LITMIR.BIZ

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      “I’m not ready!” she protested.

      “Look at me,” he commanded.

      She did. She looked into the strength and calm of those deep brown eyes and all of it felt like an intoxicating chemical cocktail so strong it made a life-threatening beesting feel like nothing.

      The years dropped away. He was woven into the fabric of her life, the way he cocked his head when he listened, the intensity of his gaze, the ease of his laughter, the solidness of his friendship, the utter reliability of him.

      She could feel her breathing slow.

      But then with her hand still in the grip of his, her eyes drifted to the full, sensuous curve of his lower lip and she could feel her heart and breath quicken again.

      Once, a long time ago, she had tasted those lips, giving in, finally, to that want he had always made her feel. Though by then they had both been seventeen, she had been like a child drinking wine and it had been just as heady an experience.

      She remembered his taste had felt exotic and compelling; she remembered how he had explored the hollows of her mouth as if he, too, had thought of nothing else for the two years they had known each other.

      What a price for that kiss, though! After that exchange, he had gone cool toward her. Frosty. It had changed everything in the worst of ways. They had never been able to get back to the easy camaraderie that predated that meeting of lips.

      David had started dating Emily Carson, she, Kevin.

      And yet, even knowing the price of it, sitting here on the curb, Kayla had the crazy thought: if she was going to die and had just one wish, would it be to taste David’s lips again? She found herself, even though it filled her with self-loathing, leaning toward him as if pulled on an invisible thread.

      David leaned toward her.

      His eyes held hers as he came closer. She could feel her own eyes shutting, and not just because they were swelling, either. Her lips were parting.

      He jammed the pen, hard, against the outer edge of her upper thigh.

      The needle popped out of its protective casing and injected the epinephrine under her skin.

      “Ouch!” The physical pain snapped her back to reality, and her eyes flew open as Kayla yanked herself back from him, mortified, trying to read in his face if he had seen her moment of weakness, her intention.

      It didn’t look like he had. David’s face was cool, remote.

      The indifference of his expression reminded her of the emotional pain she had felt that night after they had shared that kiss. She had thought, on fire with excitement and need, that it was the beginning of something.

      Instead, she had become invisible to him.

      Just as Kevin had become invisible to him. That was what Kayla needed to remember about David Blaze: he seemed like one thing—a man you could count on with your life, in fact—and yet when there was any kind of emotional need involved, he could not be relied on at all.

      The moment of feeling intoxicated by David was gone like a soap bubble that had floated upward, iridescent and ethereal, and then pop—over.

      “That hurt,” she said. It was the memories of all the ways he had disappointed her as much as the injection, not that he needed to know.

      “Sorry,” he said with utter insincerity. He hadn’t cared about her pain or Kevin’s back then, and he didn’t care now. He got up, moved to his car with efficiency of motion. It seemed as if he were unhurried and yet he was back at her side almost before she could blink.

      He settled back on the curb, and Kayla ordered herself not to take any more comfort from the strength in the shoulder that touched hers. She saw David had retrieved a small first-aid kit from the glove box of his car, and he unzipped it and rummaged through, coming up with a pair of tweezers.

      “I’m just going to see if I can find the stinger.”

      “You are not!” she said, yanking her skirt down over her naked thigh and pressing the fabric tight to her legs.

      “Don’t be ridiculous. The stinger could still be pumping poison into you.”

      She hesitated and he, sensing her hesitation, pressed. “I already saw the sting site. And your panties. They’re pink.”

      To match the blush she could feel moving up her cheeks. Kayla sputtered ineffectually as he easily overpowered her attempts to hold her skirt down.

      “There it is. Quit jumping around like that.”

      “Give me those tweezers!” She made a grab for them.

      “Stay calm, Kayla,” he ordered, amused. “It’s like being bitten by a snake. The more excited you get, the worse it is.”

      “I don’t want you messing around under my skirt and talking about excitement,” she said grimly.

      But for the first time, his stern mask fell. He gave a small snort of laughter, and that damned grin made him more astoundingly attractive than ever! “Just be grateful you didn’t get stung somewhere else.”

      “Grateful,” she muttered. “I’ll be sure and add it to my list.”

      “Got it!” he said with satisfaction, inspecting the tweezers and then holding them up for her to see. Sure enough, a hair of a stinger was trapped in them.

      The amusement that had briefly made him so attractive had completely evaporated.

      “Get in the car.”

      That’s what she had to remember. The very qualities that made David a superb rescuer—detachment, a certain hard-nosed ability to do what needed to be done—also made him impossible to get close to.

      What had she been thinking, leaning toward him, thinking of his kiss?

      She was in shock, that was all. Riding her bike with her dog and sunflowers on a perfect summer day when out of nowhere, a bee. And him.

      She, of all people, should know that. When you least expected it, life wreaked havoc. It was a mistake to surrender control, and the circumstances were no longer life-threatening, so she simply wasn’t giving in.

      “My dog,” she reminded him. “And my bike. My purse. My stuff is all over the road. The phone is new. I need to—”

      “You need to get in the car,” David said, enunciating every word with a certain grim patience.

      “No,” she said, enunciating every word as carefully as he did, “I need to find my dog. And get my bike off the street. And retrieve my phone. It is a very expensive phone.”

      He frowned, a man who moved in a world where his power was absolute. He was unaccustomed to anyone saying no to him, and she felt a certain childish satisfaction at the surprised, annoyed look on his face.

      Slowly, as if he was speaking to a child, and not a very bright one at that, David said, “I’m taking you to the emergency clinic. I’m doing it now.”

      “Thank you. You’ve given me the shot. I undoubtedly owe you my life, but—”

      “I’ll take care of the dog and the bike and the purse and the phone after I’ve made sure you are all right.”

      “I am all right!”

      That was, in fact, a lie. Kayla felt quite woozy.

      And she got the impression he was not the least bit fooled as he looked at her carefully.

      “Get in the car,” he said again.

      He was quite maddening in his authoritative approach to her. Her gaze went to her personal belongings scattered all over the road. “The EpiPen bought me time,” she said, tilting her chin stubbornly at him.

      His sigh seemed long-suffering, though their encounter had lasted only minutes. “Kayla,

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