Chapter 18

18

Ben noticed that Lauren was quiet on the drive back to Hope Falls, pensively watching the scenery unfold outside their window. He watched her beautiful face for the slightest sign that there might be trouble brewing below the placid exterior, but no. She just seemed lost in thought.

He'd learned by now that if Lauren was pissed off at him but pretending not to be, what he got was an elaborate production of her pretending to work. This was quite different from that.

He liked the fact that he was getting to know her so well. He wanted to know everything about her—her history, her likes and dislikes, her facial expressions, her moods, her quirks, her...everything.

He was all in.

Ben didn't know what the etiquette was for letting someone know that you had reached the emotional place in a relationship where you're ready to take it to the next level—he'd never been there before. He assumed there was some kind of process to go through, some sort of standard method of indicating to the person that they were the only one that you wanted to spend time with, the only partner you were interested in having.

He'd heard people talk about the ‘DTR,' the talk you have with the person you're dating where you ‘define the relationship'—thus the name. In the past, when Ben had thought about having the talk with anyone, it always made him shudder, and not with pleasure. No, the shudder it inspired in him was one of pure dread.

When he thought about sitting down on a couch or at a table with a woman he was dating and coming up with definitive descriptions of exactly what they meant to each other, exactly what their relationship consisted of, where their relationship was headed, and what the future held for them—well, it made him practically break out in hives.

The thought of a ‘relationship,' in his mind, had signified the idea of being held down, like the phrase—‘the old ball and chain.' Why would anyone voluntarily tie themselves down? The very idea of it spoke of a loss of freedom, a loss of privacy, a loss of...basically everything he valued in his personal life.

What no one ever explained to him was everything you gained when you committed yourself to a relationship with someone you felt so strongly about.

No one ever told him how the right woman could make you feel like you were able to conquer the world. No one ever told him how the right woman could make you feel like there were endless possibilities open and available to you. No one ever told him it wasn't a matter of tying yourself down because with the right woman, there was only one place in the world you'd ever want to be and only one person in the world you'd want to be there with.

The right woman.

That was the key.

He'd never met the right woman before. He used to laugh when his mother would gaze at him oh so wisely and say, "Oh, Benny. Don't you worry about trying to settle down. When you meet the right one, you won't have to try to want to settle down with her. It'll be all you can think about. You'll be racing her to the altar."

He had honestly thought that she was crazy.

Until he met Lauren Harrison and everything he thought was true about the world, relationships, and his own heart was flipped on its head.

Now that he was with Lauren, he realized that his mother couldn't have been more right. All he wanted to do, all the time, was be with her. He didn't care what they were doing; he just wanted to be with her.

It was so far beyond sex that it seemed silly to him to even think about writing off the bond they shared as simply lust driven. It was so much more than that.

He honestly didn't care if they just sat together reading or doing the crossword. He loved to eat with her. He loved to talk with her. God, he would probably love doing laundry or going to the grocery store if it was with her. Lauren made everything magic.

And as far as having ‘the talk'? Well, he was more than ready. Bring it on. He wasn't afraid of being tied down to Lauren. As a matter of fact, the opposite was true. His biggest fear, at this point, was that she wouldn't want to be tied down to him .

He shook his head. He'd never felt this way about women and relationships. If you needed just one piece of evidence that Lauren Harrison had magic at her disposal you need look no further than him. In only a few weeks, she had completely transformed him.

The only question was—had he done the same to her?

As they pulled up in front of Lauren's house, she still hadn't shaken off her pensive mood, and it made Ben nervous to think about leaving things between them on this quiet, low-key note. He wanted her last impression of him, and of them, to be upbeat, joyful, and passion filled.

She turned to him, smiling quietly, saying goodbye, and he reminded her, "I'm going to be in Sacramento this weekend at the children's wing dedication. So I won't see your beautiful face until Monday."

She responded happily, "Okay, sounds good. See you then."

Hmmmm. It wasn't a bad sign by any stretch of the imagination, but it also certainly wasn't the high note he was aiming for.

Acting entirely on instinct, Ben followed Lauren as she exited the car, grabbed her wrist, and spun her around, pulling her against him and kissing her with all of his might. As he was kissing her, he concentrated on really using the gesture to communicate to her how he was feeling.

