Reluctantly in Love (21 page)

“I think I’ve been making too big a deal out of you and me.”

“Have you? I didn’t notice.” His eyes laughed at me.

I pursed my lips to keep from smiling. “I’m sure you haven’t.”

He sat back, crossing his arms over his chest. He studied me with intense blue eyes. “I’m definitely interested in where you’re going with this. Go on.”

“I was worried about you being Matt’s friend. But I decided it shouldn’t matter.”

“It doesn’t.”

“I mean, we’re both adults.”

“We are.

He was doing a great job of letting me get this all off my mind.

“And it’s not like we’re talking marriage or anything.”

“I’m definitely not ready for marriage.” He chuckled. “So I think we’re good.”

I nodded. “Right.”

“And you’ve definitely made it clear that you’re not looking for a relationship.”

I cocked my head. Had I told him that? For some reason, I thought I’d just been internalizing it. “Right. But I think you and I could be really great at . . . other things.”

“I can think of a few,” he said.

I didn’t want to seem too eager—
even though I am—
so I chose not to respond. His words made me tingle—all over. “We can definitely hang out. Eat Mexican food.” I flipped my hand in a wave to the restaurant. “Maybe some other stuff.”

“In the dark.”

“I like the dark.” Thoughts of me and Chase in the dark, rubbing my hands up and down his sexy chest, played through my mind.

“So now we’re hanging out?” he asked. “Dating, hanging out?”

I shrugged. “Whatever you want to call it. No big deal.”

“No big deal,” he repeated. His gaze dropped to my lips. “I’m just letting you know right now, it’s going to be hard to keep my hands off you. So I hope that’s part of this
hanging out
you speak of.”

My heart tripped over itself. “That sounds fair.”

“Good. Because I don’t think I can be around you without wanting my lips on yours.”

“
Holy hell
,” I murmured. “If we weren’t in a packed restaurant you’d be in trouble.”

I raised my ice water to my lips and took a sip to cool down.

“We should have done takeout,” he said, and I laughed.

“I like your style, Dr. Walker.”

Dinner was fun. Chase was fun. I lost myself in conversation. I loved hearing about his family. His face lit up when he talked about his brothers and sisters. Their family was the kind of family I’d always fantasized about when I was a kid, shut in my bedroom while l listened to my parents fight somewhere else in the house. The family dinners Chase described were full of laughter and joy, instead of the blame and anger I’d seen growing up.

Our dinner turned into sharing dessert, and then a beer. By the time we stepped outside, the sky was dark. Lincoln was a college town, and the sidewalks were busy with twenty-somethings milling in and out of the bars and restaurants lining O Street.

We stood beside my car, my body vibrating with all the things we could do now that we were on the same page.

“Thanks for the tacos,” Chase said.

“Thanks for the company.”

He brushed his hand against my cheek. “I like hanging out with you when you’re not hurting me.”

“Always the comedian.” I tilted my chin up, staring into his eyes. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was doing, but it felt a little like playing with fire. “So . . .”

He closed the distance between us and took me into his arms. He kissed me so thoroughly stars flashed. Bright, pulsing, beautiful stars. His hands pressed against my back, pulling me firmly into his embrace. His mouth tasted of peppermint candy. My entire body turned to jelly, and I leaned into him—wanting more. Everything about him was warm and firm and when he leaned away to look down into my eyes, I felt the world get a little colder.

“I’ve been wanting to do that all night,” he said, his arms still around me.

“Is that how you kiss all your friends?” I asked, breathless.

“No. That is how I kiss
you
.” He eased back and I settled onto the pads of my feet. All of me wanted to be against him again. He brushed his thumb against my cheek then tucked a lock of hair behind my ear. “I’ll see you soon, Roxanna.”

He left me standing beside my driver’s door. I pressed my fingertips to my lips and blinked after him. I felt like I’d been hit with a Mack truck.
Wow!

