Unexpected Chance by Annalisa Nicole Page B

right and perfect and I want to go back out there and do it again. I need to go home. I need to get as far away from Aiden as I can. He deserves so much better than me. The zoo, the family, dinner, the movie, those are things that happen to other people. Every time I let myself think that those types of things can happen to me, I end up literally losing my shirt. It’s not even the clothes, or the things that I lose that gets me. This time it’s my heart that’s at stake. I’ve guarded my heart since I was ten. I can’t give that to anyone ever again. It died with my mother, that’s what I told myself. Slowly over the last few days I’ve felt it come alive. This can’t happen. It needs to stop.
    I start to pace Aiden’s bathroom. I see my toothbrush in his holder and my things on his counter. All reminders that I’ve let this go too far. Shit, I don’t have any clothes in here. I look at the towel hanging on the rack, then at the window to my left. I could sneak out the window and just disappear. I can get a new place and a new job. That will protect Aiden from me.
    I roll my eyes at myself. What good will that do? I still have school; my scholarship is only for that school. I’m not letting anything stand in the way of that. Besides that, Aiden knows where I go to school. I bite my thumbnail and try to come up with another plan. I turn around to pace back toward the door, when my heart jumps out of my chest.
    “Is everything alright in there?” Aiden asks, gently knocking on the door.
    “Uh, yeah, I’ll be out in a minute,” I tell him.
    Now what do I do? I use the bathroom, then wash my hands. I crack the door open to look for Aiden. He’s lying in bed, the sheet covering him from the waist down. He has my side of the bed sheets pulled back; he smiles that killer smile at me that melts my reserve every time, then he pats the mattress next to him.
    “Come to bed, baby,” he says in a husky voice .
    ‘I can dream, can’t I?’ Those words roll through my thoughts pulling me so easily back into my fairytale. I find my feet taking one step in front of the other to his bed. I put one knee on the mattress, then the other, and lay down next to him. The heat from his chest on my back feels incredible. How can this be wrong? He covers me with the sheet, then pulls my hair to the side, tucking it between us. He places a soft, warm kiss on the center of my neck, leaving his lips lingering there. He trails down to my shoulder, then brushes them back and forth. He places one more soft kiss on the top of my shoulder, then lays his head down on his pillow.
    I squeeze my eyes closed hard. I’m such an easy fool. Aiden squeezes me tight to his body, then wraps his arm around my chest. I kiss his wrist, and within five minutes his warm, even breath is steady on my neck. He has a slight snore with every inhale, but even that is comforting.
    I lay for hours going over all the reasons I shouldn’t be in this bed with this amazing man. I can list a million reasons, all of them a reflection on me. I’m damaged, broken, tainted goods. There’s only one reason why I should be here, the one that keeps playing over and over in my brain. I’ve always been the dreamer, always thinking that my Prince Charming will show up one day and whisk me away to my happily ever after. I’m thirty-five years old, if it hasn’t happened yet, it never will. ‘ I can dream, can’t I? ’ It will always just be a dream.
    As I count the million reasons why I’m just not good enough, still I find myself threading my fingers in Aiden’s hand as he sleeps.
    I must have fallen asleep; there is soft, scratchy stubble around smooth, warm lips running up and down the top of my arm. I open my eyes and see my fingers still threaded in Aiden’s.
    “Good morning, beautiful,” he says with a kiss.
    It was as physical as any beating I’ve ever taken from a man. It was a compliment, but felt more like the most painful lie I could ever tell myself.