Royally Chosen Christmas (Royal Sons MC #7) - Elle Boon Page 0,22
heart racing for a completely different reason. He was so freaking gorgeous. Of course, he wasn’t her biological brother, but he’d grown up being her protector. She wished he’d take that hat off and see her as a woman grown. A woman he wanted. The saying if wishes were rainbows, we’d all have gold came to mind. Yeah, she’d be so damn rich if that were true. Not that she wasn’t technically rich, although she’d give it all away if she could have a life with Scott.
“Are you even listening to me?” Hollywood snapped, shaking her by the arms a little roughly.
She shivered at his touch. “Yes, Sir, I’m totally listening to you,” she answered. Even his rough handling turned her on. She wouldn’t tell him she fantasized about all the naughty things she’d like him to do to her. He’d probably turn tail and run for the nearest institution and have her committed.
His eyes narrowed at her breathless words. “You’re going to get put over my knee, little girl.”
Talena imagined what it would feel like to have his big palm on her bare ass. Good lord, how she would love it if he actually did follow through with his threat, the same darn threats he’d been making since she’d been seventeen and he’d caught her sneaking out with friends. “Promises, promises, big guy.”
He gave her another little shake before releasing her. “I’m not kidding. You can’t be driving a car like that so fucking recklessly.”
She watched him pace away, enjoying the view from behind as much as the view from the front. In a pair of worn denim that fit his ass like a glove, she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the way his angry strides had every muscle flexing. His thighs were also a thing of beauty. When he’d left the military, she and her mother had been ecstatic. Secretly she’d hoped he’d move in with them, back into the huge house that had seemed so empty since Angela and...the man she’d thought had been her father had died. No matter that it had been ten years since that time. The memory of their deaths and their betrayals had her stomach cramping like she’d eaten bad sushi. She and her mother hadn’t told Scott, or rather Hollywood as he was called, about her eating disorder. Her mother didn’t notice at the time how dangerously ill she’d become, and neither had she, both grieving and trying to come to terms with the upheaval of their lives until it was almost too late. She hadn’t told her mother she’d known about her adoption until she’d been in the ER, hooked up to life-support. Even now she had to work to maintain a healthy balance.
“What am I going to do with you, Talena. You keep pushing and pushing me. I’m your big brother, yet you push all my buttons,” he growled.
“I’ve been pushing your buttons since before I was old enough to know that’s what I was doing.” She took a deep, cleansing inhale, letting it out before she said something she’d regret. “I get what you’re saying, and I’ll try to see if I can keep from pushing the speedometer to the limit again.” Total freaking lie, but she said it with a straight face, and he wanted to believe her. Good ole Scott, he didn’t want to face the fact she wasn’t the little pipsqueak he remembered her being.
Hollywood turned to look over his shoulder, giving her a half grin. “I guess that’s the best I’m going to get out of you, huh?”
It was best not to lie to the man since he was like a human lie detector. He didn’t speak of his time in the Army or how he’d been recruited into the Delta Force much, but she knew from what she’d researched that you had to be super awesome in order to become one of their elite operators. That was one thing he’d mentioned. They weren’t called soldiers but operators.
“T, why aren’t you happy?”
His question and nearness startled her, making her realize she’d zoned out again, dammit.
“I’m happy,” she lied.
“Bullshit. You know better than anyone about not telling me the truth. If there’s something you don’t want to tell me, then you just say it’s none of my business. I may not like it, but I’ll take that over an out-and-out lie.” He ran the back of two fingers down her cheek.
She wanted to scream at him that she would be happy if he saw