I snapped my mouth shut.

Ham did not.

“Now either you open your mouth and get that or you keep it shut and ride home with me. Which is it gonna be?”

Although, in an alternate universe, I’d jump at option A, in this universe, I was definitely going with option B.

So I pressed my lips together and, just in case he couldn’t see that from where he was lounging in the doorway, I slid them to the side to make sure I made my point.

“Good f**kin’ choice,” he stated. “Now get your ass in here while I finish shit.”

He stepped to the side and I got my ass in there, squeezing by him, so I could wait it out while he finished shit.

Then, clearly, we were going home to talk.

And I was utterly terrified of what he had to say.

Chapter Eight

I Lied

We made the ride home in silence but I knew I couldn’t avoid the talk just as I knew I shouldn’t.

We had to get this out and move on.

And I knew how we were going to move on and that was me moving out and finding another job (again) because this was messed up.

I couldn’t live like this.

I’d tried but I’d rolled the dice and f**ked it up.

I was in love with Ham. I had been since I was twenty-four. I probably would be forever.

So as he “finished shit” at the bar, I blanked my mind, stayed quiet, and waited.

The ride home was silent and tense. And when we got home, I moved to the living room, shrugged off my purse and jacket, and threw them on the armchair before I turned to sit my ass on the couch in order to get this done and prepare to move on.

Before I could make it to the couch, my hand was seized, my arm tugged, and I found myself being dragged behind Ham toward the hall.

“Ham—”

“Shut it five seconds, baby,” he told the hall, taking us on a direct trajectory to his room.

It took more than five seconds but I kept it shut the entire time, mostly because I was bemused, sad at the thought of losing Ham for good, and freaked way the hell out at the way Ham was acting. I was also wondering why I managed to always f**k up my life. I had no one else to blame but me about everything.

And especially this.

I knew better than to move in with him. I way knew better than to go to him that first night.

But I did.

Now we were broken, just like I broke Greg.

Ham was right, Greg knew me. He knew who he’d married, so I’d come to uneasy terms with that being not exactly all my fault.

This, I had no leg to stand on.

When we got to his room, Ham switched on a bedside lamp, used his hand in mine to maneuver me to the bed, and then let me go to put his hand in my belly. He gave me a little shove so I was sitting on his bed.

I looked up at him. “Ham—”

“Five more seconds, cookie,” he muttered as he bent, lifted my leg, yanked off my boot then he did the same with the other.

After that, he straightened and shrugged off his jeans jacket, letting it drop to the floor. He then stooped to take off his own boots and only after that did he come to me, plant his hands under my arms, and haul me into the bed so I was on my back, head to the pillows.

I belatedly started breathing heavily when he put a knee to the bed, hiked his other leg over me, and settled his big body mostly on me, partly to my side.

He put his elbow in the pillow, head in hand, and locked eyes with me.

That was when he asked, “What the f**k was that?”

My mind was now blanked for a different reason, primarily freaking way the hell out that we were having this conversation in his bed, so I didn’t know what he was asking.

Even if I wasn’t freaking, I still would be confused.

Therefore, I asked, “What the f**k was what?”

“Last night,” he answered. “I go to the bathroom to get rid of the condom, come out, you’re gone. By the time I make it to the door, buck naked, mind, I see you dressed and runnin’ down the hall. Seein’ as I’m buck naked, I can’t get to you before you disappear. You’re gone all night, don’t answer your phone, don’t answer it all f**kin’ day. I’m worried sick, you stroll into the bar, and then you’re beyond weird at work.”

I stared into his eyes, marveling how the light brown at his pupils spiked through the dark brown that edged his irises. I’d never seen anything like that and it was all kinds of fascinating because it was all kinds of gorgeous.

I did this memorizing it because, soon, I wouldn’t see it again.

Then I focused not on the color of his eyes, but him.

“I need to move out,” I whispered and his body seemed to grow heavier on mine as his eyebrows snapped together.

“What the f**k?”

“I need to move out,” I repeated, louder this time. “And, um, give notice.”

“What the f**k?” he said again, pissed this time, then he bit out, “For f**k’s sake, why?”

“Why?” I asked.

He had to know.

“Yeah, babe, why?”

He didn’t know.

“I can’t do this,” I told him. “I can’t be like we are now. I can’t be roomies.”

“Yeah, your sweet, hot, middle-of-the-night visit clued me in to that. Or, I should say, your sweet, hot, long-fuckin’-overdue visit clued me in to that.”

I felt my lips part as my eyes went from looking into his to staring.

“What?” I breathed.

“Zara, for nearly two months, I’ve been waitin’ for you to come to me.”

What did he just say?

I didn’t get a chance to ask; he kept talking.

“I didn’t handle it right that first night. Got the wrong end of the stick. You weren’t you. Thought your head was f**ked. You gave me plenty of time to think about it, though, and I get it. You were you, and Christ, never knew a woman who liked my c**k in her mouth so much. You got lost in that, lost control and, my guess, it’s been a long time so that made you totally lose control. It was f**kin’ hot, don’t get me wrong, but you got so lost it made me feel like available meat. But I shouldn’t have been a dick. I should have talked to you about it. But I’d been waiting so goddamned long for you to come to me, and that was not how I wanted it to go when you did, that I got pissed and acted like an ass**le. But you shouldn’t have run away when we sorted that out last night in my bed before we could totally sort it out by havin’ a goddamned chat.”

I heard all that.

But I honed into one part of it.

“You’ve been waiting for me to come to you?”