Dropping The Ball - A New Year’s Billionaire Romance - Weston Parker Page 0,60
common. Now all I had to do was determine whether I was still what she wanted. I hope to all things that have ever been holy that I am.
I moved another inch closer to her, our chests brushing whenever we inhaled. “Do you really have to ask that? I’m here to protect you, Ry. I couldn’t let it be anyone else.”
“Is that the only reason? If it was, why did you lie to me?” Her voice was steady and quiet but fierce nonetheless.
“I’m not a liar. I know that doesn’t seem like the truth right now, but it is. Keeping this from you nearly gave me a fucking ulcer, and I honestly don’t know why I did, but I can’t change what I did. I thought it was for the best.”
When she didn’t say anything, my heart contracted. “Are you going to get over the fact that I didn’t mention it, or are we going to keep living like fucking zombies?”
“Are you really here to protect me?”
“Yes, but if you want more from me, I’m into that too. To whatever extent you want to take it.” I’d never been more sure of anything in my life, but Rylee still didn’t believe me.
In the heat of the moment with everything I felt for her setting fire to my bloodstream and extinguishing my thoughts, I brought my hands to her face and slowly lowered my head. “Unless you tell me otherwise, I’m going to kiss you now.”
Her eyes fell to my lips, and her tongue darted out to swipe across hers. She even tilted her head back some, flashing me a cheeky smile. “Not if I kiss you first.”
She surged up on her toes as I went to close the distance between us, our mouths meeting somewhere in the middle for a hard kiss that would’ve led to a hell of a lot more if my parents weren’t right upstairs.
Our lips mashed together, our tongues battling for dominance before we broke apart when we heard them laughing on the stairs. We were both breathing heavily and looking extremely guilty when they joined us in the kitchen.
My parents took us both in, but neither of them said anything. They’d walked in on much worse than this before.
“Well.” Dad clapped his hands together once. “Are we still going to go cut down that live tree? It doesn’t seem like you two got around to getting the drinks, so we won’t be wasting anything. We should get going if we want to cut the tree down and get it decorated before tonight.”
“Yeah. Let’s go.” Rylee put herself together much faster than I had, but she also didn’t have a very obvious raging hard-on to contend with.
Staying behind the counter from them, I grabbed an empty glass and filled it with water. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
I didn’t even know who the glass had belonged to, but it had to have been either mine or Rylee’s. Since I didn’t mind swapping spit with her, it didn’t really matter who had left the glass there. It was the distraction I needed to get my body to calm down before I dragged her upstairs to see if an angry fuck would get her over it.
Dad gave me a knowing smile before he and Mom followed Rylee out of the kitchen. I rolled my eyes, and his laughter rang out behind him while he muttered something about “finally.”
Once I could safely leave the kitchen, they were ready to leave with jackets hanging over their arms and purses over Rylee and Mom’s shoulders. Dad still looked like the cat who had gotten the cream, and Mom was looking at Rylee like she wanted to hug her again.
Way to play it cool, guys. I couldn’t help but smile, though. Sometimes, it was nice to know that some things would never change. My parents, for instance.
They exchanged a glance when we walked into the parking lot. My dad motioned toward a tiny car in one of Rylee’s visitor spots. “We’ll take the rental. It drives like a dream. Don’t worry if you lose us in the traffic. Just let Mom know where we’re going and we’ll use that app Tucker installed for us to find you.”
“It’s a GPS, Dad,” I said, but since I appreciated that they were giving us time alone on the drive, I didn’t point out that it would be much easier if they came in the truck with us. “We’ll send the location. See you in a