Chapter 29

Monday morning – Luke

And the Grammy for biggest effing idiot goes to…Luke Knightley. Laying in my bed, I stared at the ceiling and groaned. I'd gone down to dinner last night with every single good intention of keeping my hands to myself. But the moment Ellie walked into the room, it's like we were two magnets pulled together with a snap. We'd been on the damn couch together before either one of us could talk, let alone discuss anything.

Then, when Ellie had asked me to come to her room, my stomach had dropped straight to my feet. Did I want to go to her room? Hell, yes. Was I going to? No. No way. I couldn't. I just couldn't. Panic clawed at my insides. "No," I'd blurted before I even knew what I was saying.

The look on her face had crushed me. I'd hurt her. Without ever intending to, I had hurt her. She'd been disappointed and rejected, and I hated that I'd been the one to make her feel that way. But kissing was one thing and going to bed together was another. If we spent the night together, it would turn our entire relationship upside down and dump it in the trash. Why? Because we may have started being friends and progressed to kissing, but I was still me. The mess with women. The guy who couldn't make a relationship last more than two months. I would never be able to make her happy. At least not past a few fun hours in bed. And Ellie deserved better than me. Ellie deserved more than that. Especially after what she'd been through with her tool of an ex-fiancé.

If I'd taken Ellie to bed, I'd be no better than her loser ex. Another man who would just end up breaking her heart.

I blamed myself, of course. I never should have let our hot make-out sessions last this long. I shouldn't have let it go this far. Hell, I probably never should have guilted her into being my nurse in the first place. I was a complete and total ass. But better to cut things off now while they were still in their infancy than keep going, sleep together, and end up possibly breaking her heart when I inevitably got the urge to move on.

I took a deep breath and slowly exhaled, closing my eyes. Regardless of the mistakes I'd made already, there was clearly only one thing to do now. I would start by apologizing, profusely. Then I would call the insurance company and tell them I needed another nurse. They would send someone. Someone random. Someone I would just have to trust. And if I didn't like it, and if the new nurse took pictures and sold them to tabloids, well, it was nothing more than I deserved for being such a jackass to Ellie. She had been right about me. I was no good. She needed to go back to her life in Milwaukee, and we would forget all of this ever happened.