Sinful Like Us (Like Us, #5)

by Krista Ritchie

I can’t read his hard features. My pulse won’t slow, and I have to ask, “What are you thinking?” He looks me over. “You keep me on my toes.” He lets out a laugh. “And it’s driving me nuts, and it’s un-fucking-real how much I want you.” “You have me,” I remind him. Thatcher nods a short nod, and in a long beat, he looks deeper into me. “When I was your bodyguard and we were fucking, you’d let me help you no hesitation, and now that I’m your boyfriend, you’re frozen.” My eyes flit down. Thatcher shifts uneasily. “You’re confusing the hell out of me, and I want to walk with you through this, honey. But I don’t know where you’re going.” “I want you to hold me so badly,” I admit. I want you to swallow me whole. Fear pinpricks me, and I hate that I’m unwilling to drown in his comfort right now and yet I hate that I want to be completely and wholly consumed by him. “But I feel like I have to stand on my own first.” I cling onto my autonomy by my fingertips, and he’s there, reaching a hand out and asking me to grab hold, to pull me up. And I won’t let him. Not entirely.