The feel of his lips, the taste of his kiss, the scent of him lingered on me all the way home. He was like a drug—a high that burned inside me while I wrote late into the night.

Chapter Nineteen

“Excuse me. Sorry. Excuse me.” I side-stepped through the rows of seats while people grumbled and shifted their legs to the side to let me by.

The popcorn bucket was warm under my arm, the large soft drink swished ice with each step. I found three empty seats between a teenage couple engaged in serious tonsil hockey, and an older couple who didn’t look at each other at all. I sat down and set my purse in the empty seat between me and the teenagers. They didn’t notice and didn’t come up for air.

I loved the theater. I mostly went alone because Lexie had a tendency to talk through movies, and Gen got up every thirty minutes to refill her popcorn, add more jalapeños to her nachos, or decide she wanted M&Ms, after all, with her popcorn. I’d been waiting to see this movie since the trailers aired, and going alone meant I’d actually be able to concentrate on the sexy vamps on screen.

I was so engrossed in a sci-fi preview that the seat being taken beside me barely registered. I startled in my chair at the explosion on screen, the sound of the blast rocking the room. I reached into the popcorn on my lap to stuff my face, my eyes wide as the rest of the preview played out. The movie was definitely on my Must See list.

My fingers brushed against a hand inside my popcorn bucket and I froze. A second passed before the surprise wore off, and I looked down to see a man’s fingers close around two pieces of fluffy popcorn before making its escape. I followed that hand right up to a pair of full, smiling lips. I opened my mouth to rip some popcorn-mooch ass, but fell speechless when my gaze connected with a pair of blue eyes.

“Chase? What the hell!” I turned in my seat so I could give him my full attention. “You were about to get tased, you know.”

“You bring your Taser gun to the movies?” His eyes laughed at me. “Really?”

“I bring my Taser gun with me everywhere.” My pulse raced. Already.
What is it with this guy?
“What are you doing here?”

He winked at me. “I heard this was a good movie.”

He was everywhere, it seemed. And the weird thing? All of me
loved it.
There wasn’t an ounce of hesitation anymore about whether or not spending time with him was a good thing. I craved these moments. Even now, my entire body thrummed with electricity—I was drawn to him and it was out of my control.

“I thought you were having dinner with your sister?”

“She decided not to come to the city this weekend.”

“Oh,” was all I said. What I wanted to do was throw myself into his arms.

“So, here I am. I thought you might have missed me the last couple of days.”

Sucking in a smile, I shrugged. “Maybe a little. I like having you around. I’ve heard threatening people is good for mental health—confidence builder and such.”

“And the truth is out.” He went for the popcorn again. I edged it closer to him so he’d have better access. “Besides, that’s a lot of popcorn for someone your size.”

“Popcorn always tastes better from a big bowl.”

“I agree.” He popped the buttery kernels into his mouth and chewed.

I pretended to concentrate on the screen, but I was thinking about how much I wanted to take the lead from the horny teenagers and play tonsil hockey with Chase.

“So you’re good with me sitting by you and sharing your popcorn, then?”

“That depends.” I poked him in the arm. “Are you a talker? Through movies.”

He widened his eyes in mock dismay. “Me? Never. I’ll shut up right now.”

Smiling, I handed him the large soda. “Then you’re the perfect date. You can stay.” I turned to face the opening credits.

“I’m pretty sure I missed you more than a little.” Even in the dark his eyes were intense, his smile insanely sexy.

One thing was certain—
I’m going to have a tough time concentrating on this movie.

I awoke with a start. The mascara on my lashes was clumped together and my eyelids blinked several times before opening. The tank top I’d worn under my burnout tee the night before was already damp from the moist morning air. A bird tweeted nearby—I was outside.

A fly buzzed around my head before landing on my nose.

“
Ugh
.” Groaning, I swatted the fly off my nose. My fingers brushed against drool—my drool—wetting my lips and pooling on a very hard, very bare chest.

