“Don’t get me started,” he said under his breath.
She didn’t know what he was talking about. As far as she was concerned, there wasn’t enough wrong with him. Life had dealt him a devastating blow, but he wasn’t bitter. He may have closed himself off for a little while, but who wouldn’t? Besides, underneath all those guarded walls, he was thoughtful enough to stock her coffee and give a home to a dog who probably wouldn’t have found one with anyone else. She didn’t know what he could mean, at least not from a negative standpoint “But it’s better now, right?”
“It’s different.” He pushed the pizza box to the coffee table, then glanced at the dog and got up instead and put it in the fridge. “I’ll learn.”
“I have a feeling you’ll figure everything out just fine.”
“I did manage to figure one thing out.”
“Which was?”
He walked back to the sofa and held out his hand. She expected at that point he’d pull her to her feet, but not into his arms. “That gala is in three days, and it’s been a long damn time since I’ve been forced to dance with anyone.”
“No one is forcing you now,” she said lightly. Although by that point, she wasn’t above begging. Being in his arms was an experience she hadn’t been prepared for in the balloon, and despite the fact that she’d done nothing since but crave the deep, shuddering impact of full-body contact, it wasn’t the kind of thing for which a person could prepare. Especially not her. She didn’t do electricity. She’d sooner jump out of a plane than touch a nine-volt battery to her tongue. Or at least that had been the case. Because Ethan’s kind of electricity was addictive—the kind of stimulation any woman would crave. But she wasn’t any woman.
She was the woman he’d kissed.
“I want to dance with you,” he said, either impervious to or ignoring the fact that she stared, probably all moon-eyed and ridiculous. “Besides, if I don’t keep you busy, you know Boyd will want to. And you can pretty much guarantee that between your social status—”
“My parents’ social status,” she corrected. “Which has nothing to do with me.”
“Okay, between your DNA, and the people who can’t stop gaping at the fact that I have a date, I’d rather not spend the night tromping all over your feet.”
“So you want to…dance? Here?”
“Trust me,” he said ruefully. “This is not anything that needs to happen in public. Not yet.”
“There’s no music.”
He leaned over and picked up the remote, then pointed it at the TV and turned it on, programming it to a music channel. “Any other excuses? Because I’m pretty sure you asked me to jump out of a plane, and when I refused, you took me to New Jersey and put me in a balloon. Between that and your aspirations of flinging yourself to the ends of the earth, I figured dancing would be about as exciting as slowing down for a yellow light.”
“Technically you took me to New Jersey,” she muttered. “And then you kissed me.”
He was already pulling her back into his arms, but at her words he froze. “I won’t apologize for that. Not specifically. But if I crossed a line—”
“Your line. Not mine.”
“I don’t…” The objection had come immediately, but it didn’t last.
“You do.” Whatever it was, he did. He had to, or she’d drown.
“You’re leaving,” he said softly. “The lines are there, and they’re nonnegotiable. Neither of us has to worry about falling…not when there’s nowhere to go.”
He said the words so matter-of-factly, like he hadn’t made her world turn and spin and dip and twist off its axis. It didn’t matter that he was denying anything between them, because within that denial lived an admittance.
She hadn’t imagined this thing between them.
She was too dazed to resist when he pulled her close, not that she would have. Nope, that ship had long sailed, and by her estimate, it was headed straight for an iceberg…as if an iceberg stood a chance against the utter hotness that was Ethan Chase.