Free A Longtime (and at one point Illegal) Crush by Janette Rallison Page B

fingers through it. “Now I’m not supposed to feel awkward when we run into each other?”
    “You never needed to feel awkward.” He was near enough to her that he didn’t have to step closer to put his hands on her shoulders. She hadn’t realized how tense they’d been until he gently massaged them. “You were eighteen and vulnerable. I knew that. It would have been wrong for me to respond to you, even if I wasn’t your teacher. The fact that I was your teacher made the idea unthinkable.” He kept massaging her shoulders, kneading away the tension there.
    She supposed she should have always known that Kye wouldn’t respond to that first kiss. But still, it had hurt to be unloved, unwanted by the guy she’d loved so desperately. Now with his hands making ripples of pleasure across her shoulders, with the taste of his lips still on hers—raspberry sherbet punch—all her anger at the event drained away. Instead she knew she had to be honest. “I didn’t kiss you just because you saved me. You sent me away at the dance, so I went with that Bono guy to make you jealous.”
    Kye’s fingers froze on her shoulders. “You . . . you what?” His voice rose, incredulous. “That was a stupid thing to do.”
    “I know,” she said. “I realized that pretty quickly.”
    Kye went back to massaging her shoulders. “ You didn’t need to do it. I was jealous before you ever left with him.”
    Elsie cocked her head, checked his eyes to see if he was teasing her. The amusement that played at the corners of his mouth so often was absent now. He meant it.
    Kye pressed his fingers into the tight muscles along the bottom of her neck. “You were smart, beautiful, and could discuss any subject and make it seem interesting. You had everything I wanted in a girlfriend except for the right amount of years.” His hands moved up her neck, caressing the skin there. “And every day you sat in my class and stared up at me adoringly. You’ll never know how hard it was for me to push you away when you kissed me. It made me feel like some sort of predator. I had to make frequent calls to Carson to remind myself that he would tear out my entrails if I so much as touched you.”
    Elsie felt her heart lift, saw the memories of that time in a new light. He hadn’t thought she was a pathetic groupie. He’d been attracted to her—he still was, judging by the way his hands were massaging her neck.
    “Why didn’t you say anything to me after I graduated?”
    “You were still so young.” One hand left her neck and went to her face. His thumb traced the curve of her jaw. “I figured you would go to college, look around, and realize you could do better than me.”
    That had never happened. She had met plenty of guys who would make more money than Kye, but she had never met one that made her forget him.
    She s lid her arms around Kye’s waist, liking the fact that she could take that liberty. Instead of pulling away from her, he leaned into her, nuzzling the hair at her temple. “I kept tabs on you through Carson. I’ve always cared about how you were and what you were doing.”
    “When did you realize I still had feelings for you?”
    “When you kissed me back just now.”
    “Only j ust now?” she asked. She had been sure it had been there on her face every time she looked at him. It was the reason she hadn’t wanted to meet his eyes.
    “ Yes, although I realized I still had feelings for you as soon as I saw you sitting in your car trapped by my cattle.” He smiled lazily. “You make an appealing damsel in distress. I had to call Lisa and tell her not to come.”
    Elsie might have made a comment about that, and not one that showed much sympathy toward Lisa, but Kye kissed her again. This one was soft, gentle. One that said they had time.
    “So,” Elsie said when he finally lifted his head, “I guess you’ve stopped worrying about Carson ripping out your entrails?”
    “You’re three years older , and I know for a fact