Five of the guys had gathered around her. Lance had to shift to see her between them. She stood her ground, but for once, shewasn’t standing there belligerently, daring any of them to challenge her.
Pony snapped his fingers. “Juicy, get over here and try the beer.”
Kaci’s gaze dipped to the floor. Her cheeks weren’t just pink. They were flaming red.
She was embarrassed.
Her discomfort hit him like a sack of bricks to the gut.
No matter how mad he was with her for walking away today, for leaving him alone wondering if she’d gone and gotten herself run over by a car or a random marauding bull or attacked by a rabid sparrow—which all seemed equally likely, knowing Kaci—he still didn’t want her swallowing her pride.
She’d worked damn hard to earn that pride, at least professionally.
And he shouldn’t have called her a baby.
“This beer’s shit,” Juice Box announced.
“Sugar, that’s your age talking,” Kaci said.
She clamped a hand over her mouth and looked down again.
Pony snickered. He snagged the red Solo cup from Juicy and tipped the beer back. “Lady ain’t wrong,” he declared. He pulled the keg into the building and gave her a nod. “Good beer. Thanks.”
And then he shut the door in her face.
Lance shoved forward. “Dammit, Pony, don’t be an asshole.”
“What? We’re even. Not friends.”
He was going to regret this. Even buzzed, he knew it was a bad idea. But he still stepped around his squadron buddies and flung himself out into the night.
Kaci turned back toward him. She bit her lower lip, then looked down again. “Thank you for landing the plane safely this morning.”
He stopped and crossed his arms. Chilly tonight. “Like you said. I want to live asmuch as you do.”
“I can be…outspoken sometimes.”
“I shouldn’t have called you a baby.”
“About this deal we made,” she said. She shoved her hands in her pockets, then looked up at him. “I need to change the terms.”
Hell. He hadn’t meant to make her feel bad. “Kaci?—”
“I need to takeyouon a date. Not the other way around. Because I—I was getting the better end of everything. So…can I take you out? On a date? And then you never have to see me again.”
She was the one putting it all out there, going out on a limb, risking her pride, risking him saying no.
So why were his cheeks warm, and why couldn’t he figure out what to do with his hands? “I never said I didn’t want to see you again.”
“You don’t have to. When it comes to me and men, that’s just how it ends every time. But you’ve been really nice to me, and I’d like to be really nice back. I can do it. I promise I can. Well, my mouth might get involved a little, but I’ll try to make it behave.”
She was adorable. “I like your mouth.”
“Even when it’s talking?”
“Maybe twenty percent of the time. Just when you’re funny.”
She barely cracked a smile, and even in the semidarkness, he could tell it didn’t reach her eyes. “So I’ll call you about setting up a date.”
