“About what?”
“Sour. Bitter. Extremely persnickety.”
Leaning away from him, I grabbed my drink and brought it back to his lips. “Try it again.” He gave me an adorably stubborn look, pressing his lips together in refusal. “Sip it this time.” When he still didn’t move, I pulled out the big guns. Don’t be a chicken was sitting on the tip of my tongue, but at the last second, I heard myself say, “Please?”
It worked. However, he took the glass from me so he could do it himself. After he had taken the most careful sip of all time, he handed the glass back to me. I took a sip myself, making sure this wasn’t a terrible brand in general. The taste hit my tongue with the force of ten lemons, opening up my palate and making me pucker my lips in the best way.
“Hmm?” I asked, bugging him for an answer.
“It’s definitely better in small doses,” he admitted.
“Like our friendship,” I teased.
He looked up at me and his eyes were crystal clear. Gray sea glass. The ocean at dawn. “Is that what we are? Friends?”
Nuzzling closer, I slid back to my butt, finding that I was now nearly tucked into his side. “I figure three life-saving events bridged the gap between strangers and friends.”
He chuckled, the sound rumbling through his body. I had the strangest urge to mess up his hair. It seemed too tightly maintained, too perfectly quaffed. He wasn’t this clean cut, preppy guy he pretended to be. He was dominant, in charge, fierce. He wasn’t docile and restrained. He wasn’t only sharp angles and pressed pants. He was in your face with his opinion and bossy and… hiding a serious sense of humor.
“No wonder I have so little friends. I haven’t saved nearly enough lives.”
I found myself laughing again. Had I ever laughed this much with a guy before? “I think you could just hang out at coffee shops and interrupt bad dates if you’re in the market for more friends.”
He nodded seriously. “Especially if that last douche of yours is involved. Did you hear from him again?”
“He texted to tell me how rude I was to leave him there. I tried to explain that I had a kitchen emergency, but he saw through me. Our mutual friend, Benny, texted later to scold me on my bad manners.”
Vann snorted. “Did you tell Benny his friend was a total asshole?”
“I did, actually. In those exact words.”
He smiled at me and I nearly lost my breath. It surprised me, full and wide and nothing I had ever seen before. This man that usually scowled and glowered and pondered and considered, but rarely ever smiled at anything. At least not in the short time I’d known him.
I found myself staring at his lips, taking in the happy expression as I tried to wrestle my pounding heart into neutral attraction.
He was a good-looking guy. Naturally, I would be enticed by his smile. He had these perfectly masculine features and tanned skin, topped off with pearly whites that only appeared when his full lips lifted in this sigh-inducing expression.
It was the logistics of being female that had me feeling like all the alcohol tonight had very suddenly caught up to me. My anatomy couldn’t help but be totally smitten with his anatomy.
Plus, there were all those times he’d saved me stacking up in favor that this guy was hot.
But he was also Vera’s brother. He was also a mostly, total stranger. He was also not right for me.
Okay, Dillon, my inner future-cat-lady asked impatiently, if he’s not right for you, who is?
Someone who worked similar hours to me, I told the desperation. Someone who didn’t think I was a total moron. Someone who…
Oh, who was I kidding? Fear curled around my lungs, tightening, choking, suffocating. Memories from six years ago threatened the happiness of the night. I didn’t want a relationship.
I didn’t even want male attention. Not really. Kind of, but not really.
The freshness of those early wounds had faded. The sharpness of the hurt and pain and fear had dulled. The fogginess of that night had never lifted. But still. Still…. Still…
Still. That damn smile.
It made me want to try again. It made me not want to give up on the male species as a whole.
It faltered when I had stared at his face for so long I’d made it awkward between us. He leaned forward, apparently a prisoner to the same pull that I was.
