Page 41 of Coerced

And that look alone was enough to cause a flutter in my belly. But when mixed with it being clear he could have easily caught me if he wanted to, it was enough to unbalance me, both figuratively and literally.

One of my feet twisted at an awkward angle, and my hands flew out in an unsuccessful attempt to steady myself. My effort wasn’t completely wasted, because Paxton was on guard, easily surged forward, and reached for me just before I could go down.

“Oh, God. That would have been so bad.”

Paxton was still propelling himself forward, easily guiding both of us around the rink. His eyes were shining. “I wouldn’t have let you fall.”

My eyes narrowed slightly. Evidently, I hadn’t been wrong about his skills. He knew how capable he was; he’d merely wanted to play. Warmth spread through me that had nothing to do with the physical effort I was putting in.

I was so caught up in how nice it was to have someone treat me the way Paxton was; I wasn’t prepared for it whenhe suddenly tugged on my arm, forcing our bodies even closer together, and spun us around.

I let out a yelp of surprise. Laughing, Paxton suggested, “Maybe we should give you a chance to get acclimated to going forward for a bit.”

He remained close, evidently intending to do that until I provided him with a response. I couldn’t deny how nice it felt to have his strong body pressed close, so I was tempted to remain silent.

As enticing as that might have been, no matter how much I enjoyed him holding me, I wasn’t sure I was prepared for this level of intimacy with a man I barely knew. I wanted more time to get to know him better.

So, I agreed, “That’s probably a wise idea.”

Paxton loosened the hold he had on me, a look of pride washing over him, before putting some distance between our bodies and spinning himself around, so we were both facing forward for a while.

And now that we’d left the rink, I couldn’t deny just how great of a time I’d had with him. At no point over the last five years, maybe longer, had I laughed even half as much as I had with Paxton today. Everything that had been weighing me down, particularly for the last year, ceased to exist in my mind. His playfulness and the way he touched me or held my hand made it impossible to focus on anything but how great of a guy he was.

When we came to a stop beside his car, I turned fully to face him. My gaze lingered on his handsome face, my mouth curving into a smile. “Thank you for doing this for me today. I think you deserve to know how much I appreciate you taking my mind off everything. For the lastcouple of hours, I’ve managed to forget about the stuff that’s been weighing me down lately.”

Paxton sent a sweet smile my way as he reached for one of my hands and stepped closer, the scent of him consuming me. He gave my hand a squeeze and said, “You’re welcome, Aria.” I held his stare, my belly trembling with excitement, and a beat later, he asked, “So, have you worked up an appetite like I have? Would you like to go grab some lunch?”

As soon as he said it, I realized just how hungry I was. It had been hours since we had those doughnuts, and with all the physical activity while at the roller-skating rink, it was safe to say I was famished. “Lunch sounds great.”

With that, Paxton reached around my body with one hand, the other coming to rest lightly on the small of my back and sending shivers along my spine, then opened the car door for me.

Not quite twenty minutes later, we’d sat down to have lunch together. And while we waited for our food to come out, Paxton didn’t hesitate to fill the silence. “I know I sort of made a last-minute decision earlier this morning to go roller skating with you instead of showing you around Steel Ridge, but I hope that doesn’t ruin the chance I have to convince you this town is a great place to live.”

Did he honestly believe that was possible? It wasn’t as though he’d made a plan with me and blew me off. “Quite the opposite,” I assured him.

He seemed surprised by my response. “Yeah?”

There was a part of me that wanted to tell him the full truth, that people didn’t normally move away from their crushes.

I was too afraid to share that little nugget of informationwith him, though. Perhaps it was because it seemed too sudden.

But I knew it was how I felt.

I had a crush on Paxton. Not only was he very nice to look at, but he was simply a great guy, too. His thoughtfulness was probably the one thing I liked most about him. It had been there in every interaction I’d had with him. He consistently went out of his way for me.

And that was nice to have.

It’d been so long since anyone had paid me the kind of attention that Paxton did. He cared just because he cared. And he seemed interested in me. Genuinely interested. I didn’t want to get ahead of myself and make assumptions about Paxton’s intentions, but it was difficult not to think he felt something for me that went beyond us being friendly acquaintances or neighbors.

Paxton had shown enough interest in me to make me believe, at the very least, that he was looking to get to know me better. Where that would lead us, I had not a single clue.

And I didn’t want to allow myself to think about it too much. I didn’t want to believe it was a possibility for there to be more than just surface-level friendship.

The disappointment of losing it would just be too crushing.

Plus, the reality was that I hadn’t had a boyfriend since college. Although I’d gone on a handful of dates since graduating, nothing had ever amounted to something serious.

Then there was my family. They didn’t pay particular interest to me beyond what I could do for them. I’d always thought it was me loving them that made me do what Idid for them, and to a degree, I guess it was. But the more time passed without them ever reciprocating, I had no choice but to face the cold, hard truth. They were capable of abusing my love and loyalty to them, not caring about what it cost me in the end.