With every bit of passion, every bit of affection, every bit of magic that he felt with every fiber of his being any time she was in the same room with him—who was he kidding, any time she wasn't in the same room with him as well—he did his best to communicate to her with that kiss.

When he finally drew back and looked into her eyes, he was rewarded by seeing the unguarded sparkle there that he'd seen during their very best times together. Now that was the reaction he'd been hoping for.

She seemed to have been robbed of the power of speech, and he liked the thought of leaving her a little off-balance with something to think about.

So without another word, he climbed back into the car and shut the door behind him. As the town car started to pull away, he slid the tinted window down and said, "See you Monday, gorgeous."

Her only response was to smile and gently touch her lips in wonderment.

That was perfectly fine with him.

--- ~ ---

Lauren sat in her chair at book club, wondering if she should just make an excuse and head home. Things were so confusing with Ben right now, and she really felt that what she needed more than anything was some time alone to work through it in her mind and attempt to come to some sort of conclusion.

Of course, because her friends were who her friends were, if she did try to make an excuse and hightail it out of there, the only thing she would accomplish would be to draw attention to the fact that she had something juicy to discuss. She wouldn't get out of there until midnight.

She couldn't stop thinking about that last kiss Ben had given her just outside her house the day before. It was different than any kiss they'd shared before.

Lauren realized that what she was about to tell herself was a ridiculous assertion for two people who'd been naked together on more than one occasion, the truth was, that kiss in front of her house felt like the most intimate, the most personal thing she and Ben had ever shared. Really, it felt like the most intimate, most personal thing she'd ever shared with anyone.

It was freaking her out.

The more she thought about it, the more she felt like an idiot for entrusting her heart to someone like Ben Stevens.

First of all, she didn't know what his intentions were. What was he planning to do if the show got picked up? What was he planning to do if the show didn't get picked up?

Who was to say that he wouldn't be treating her like a stranger again the next time she saw him? They'd gone from piping hot to icy cold before in the blink of an eye—what made her think that it wouldn't happen again?

What, for that matter, made her think that she wasn't one in a large group of women Ben was seeing right now? What made her think that what was happening between them was special to him in any way?

What if, from his perspective, this wasn't even something that was "happening" so much as it was just one of his many random hook-ups that happened as he traveled from town to town, charming his way through all the local ladies with his television star status?

Oh, God. Was that what she was? Was she little more than a local groupie?

Her instincts told her that this was so much more than that, not only from her perspective, but from his as well. After all, she made her living by reading people. She couldn't be that wrong about him... Could she?

She shook her head. Not possible. Not after that kiss. Not after all she had felt coming from him as he'd held her, not after the way he'd looked at her when he'd pulled away. Not after that.

She glanced around, wondering how much longer the meeting was going to last before she could make her graceful exit, and noticed that every single person in the room was staring at her.

"What?" she asked.

Amy glanced at her watch. "Six minutes and forty-seven seconds," she pronounced definitively. "I believe that makes Sam the winner at seven minutes. Unless we were playing with Let's Make a Deal rules where you can't go over. I believe we were just playing that the closest guess wins, right?"

"You bet your ass that's how we were playing," Sam said decisively. "Now hand over your ten dollars, losers."

The rest of the girls reluctantly pulled ten-dollar bills from their purses, grumbling all the while.

Karina said, "Yeah, even if we disagreed, it wouldn't be worth getting in a fight with you about it, Little Miss Competitive."

"Damn straight," agreed Sam, not in the least offended.

"What is going on here?" Lauren said, puzzled.

"We had a bet going, about how long it would be until you came out of the trance you were lost in and realized that we were all sitting here staring at you. I was the timekeeper," Amy explained.

Lauren sighed. Damn it. Now they were going to make her talk about it.

"So you know now you have to talk about it, right?" Karina asked.

"I realize that," Lauren replied.

"I assume," Karina continued, "that this has something to do with Mr. Hottie Co-Host, correct?"

Lauren laughed a short laugh and said satirically, "How did you guess?"

"So...are you actually in a good place with him right now?" Amanda asked. "The last I heard, things were pretty rocky between the two of you."

