by Vi Keeland
Izzy showed off her dimples while shaking her head. “Nope. Didn’t say a word.”
The two of them had been teaming up against me since we left the apartment. I didn’t mind, especially since it seemed to take Izzy’s mind off her terrible day.
“Are you Italian, too, Hunter?”
He nodded. “I am.”
“Did your mom do a big Sunday night dinner like Nanna Rossi?”
“No, she didn’t. My mom was sick a lot when I was growing up.”
“Oh. Mine was, too. She had cancer.” Izzy had surprised me a lot today with all of her openness. “Did your mom die?”
“Izzy,” I tried to gently remind her of her manners. “That’s not really dinner conversation.”
“It’s alright. I don’t mind,” Hunter said, turning his attention back to Izzy. “She died when I was seventeen.”
“Was she sick for a long time? My mom was only sick for, like, a year. She had small cell bronchial carcinoma—they call it oat cell cancer. Barely anyone gets it unless they smoked. My mom never smoked.”
Small cell bronchial carcinoma shouldn’t roll off a fifteen-year-old’s tongue so smoothly.
“My mom was sick for a lot of years. But she didn’t go to the doctor. She didn’t take care of herself.”
Izzy held up her hand to show off her charm bracelet. She wore it every day. “This was my mom’s. My dad bought her most of these.” She fingered through the collection of dangling charms until she found the pearl-colored ribbon. “Nat bought me this one last year on my mom’s birthday. It’s the ribbon that represents lung cancer. Is there a ribbon for what your mom had?”
Hunter looked down at his own wrist. “Not that I know of. But my mom made this bracelet.” He wore a beautiful, braided leather band with a thin silver rope entwined through it. I’d noticed it before. “She used to do a lot of craft projects when she couldn’t get out of bed.”
God, this was the strangest date ever. We were sitting in a fancy, romantic restaurant with a fifteen year old, discussing death. And…it wasn’t even supposed to be a date.
Izzy frowned. “Yakshit’s mom died early, too. She wouldn’t go to doctors either.”
Hunter and I exchanged glances. “Sounds like you two are close,” he said.
“We were. Until he decided to go to the dance with Brittany.”
Izzy so rarely allowed me access to her emotions. I jumped on the opportunity to understand what was going on in her teenage head.
“Why didn’t you ask Yakshit to the dance if you wanted to go with him?”
She shrugged and pushed pasta around on her plate with the fork. Her voice was a vulnerable tone I so rarely heard. “I was afraid.”
“Afraid he would say no?”
She shook her head. “But now he likes Brittany.”
“Maybe not. Sometimes people say yes just to go out on a date.”
Izzy looked up with a glimmer of hope in her sad eyes. “Like you and Marcus?”
My eyes flashed to the smirk on Hunter’s face. I sighed. “Yes. Sort of. He was nice, so I went out with him and gave it a chance.” I squeezed Izzy’s hand. “You’re young. I’m not saying you should go ask out every cute boy at school. But if it was the Sadie Hawkins dance, and you really liked him, you should have asked him. Don’t be afraid of getting hurt.”
When I looked back up at Hunter, he was staring at me. He spoke to Izzy without breaking our eye contact. “Sounds like good advice, if you ask me.”
After dinner, Hunter went back to our apartment with us to make sure we got home safe. Izzy thanked him for dinner and took off to her room the minute we walked in.
I kicked off my heels. “Thank you so much for tonight. I know it wasn’t exactly the date you had planned, but I appreciate what you did. You have a sweet side, Mr. Delucia.”
He looked over my shoulder and down the hall to Izzy’s bedroom. Finding it all clear, he wrapped his hands around my waist and locked them behind my back. “At least you admit now that we were supposed to go out on a date.”
I hadn’t thought about my words. But the least I could do was be honest. He deserved it. “I wore this dress for you and put on the perfume you told me you liked when we first met.”
A slow smile spread across his face. “I know. But it’s nice to hear you admit the truth for a change.”
“God, you’re so arrogant. You couldn’t just accept the compliment.”
He cupped my face in his hands. “Friday night. Just the two of us.”
I nodded. Somewhere between him opening up to Izzy during dinner and the ride home, I’d given in.
Hunter’s eyes dropped to my lips. “Now kiss me. I missed this mouth.”
For the first time, I didn’t think about it. I kissed him—well, at least it started that way. Hunter took it over after about three seconds. It was tamer than the kisses we’d shared before, probably because we were both aware that Izzy was just down the hall and could walk out at any moment. But it was no less passionate. Before it broke, he did that thing that drove me wild—catching my bottom lip between his teeth and tugging. Lord, the man can kiss.
“Seven o’clock?” he asked.
I nodded. “It’s a date.”
He smirked and leaned down for one last peck on my lips. “Yes, it is. It was always a date.”
