Chapter Fourteen
Eventually they leftthe party and went to their hotel. They didn’t talk after the episode with Wes, or dance either after they finished the one Connor had been so rude about. They still hadn’t spoken after they reached the hotel. It didn’t seem to bother Connor, but she was still pissed. And she intended to let Connor know it. Sierra took off her heels the moment she walked in the room. She sat on the bed and rubbed her poor, abused feet. She knew better than to wear spike heels but these were so pretty. Right, pretty torture chambers.
“What is wrong with you?” she asked him.
“Nothing. Why?”
“I want to know why you acted like a Neanderthal at the party.”
“I shut down the ass who was hitting on you. That’s not acting like a Neanderthal. It’s not like I punched him out. Although he deserved it.”
“You are kidding me. The night we met your date had dumped you for another man. That didn’t seem to bother you a bit. So why did this bother you so much?”
He’d taken off his jacket and ripped off his tie. The cuff links came next, landing on the dresser. Next, he yanked his shirt out of his pants and started undoing the buttons. All without speaking.
“Are you going to answer me?”
“It’s not the same thing.”
“How can you say that? Of course it is. She totally dumped you and you shrugged your shoulders then but now you went ballistic when another man asked me to dance.”
“That wasn’t ballistic.”
“Fine. Rude and obnoxious.”
“You want to know the difference? The difference between you and the woman who dumped me in Vegas?”
He’d finished on his shirt and shrugged it off, tossing it over a chair. She wished he hadn’t. His bare chest distracted her. Who was she kidding? Everything about him distracted her. “Yes.”
“I wasn’t in love with her.”
Her breath caught in her throat. “Wh—what does that mean?”
“What do you think it means? I’m in love with you.”
She stared at him with her mouth hanging open. “I don’t believe you.”
“You should. I don’t say what I don’t mean. I thought you knew that. I love you.”
“Why are you angry?”
“Because this wasn’t the way I wanted to tell you. I planned to take you out to a nice, romantic dinner and tell you. Or maybe seduce you first and then tell you. Instead we’re talking about you and another man, and it made me crazy. You introduced me as yourfriend, for God’s sake.”
“What was I supposed to call you? What’s wrong with saying you’re my friend?”
“Oh, come on, Sierra. You gave him an opening. It’s like you hung out a big-ass sign saying ‘We’re not together. We’re justfriends.’”
“You’re being ridiculous.”
“Am I?”
“You—We just agreed to date. Neither of us said anything about falling in love. You don’t do love.”
“Yeah, well, I do now.”
“I don’t know what to say.” Because if he meant it—
He walked to the bed, reached down and took her hand to haul her up. One arm banded around her, holding her close. The other came up to cup her cheek, to caress her face. “I’ve been falling for you since the night we met. I almost went crazy trying to find you. I don’t know what I’d have done if you hadn’t walked into the hospital. I was ready to go to Texas and start looking for you.”
