A California Christmas (Silver Springs #7) - Brenda Novak Page 0,58
her head. “I used to report on revenge porn and bar fights... I wasn’t involved in that sort of thing.”
“You’ll get back to what you’re used to eventually.”
He was obviously spent, and she could understand why, after such a tremendous surge of adrenaline. She was feeling the effects of it, too, although she couldn’t imagine it was to the same degree. “Right,” she said so that he wouldn’t feel the need to continue to encourage her. “I’ll let you get to bed.”
“Okay. You get some rest, too. And please don’t worry about what happened tonight. You did nothing to cause it.”
“I did cause it, though—just by being at the bar.”
“You had as much right to be there as anyone else. He was the one who was out of line.”
That was true—and yet the fight wouldn’t have broken out if not for her. She kept wondering if she should’ve tolerated the idiot’s groping and suggestive language even though she could tell he was leading up to trying to get her to go home with him. “The police didn’t come, did they?” she asked as an afterthought. “You’re not in any trouble...”
“The police got there before I could leave. But they didn’t threaten to arrest me or anything. I didn’t start the fight, and there were plenty of witnesses to back that up.”
“So he’s the one who’s in trouble?”
“He could’ve been. He’s lucky it broke out on the dance floor. Even though we ran into a few tables and chairs, we didn’t break anything. So there were no property damages. And I won’t be pressing charges. The medical bills and other stuff he’ll have to contend with will be punishment enough.”
She felt her eyes widen. “Medical bills! What happened to him?”
“He has a broken nose, at least. I’m fairly certain he has a broken jaw, too. Having that wired shut for several weeks won’t be fun.”
“I’m glad it’s him and not you.”
“Me, too.” He offered her a weary smile as he started past her, and she told herself to let him go, let the evening end right there. But, for some reason, she couldn’t stop herself from reaching out to catch his arm as he went by. He was just close enough to touch and she wanted to touch him badly enough that she’d done it almost involuntarily.
He froze, but instead of meeting his gaze, even though she knew he had to be looking at her, she watched her own hand slide down the soft, tanned skin of his forearm.
He allowed her to lace her fingers through his. But then he said, “Emery...” and she knew by the tone of his voice that it was a warning.
She kept her gaze on their entwined fingers. “What?”
“I don’t have any reserves tonight. If you’re not careful, what happened on the beach will happen again.”
Finally, she lifted her eyes. “That’s just it,” she said. “I want it to.”
* * *
When he was shuffling in the back door, Dallas had been so tired and sore he could barely walk, but as he took Emery’s hand and led her down to his room, he experienced a fresh surge of energy.
At first, he was afraid she’d feel the need to do a lot of talking—to try to explain what she was thinking or feeling or determine what he was thinking or feeling so they could, once again, lay down some ground rules to avoid future trouble. She hadn’t done that when they’d started this last time; he had. But she’d nearly freaked out in the middle.
Tonight, he wasn’t in the mood to contend with any of that. That they wanted each other so badly didn’t make a lot of sense—they came from such different backgrounds and were heading down completely different paths—but in his mind it didn’t have to make sense. He was fine with the inexplicable, with random attraction, with living in the moment. But as good as Thursday had been, tonight he craved total silence. He didn’t want to hear anything or see anything. He wanted to connect with her through touch alone, to feel her bare body against his and savor the exquisite sensation he knew that would create for as long as he could stop himself from taking it further.
Fortunately, she seemed to understand his need for silence, because after all the excuses they’d allowed themselves before, this was exactly the opposite experience. They were going to take what they wanted, but he got the feeling they weren’t going to acknowledge that they were