Chapter 19
Natalia
I’d never been so nervous for a date in my life. It made no sense. I’d spent time with Hunter, knew he was a decent guy, so why was I unable to sit down and relax? In the last half hour, I’d unloaded the dishwasher, reorganized two kitchen cabinets, and now I was checking the date on each spice in the spice rack. I shouldn’t have gotten ready so early. When the buzzer rang, I literally jumped at the sound.
Wine. I need wine.
“Come on up,” I feigned calm and casual as I pressed the button to unlock the interior door downstairs. I then proceeded to run to the refrigerator, pour a glass of Shiraz and down it like it was medicine. I made it back to the door just as Hunter stepped off the elevator.
He was dressed more casually than I’d expected—in a pair of jeans and a navy polo. Don’t get me wrong, he looked delicious, but when I’d asked him how to dress for where we were going, he’d said a sexy dress and heels. As he strode toward my door, his eyes did a sweep over me, and I felt warmth travel through my body that had nothing to do with the alcohol coursing through my veins.
“I think I overdressed.”
Hunter leaned in and covered my lips with his for a quick hello. “Nope. You’re dressed just right.”
“But you’re wearing a polo and jeans. You said a sexy dress, so I thought that meant the dress code was more formal.”
“I said sexy because that’s what I wanted to see on you. There is no dress code where we’re going.”
“Where are we going?”
“My place. I’m cooking you dinner.”
“I could have worn jeans for that.”
He smirked. “Might want to ask where we’re going in the future, rather than what you should wear. Because my answer’s always going to be sexy dress and heels, even if we’re going to McDonald’s.”
I laughed, stepping aside. “You’re impossible. Come in for a minute. I need to tell Izzy I’m leaving.”
Inside, Izzy had emerged from her bedroom and was hanging on the refrigerator door. She glanced up. “Hi, Hunter.” And went back to staring at the food.
“I made you ravioli.”
“I’m on a diet. Do we have anything low carb?”
“What? A diet? Since when? And better yet, why? You’re a size two.”
“Since this morning.”
I walked to the refrigerator, took out the ravioli and sauce and put it on the counter. “Start your diet tomorrow.” I kissed her cheek. “Mrs. Whitman knows I’m going out. I won’t be home late.”
She shrugged. “Whatever.”
“No one in the apartment while I’m gone.”
Izzy rolled her eyes
. “There goes the rager I had planned.”
The nerves the wine had calmed were back in full force once I was on the way to Hunter’s apartment. I stared out the car window, debating whether I was ready to sleep with him. I’d thought we were going out to eat, and since he knows I have to be home early for Izzy, it wasn’t something I’d been worried about. Now dinner was at his house, and I knew all it would take was one kiss and my decision-making skills would be hampered. I needed to make a decision while I was not under the influence of his hard body pressed against mine.
Hunter side-glanced to me and back to the road. “What’s going on in that head of yours?”
“Nothing.”
We stopped at a light, and Hunter turned to me. He didn’t say a word. Instead, his eyes pointed down to where my hands were picking lint off my dress that wasn’t there. Then his gaze met mine.
“Shut up,” I said.
He chuckled, and the light changed, pulling his attention back to the road. I’d thought I’d been granted a reprieve, but a half a block later, he casually said, “We’re not having sex tonight, if that makes you relax a little more.”
Did he just say…
“What?”
“Sex. We’re not having it.”
“Why not?”
“Because tonight I’m making you dinner. We’re going to share a good meal and talk about sex. I want to know what you’re up for and what you’re not. But you have to be home early for Izzy.”
“Isn’t that a tad presumptuous of you? Assuming you’re the one who gets to decide when we have sex. What if I don’t plan on ever having sex with you?”
“I think your wet panties when we kiss says you do plan on having sex with me.”
“My panties are not wet when we kiss.” I totally lied.
“Okay. I’ll check next time to prove you wrong.”
I didn’t put it past him to do exactly that. “Let’s back this conversation up a little. So you’ve decided we aren’t having sex tonight. What if I told you I wanted to have sex? You wouldn’t have sex with me?”
He actually considered my question for a minute, which I found rather amusing. “What I meant was, I wasn’t going to try to have sex with you tonight. But if you try to have it with me, by all means, you’ll be getting fucked.”
I probably should have been offended for a dozen different reasons, but I wasn’t in the slightest. Instead, the ludicrousness of the conversation made me burst out laughing. “You know what?”
“What?”
“I was stressing over us potentially having sex tonight. And now I’m not. So as strange as this conversation was, it actually made me feel better.”
Hunter smiled as he pulled into an underground parking garage. “Glad to help. And trust me, I haven’t even begun to make you feel better yet.”
***
“Wow. This is a sublet?” The apartment Hunter was staying in was really nice. It wasn’t huge, but it was modern, with high ceilings and an open floor plan, so it felt bigger than the square footage—though it was the outside space that elevated the place from really nice to damn spectacular. New York and outside space weren’t normally bedfellows. But this place had a balcony big enough for two lounge chairs, a table that seated six, a barbeque, and a dozen potted plants.
