March chose olives and extra cheese.
Forty minutes later, I’d unpacked a few clothes for tomorrow in his spare bedroom and now sat across from him with a hot pizza between us.
His eyes held mine for a few seconds before he asked, “How are you feeling?”
“Just fine. Don’t I look okay?”
“You look good to me.”
I couldn’t take the double meaning, so I headed back to the fridge. Maybe he hadn’t meant for it to be suggestive. I was probably reading too much into everything.
“Time to eat, Angel. Where are you going?”
I opened the refrigerator, where I’d seen some soda, a bottle of wine, and a few beers. “What would you like to drink?”
“Ginger ale.”
Once again, the big SEAL surprised me. I would have guessed he was a beer drinker with the way military guys were portrayed in the movies. I brought over two ginger ales and popped the tops.
He pulled pizza slices apart and slid one onto my plate. “Sooner or later, you’re going to want somebody to talk to. We all do.”
“Right now, I vote for later.” I lifted my slice and bit into it.
He let the subject go as I devoured two slices, and he finished off three. Finally he took another swallow of his ginger ale. “What I really meant when I asked how are you feeling—” He hadn’t let it go. “—was aboutyour day of being mugged and then burgled. It’s a lot to have to deal with.”
It was too damned much to deal with. “You forgot losing my bike too. I’m processing.”
“That backpack meant a lot to you, didn’t it?”
He was more observant than I gave him credit for. “I don’t have a lot of things. But there’s nothing I can’t deal with.”
“I’m sorry that happened to you.”
We couldn’t keep going down this road, so I stood. “You need to tell me if I’m all right. Z, Y, X, W?—”
“Stop,” he said.
“One, two, three, four,” I intoned as I repeated my heel-toe balance exercise.
After a few steps, March jumped up, grabbed my arm and turned me to face him.
“Hey. I’m walking here.”
“Talk to me.”
I couldn’t help but look up into his eyes.
“Let it out.”
I inhaled a large breath. “I’m stronger than you think.”
He held my biceps. “I have no doubt.” Then, he pulled me in for a hug and rubbed up and down my back. It seemed to be his thing, the back rub.
I stiffened and pushed against his shoulders. It took a few seconds, but his touch eventually broke through my defenses, and I stopped resisting. Melting into him, I closed my eyes and breathed in his woodsy scent. Why did he have to smell so good?
He rubbed a tense section of my lower back. “That’s better. Just relax.”
His warm, hard chest reminded me how long it had been since I’d been held, how long it had been since my breasts had pressed up against a man and felt his chest expand with every breath.
