JOSIE
I’m ready to commit murder.
Not literal murder—I’m a lawyer, I know how that ends—but the kind of murder you fantasize about when you’ve been stuck in a guest room with nothing but pain meds, daytime television, and the constant parade of well-meaning bikers checking to make sure I’m still breathing.
You’re fine, Josie. You’re healing. You’re definitely not going slowly insane.
I push myself up from the bed, ignoring the twinge in my ribs. The burr holes in my head have scabbed over nicely—Maggie changed the dressings this morning and declared me “on the mend”—but my head still throbs if I move too fast, and my wrist itches constantly under the cast.
The worst part isn’t the physical pain. It’s the waiting.
Waiting for my body to cooperate. Waiting for news about Summit. Waiting for Stone to get his act together and come kiss me again.
Seriously? Way to give a girl blue bean.
That kiss—or kisses, plural, because we lost ourselves for a good ten minutes before Hawk interrupted—has been replaying in my mind on a constant loop. The heat of his mouth. The way his hands felt cradling my face. The rough sound he made when I bit his lower lip.
And then... nothing.
Oh, he’s been attentive, checking on me every few hours, bringing me meals, sitting with me while I pretend to watch TV and he pretends to review club paperwork. But he hasn’t kissed me again. Hasn’t even tried.
It’s driving me absolutely insane.
Maybe he’s having second thoughts. Maybe the kissing was a one-time thing. Maybe?—
“What’s got you frowning?”
I jolt, nearly dropping the water glass I’ve been clutching. Stone stands in the doorway, one shoulder propped against the frame, watching me with those unreadable gray eyes.
“I’m not.”
“Oh, so your forehead always gets this little crease when you think?” He pushes off the frame and crosses toward me. “It’s been there for the past ten minutes.”
“You’ve been standing there for ten minutes?”
“Five.” His mouth curves. “I was enjoying the view.”
Heat floods my cheeks. Dammit. I’m a forty-year-old woman with a law degree and a four-figure body count of corporateexecutives I’ve destroyed in courtrooms. I should not be blushing like a teenager because a man says he enjoys looking at me.
“Shouldn’t you be doing president things?” I manage.
“Took a break.” He stops at the edge of the bed, close enough that I can smell leather and soap and that indefinable scent that’s just him. “Thought I’d check on my favorite patient.”
The way he’s looking at me does things to my chest that I refuse to examine too closely.
“Stone.” I set down the water glass, meeting his gaze. “We should talk.”
“About?”
“About the kissing.” I force myself to be direct. It’s the only way I know how to be. “And the not-kissing. And the—” I wave a hand vaguely. “Purgatory of passion that we’ve created.”
He snorts. “That’s certainly one way to put it.”
I wave a hand breezily. “I nearly died. I reserve the right to be as dramatic as I want.” I point at him. “Now, let’s talk about the kissing.”
“You want to talk?” He moves closer, and suddenly the room feels very small. “Or do you want me to?”
My breath catches. “Stone?—”