Memories from the night before flashed through my mind—movie, Chase, drinks, Chase, shots, Chase, a cab ride home, Chase, more drinks, Chase, stumbling and falling with him into the swimming pool. We’d spent the night laughing, and drinking, and flirting, and kissing—but that was all. We passed out under the cabana, an empty bottle of wine on the accent table beside us.

My shirt hung off the edge of the lounge mattress. Careful not to wake Chase, I snagged it and used it to wipe up the puddle.

“You’re adorable when you drool.”

My hands numbed with mortification and I wadded the shirt in my fist. “Um, yeah, sorry about that.”

“You also snore.”

“What? I do not.” I untangled myself from his limbs and sat up.

He’s not wearing any pants.
My heart thumped an erratic beat in my chest while my gaze ate up Chase—
in holy freakin’ boxer briefs!

Another memory flashed of me laughing while I yanked down his jeans soaked from our fall into the pool. And he looked damn good without pants on. Which made my drooling on his chest even more embarrassing.

Chase tugged a strand of my hair, stringy from drying after being soaked in chlorine water. “Yeah, you do snore. You sound like a freight train.”

Grinning, I smacked his hand away. “Whatever.”

He imitated snoring and laughed when I pounced on him. He lay back onto the mattress, and I kept my hands on his chest. I liked the way his pecks felt under my hands, so I left them right there.

“Very funny, jerk.”

“Jerk?” He gave me an obnoxious wink. “Or do you really mean irresistible?”

“A little of both, maybe.” Nibbling on the corner of my lip, I gazed into his smiling eyes. I couldn’t figure him out—this out. He was always on my mind lately. When he wasn’t around, I found myself wondering when I’d see him again. When he was around, my lips were always smiling.

It was unnerving how amazing I felt when I was with him.

I took my hands off his chest and crawled off the mattress. “Mel’s going to kill me.”

“Mel?” He sat up and swung his legs over the side of the mattress.

“She’s my friend who owns the cupcake bakery. I was supposed to stop in to taste test cupcakes for a bakery contest.” I tossed him his jeans that had been draped over the back of a patio chair beside the cabana. “I told Gen I’d pick her up on the way.”

“You can’t.” He stepped into his jeans and pulled them up over his hips.

I couldn’t tear my eyes from the flat plane of his stomach that disappeared under the waistband of his jeans. He buttoned the fly and I nearly let out a sigh of disappointment.

I needed to get a grip. A big one.
Like, on his—

I snapped my gaze back up to his, only to be met with a knowing smirk. Apparently, this steamy hot, sexy doctor was also a mind reader. I felt sorry for all the other men in the world.

“I can’t?” I asked in answer to his comment. “Why?”

Because you want to throw me onto this mattress and have hot, wild sex with me on my patio?

“Because we took a cab from the bar and neither of our cars are here.” That damn smile of his flirted with his lips in a way that made my knees weak.

“Oh. Yeah, right.”

His gaze dropped to my bare legs. I was in my skivvies, too. The jean shorts I’d worn last night were discarded on the patio near the edge of the pool. Not that I was embarrassed. I worked out; I was confident about my physique. Also, I happened to rock these boy short panties and this tank top. After a night of boozing and probably making an ass of myself, my super power of looking great with a hangover was the only thing I had going for me right now. I chalked it up to good genes—I only wore eye makeup so there wasn’t much to wear off through the night.

“How about we get a cab. We’ll drop you off at Gen’s and I’ll go get my car.” His head disappeared for a moment under the t-shirt he pulled on. “Then if you need me to come get you to bring you to your car, I can.”

“Yeah. Great.” I nodded.
Later.
It was like hitting the hot doctor lottery—twice in one day. “I’m just going to shower real quick. If you’re hungry, all I have is . . .” I had no idea what I had in the house. Not much. “Yogurt and toast, probably.”