The 5-Year Plan (Friends to Lovers Romance Book 1) by Cara Nelson Page A

molded his fingers around her curves. Trailing a line of kisses down her throat, he wondered how long it would take to get her out of her sweats. She leaned back and he slipped his fingers under the waistband of her pants.
    She stopped moving. Trent stopped, too. Pulling back, he stared into her eyes—dark now with desire and something else. Something he didn’t want to think could be anger.
    With deliberate care, she stepped back. He let his hands fall away from her. She swiped a hand over her lips as if to wipe away his taste. “This is not happening.”
    “Come on, Tori!”
    She pointed a finger at him. “I am not one of those ditzy girls who swoons at your feet after hearing that deep, sexy voice of yours.”
    He grinned. “You think my voice is sexy?”
    “That doesn’t mean a thing. You’re never going to change.”
    “Maybe I just need the right motivation?” He didn’t want to mess this up. Victoria mattered. She was important. He didn’t want to do anything to ruin the friendship they already had.
    Her eyes filled suddenly. She folded her arms and turned away, and he realized just how on edge she had to be right now. Crap—and here he was trying to take advantage of him. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, but that only reminded him how good those little, secret touches of hers had felt.
    Dropping his hands, he shook his head. Hell! She could tell him to do anything, and he’d do it. And he’d rather shoot himself than put tears into her eyes. She’d pulled the ultimate female weapon on him, but he knew she didn’t use it like that. Which made it all the more significant. He caught a small tremor in her voice when she said, “Trent, I don’t want to destroy our friendship.”
    “Nothing will destroy that. We’re solid.”
    “Yes, we are.” She glanced at him... “And I want us to remain that way. I…it’s…I had a big shock today. My brain is addled. I don’t know…I’m reaching for comfort and you happen to be here, and I don’t want to use you like that. I think I need to be alone.”
    Anger rippled in his gut. “This isn’t—you’re not just in shock. And what are you trying to do—pull me one way and then another on command send me away?” He stared at her, willing her to fight back. Come on, Tori!
    Instead, she stared at him, eyes wide and dark, and he saw something that shook him. She was frightened. His Tori—the girl who’d taught him to shoot when she’d ‘borrowed’ her dad’s side arm, the woman who’d told him she was on a quest for excellence—looked scared. Of what? Him? Or maybe of losing him along with the rest of her life.
    She closed her eyes and shook her head. “You should go.”
    He stepped closer so that she would have to open her eyes and look at him. “I have always liked you, Tori. There has never been a moment when I haven’t thought…wished—“
    She put her fingers on his lips. “Now you need to shut up. We’re going to push and then we’re going to be sorry. And you’ve always been bad at looking ahead—so let me do that for both of us.”
    He took her hand, kissed her fingers and pulled them away from his mouth. But he kept hold of her hand. He needed that connection to her right now. “This particular slinky cat is out of the bag, and we can’t put her back in without getting our eyes clawed out.”
    “You and your metaphors.” She smiled. Victoria pulled her hand away, but she touched his bare forearm with one fingertip as if she couldn’t stop touching him, either. “Even if I said I was attracted to you or that I wished we could be together, we both know it wouldn’t work in the long run. We’d drive each other crazy. Our differences would wedge us apart. We’d have a nasty break up. We wouldn’t talk for months—or forever. And I won’t lose you as a friend.”
    He wiggled his eyebrows at her. “Opposite attract.”
    “That’s what Sue said. And look where that’s gotten me!”
    “You know, you look