Rather than watching me struggle to climb the handful of steps to the door, Ryan picked me up and deposited me at the entrance like I was a sequined piece of luggage.
“You gotta warn me,” I said, wagging my clutch at the steps. “I can’t have you tossing me around like a sack of potatoes.”
Ryan tucked my arm into his and led me to the elevator. Two bellhops held the doors open for us and went to the trouble of pressing the button for the correct floor. “You’re a lot prettier than a sack of potatoes. Softer too.”
“That’s nice and all,” I said, “but the point is that you can’t pick people up whenever you feel like it.”
He tugged at his collar when we stepped off the elevator and found no fewer than ten hotel employees waiting nearby, all face-splitting smiles and helpful gestures toward the festivities.
“All right, here’s the plan,” he said, his voice low enough to stay between us. “One full turn around the room, stop long enough to take some photos with a few people, maybe some of the guys from the team, and then get the hell out before they serve dinner.”
“No! I really want to know what a five-thousand-dollar dinner tastes like,” I said.
“It’s nothing special,” he said.
“Says the guy with the private plane.”
“I’ll have them box up a plate for you,” he said.
“It’s not the same,” I wailed.
He drew in a breath and it rattled like a warning. “I swear to god, Emme, if you make me sit through a fucking five-course menu with a full roster of speeches in the middle, I-I?—”
We stopped at the doors of the ballroom, the opulent storybook theme spilling out into the hall with exaggerated toadstools and thick branches wrapped in the dreamiest floral garlands. I beamed up at Ryan, waiting for him to land on the consequence he’d never cash in. “Yes?” I fluttered my lashes. “What will you do to me?”
I felt people watching us. I sensed the energy of their attention from every side, and from the corner of my eye, I saw someone aim a camera at us. Then another. A flash went off. It was strange, and if I gave myself a minute to think about it, I’d find a lot of reasons to be uncomfortable. But right now, here, with his hands flexing at his sides and his dark eyes eating me up, I couldn’t bring myself to care.
A snarl sounded in his throat as he shook his head once, looping an arm around my waist. I flattened my hands on his chest to keep my balance while he dragged a hand up my back and over my shoulders to rest at the base of my neck.
“Fuck it,” he growled.
He tipped my head back, and within the space between blinks, he went from staring at me to kissing me. At first it was a slow, firm press but then a quiet, strangled noise vibrated between us and I understood what he’d meant about coming out of a long, cold winter because I felt like the world was new again and I was too.
I linked my hands behind his neck and let him press me closer,closerwhile murmurs rose and camera shutters clicked around us. I couldn’t let myself think about the audience. Itold myself it was Ryan they were after and I was an irrelevant side note in the whole thing. None of it mattered much anyway because I wasn’t sure my feet were still connected to the ground and my head was definitely floating off into space and my belly was—well, there was a lot of swooping and fluttering in there.
Another important note: I was kissing my oldest friend and it wasn’t at all what I’d imagined.
This was not where I’d expected things to go tonight, but if the options were kissing Ryan or not kissing Ryan, I was good with this situation. I was a floating, flailing mess, but I wasgood.
No one had ever kissed me like this before. Like they were damn certain they wanted to kissme.
I didn’t even care that he was making the most of the media gathered nearby and checking off the girlfriend box. He was pretending in his way. I’d pretend in mine.
And then, just barely, he eased back. His forehead tipped against mine and his chest heaving, he whispered, “Fine. Dinner. But we’re leaving before dessert.”
I bounced on the balls of my feet. “Dessert is the best part!”
He closed his eyes like I was causing him real pain. “Emme.”
Before I could defend dessert, his lips covered mine again, urgently now, as if this was the last moment to make the play.
Flashes went off around us.
It was my turn to stutter out the incoherent noises, and Ryan tore himself away from me with a gasp. He brought both hands to my neck, sweeping his thumbs over my cheeks. “I’ll have every dessert in this city delivered to you tonight. I’ll have a pastry chef on call to make you whatever the hell you want. But we’re not staying a minute longer than necessary.”
Ryan kept his arm around my waist and led me into the ballroom. He resumed that cool, steady mask that looked like disdain or even disinterest to the rest of the world but I knew to be the placid surface of a raging sea.
As for me, I didn’t even have to force the smile in response to all the people who’d turned to look at us. I was as bright as this shiny, sequined dress.
