no-I’m-not-shitting-you look.

“You’re kidding?”

“I never kid about Saint, Gina.”

She shoves her spoon back into her plate. “I wouldn’t know, Rache. What I do know is that he makes you vulnerable and you’re putting up walls.”

“No I’m not.”

“You don’t want to expect anything. You’re still scared.”

“Okay, maybe I am scared.”

“Scared of what?”

My shoulder hikes up. “Everything,” I laugh pitifully. “I’m always scared.”

“About it not being reciprocated?”

I nod.

“Of his fame and his groupies? How ready they are for him to tire of you to welcome him with open legs and arms?”

“Gina!” I scowl. “He’s not like that.”

But in a way, I am scared of his groupies. I’m scared of being in love. With . . . him.

“They’re all like that, Tahoe and Callan too.” She pauses. “Dude. I’d be scared too. But . . . Look at his actions, Rachel. Those should be worth more than sweet-talking words. Paul used to tell me . . . I don’t even want to remember. But he didn’t mean it, his actions said otherwise. God, I could’ve killed him for being such a cheating liar if I hadn’t been so . . . devastated.”

She eyes me somberly.

“What Saint has done for you, Rachel. Offering the job. Canning Victoria’s article but not yours. That safety thing he did with End the Violence. Coming here last night to talk it out . . . I know you’re a words girl, but he’s more of a doer than a teller. He’s doing things to be close to you. Maybe you should start ’fessing up and telling.”

I open my hands in a helpless gesture. “I told him I loved him, on the phone. Once.”

A stab pricks my chest when I again wonder how he took it?

“Before the shit happened. Maybe he wants you to take the leap again. In that article, you wrote that you’d leap if you thought he’d catch you. Don’t you think he will?”

A warm glow fills me as I imagine leaping knowing that he would catch me, and my lips curve a little. “Since when are you so perceptive?” I ball a paper napkin and toss it over the table at her.