Read Titanium Security Series 4 - Extinguished for Free Online

down and not panic about the pause that followed. Whatever he was going to say, it had to be said. She’d just have to suck it up like the big girl she’d told him she was. Only she was fucking terrified that her heart might stop beating if he told her that kiss had been a mistake.
    “I’m sorry.”
    That was it. Two words. Jordyn swallowed and held her tongue, praying he wasn’t apologizing for kissing her.
    He shot her a sideways glance, sighed when she didn’t respond. “I shouldn’t have done it.”
    Oh, shit. Her stomach plummeted like an anvil. Reeling from the impact, not knowing how she was going to handle it, she didn’t say a word.
    “We were both emotional that night and I shouldn’t have touched you like that. I wasn’t thinking straight. I felt like such a shit afterward and then I didn’t know what to do to fix it, so I thought it was best if I…left.”
    My God, he not only regretted kissing her, it had made him feel like shit for doing it. She took a deep breath, willed her heart to keep beating as the tiny, stubborn flame of hope burning there was brutally snuffed out. The pain was far worse than she’d thought it would be, considering she’d been bracing for this. It felt like she was bleeding on the inside. “Okay,” she answered slowly, surprised her voice was working. “Why?”
    He frowned. “Why what?”
    “Why would it make you feel like shit?” Hadn’t it been obvious that she’d wanted him to kiss her? That she’d been dying for it and had been for years ?
    “Uh, because it was wrong of me,” he said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world and he couldn’t understand why she didn’t see it too. “I crossed the line and it wrecked our friendship. I’m sorry for that. I want to fix it, get back to the way we used to be.”
    Back to when she was just Jamie’s little sister to him, he meant.
    The realization made her throat ache with grief. She quickly looked away from him, afraid he’d see the devastation in her eyes. Shock and disbelief slid through her, numbing and cold. She’d been in love with him for so long and he’d never realized it, not even after that kiss or the e-mails she’d sent him. How could he not have known? Or had he just not wanted to? Worse, he felt nothing for her aside from affection and friendship. How was she supposed to deal with that?
    “Hey, you gonna say anything?” he prompted with a nervous laugh, glancing over at her. “I’m kinda out on a limb here all by myself.”
    Out on a limb was better than having your heart smashed to pieces by the person you loved. “What do you want me to say?” she managed, her voice hoarse. Driving with him was a mistake. Now she had to endure the rest of the trip while trying to smother her grief.
    “Just say you forgive me and that we can fix it. I already lost Jamie. I don’t want to lose you too.” His tone was quiet and sincere, and she knew as a man of few words that the admission hadn’t been easy for him.
    But I can’t be just your friend , she wanted to shout at him, battling the pressure of tears at the back of her throat. She couldn’t just turn her feelings on and off like a fucking faucet, even for him. “I just—I need some time,” she made herself say. Time to recover from this blow, and more time to let the idea of him go. God, how did she even go about that? She wasn’t sure if she could ever go back to the way things used to be. There was no way she could hide all the longing and hurt inside her forever, and she shouldn’t have to.
    He looked away from her, focusing back on the road as he merged onto the freeway that would take them to Maryland. His mouth thinned. “Okay. I understand.”
    No, you fucking don’t understand .
    She turned her head to stare blindly out her window and blinked fast, locking everything inside until she was alone later. God, she would not cry in front of him. That would be the ultimate humiliation on top of everything else. Why the hell