"I guess. But the fact that I have no idea just exactly how present in my life he's going to be after next week, is a big part of the problem I'm dealing with."

Amanda looked hopeful as she asked, "If you're now hoping that he sticks around, I guess that's good. Right?"

Lauren shook her head, looking miserable. She threw up her hands as if in surrender. Amanda immediately crossed the room to sit next to her and wrapped her arms around Lauren's shoulders.

"I don't know if things are good or bad between us." Lauren felt exhausted. "That's another huge part of the problem but I'm trying to deal with it!"

Karina said, "Okay, I think we're gonna need to take this one step at a time. The last thing we all knew, you guys were giving each other the cold shoulder, and you'd just seen him bring a girl into his room. Which you were really pissed about. Take it away."

"What do you mean, the last thing you all knew? I only told you that," she pointed at Karina.

Karina shrugged, grinning. "Fine. If you didn't want me to tell them, just operate on the assumption that I kept my mouth shut. Feel free to go through the entire story again."

Lauren shook her head. "Forget it. That's fine. I'll pick it up from there. So the next day, I went to his trailer to have it out with him once and for all—"

"Wearing only a trench coat?" Karina asked hopefully.

"No, wearing my normal clothes."

Karina shook her head and sighed. "When will you people ever learn?"

Lauren chuckled wickedly. "Well, it had pretty much the same effect."

"What? You little hoochie, you. Congrats!" Karina said.

"Yeah," Lauren said happily. "It was pretty awesome."

"So who did the girl end up being?" Amy asked.

"What?" Lauren was confused.

"The girl," Amy clarified. "The one he brought to his room."

"Oh," said Lauren, her happy mood downshifting a bit. "Um...I don't know, actually."

"And what did he say about giving you the cold shoulder? Did he apologize and promise never to do it again?" Amanda asked indignantly.

"Oh, yeah, well..." Lauren waffled. "I guess we didn't really get around to talking about that."

"So let me get this straight," Sam said suspiciously. "You had numerous concerns about not only his behavior but the way he was treating you, you went to his trailer to detail those concerns, stand up for yourself, and demand that he treat you with the respect you deserve, and what ended up happening instead is you had hot monkey sex and didn't discuss any of your issues. Sound about right?"

Lauren nodded, looking unsure. She hadn't really laid out the sequence of events exactly that way in her mind yet, but once she did, she had to admit that they sounded just about right.

"And you all accuse me of being na?ve about relationships," Sam said with disgust.

"Don't listen to Judgy McJudgerson over there," Karina said. "I, for one, like your style, kid. I approve wholeheartedly."

"I'm not sure that's the best message to be sending her, Karina," Amanda said, concern written across her face.

"What am I, an ABC Afterschool Special?" Karina said. "She's a grown-ass woman. She doesn't need to be forming her ideas about what the world is like based on the things I say to her. Besides, I don't actually see the problem here. She went to his trailer to ask him to treat her nicely. It sounds like that's exactly what he did."

"Except this isn't actually my style," Lauren said, sounding a little depressed.

"What?" Amanda asked.

"Karina said she liked my style," Lauren responded, "except that's kind of the problem, isn't it? This isn't my style. None of this is my style. Not having such strong feelings, not giving over all of the control, and certainly not the bizarre experience of having absolutely no idea what is going through the other person's head at any given moment. None of that is my style, and I don't like it one bit.

"Except…I really like Ben. That's the part of this that I can't get past. Something about him is just special. Yes, he makes me absolutely crazy sometimes, and at times, I feel like I'm losing my ever-loving mind when I'm around him or when I think about him. But at other times, I feel the best, and the safest, and the happiest, and the most fulfilled that I've ever felt with anyone or anything. Ever.

"It's a little bit hard to reconcile, to say the least." Lauren concluded.

"I should have you repeat all of that into the recorder app on my iPhone so I could transcribe it and base the lyrics of my next song around it," Karina said, laughing. "That's how universal those feelings are about falling head over heels for someone. I know you're not a very sit-back-and-enjoy-the-ride type of person, Lauren—but, honestly, my advice to you is to sit back and enjoy the ride. It may be bumpy, but it sure as hell is fun."