“It’s owned by Khaill-Jergin, the builder I work for. They keep this one and a few others as corporate apartments, mostly for when executives from the London office are in town. I lucked out that one was available.”
“It’s beautiful.”
Hunter slid the sliding glass doors open and held his hand out for me to step through first.
“The view is sensational,” I said. “Yet it feels serene at the same time.”
Hunter smiled. “That was the goal. Each project has an essence statement. This building was an oasis in the jungle. It opened five years ago. After I graduated, I did my internship with the architect who designed this building at Khaill. The initial design was done, but the architect winds up doing a lot of revisions while the building is going up. So this was the first project I ever worked on.
“Wow. That’s really cool. Honestly, most of the time, I don’t even think about the buildings I’m walking past every day. It must be amazing to walk by one and look up, knowing you designed it.”
He nodded. I’d become plenty acquainted with conceited Hunter, but I’d never met the humble side of him before. I liked it.
Come to think of it, I liked conceited Hunter, too.
“You warm enough to have a glass of wine out here before dinner?”
“Sure. I’d love that.”
Hunter went inside and returned a few minutes later with two glasses of merlot. He came up behind me, handed me my wine, and leaned both wrists on the rail on either side of me, caging me in as we took in the sunset and sipped. The silence was comfortable, although the feel of him so close behind me, and the profound effect it had on my body, was unnerving. After a few minutes and the feel of his warm breath tickling my neck, I felt my breaths coming quicker and deeper.
“Turn around, Natalia.”
Hunter’s voice was low and so damn seductive. I waited for him to step back so I could maneuver around to face him. After a few more heavy breaths, I realized he had no intention of giving me space, so I turned while locked between his arms. Between the close proximity, his light blue eyes, and his intoxicating smell, I needed more wine. Raising my glass to my lips, I proceeded to down the half-full glass.
When I was done, Hunter raised a brow.
I held up the empty glass and shook it back and forth. A snippet of the conversation we’d had in the car replayed in my head. “I wasn’t going to try to have sex with you tonight. But if you try to have it with me, by all means, you’ll be getting fucked.”
I bit my lip, and Hunter seemed to read my mind. Taking the empty glass from my hand, he set it down on the floor next to us, along with his own half-full glass. When I unconsciously wet my lips, he muttered a string of curses before planting his mouth over mine.
The taste of wine on his tongue was enough to make me feel like I’d drunk the entire bottle myself. My head was woozy, my body tingled, and I wanted to climb the damn man like a tree. He pressed his body even tighter to mine, and my back arched from the railing toward his as my fingers clenched a fistful of his hair.
He groaned when I yanked. “I can’t wait to be inside you. You make me hard as a rock.”
With a thrust of his hips, he demonstrated that he wasn’t exaggerating. Oh God. I was so desperate I could probably come from just dry humping with this man. Resisting taking things further was a challenge I wasn’t sure I could endure for too long.
When the kiss broke, Hunter looked just as bamboozled by our chemistry as I was. We stared into each other’s eyes for a while.
“You’re really good at that,” I told him.
His smile was playful as his brows drew down. “What?”
“Kissing.”
He leaned in and brushed his lips with mine. “I’m good at kissing other places, too. Just say the word and I’ll show you.”
I laughed. “Seriously. Why don’t you have a girlfriend, Hunter? You’re handsome, smart, have a great job, own a beautiful house, you’re an amazing kisser, and you can fix a sink and build things. You’re prime boyfriend material.”
His playful look turned serious. He also pulled back a bit, though he didn’t release me from the confines of his arms and the balcony rail.
“I don’t want that type of relationship.” He studied me carefully. “I like you. You’re beautiful and smart. We enjoy each other. But I’m not looking for anything serious.”
Even though he’d been upfront since we met, and I was not looking for a relationship at all, somehow it stung to hear him say that.
“What does that mean, exactly? That I’ll be in your bed one night and someone else the next?”
“Absolutely not. We’d be exclusive. To be clear, that’s a two-way street. My expectation,
once you’re in my bed, is that you won’t be fucking anyone else either.”
“Okay…and we’d spend time together outside of the bedroom, too?”
“Of course. I’ll always make sure you eat before I eat you.”
I squirmed a little at the thought. “So the difference between what we’d be doing and a relationship is…”
Our gazes locked. “Expectations.”
Since we were laying our cards on the table and having a little heart to heart, I figured I’d push a bit further. “You said you had one serious relationship that lasted years.”
Hunter nodded. “That’s right.”
“I married my only real serious relationship. That disaster is the primary reason I’ve been avoiding anyone with real relationship potential. I lie to myself and others by saying I don’t want a relationship because I need to focus on my work and Izzy. While that’s partially true, if I’m being honest, it’s also because Garrett burned me pretty bad, and I haven’t fully gotten over it yet.” I paused for a few seconds. “Does your not wanting a relationship have to do with the one serious one you had?”
He looked away, staring over my shoulder and out into the lit-up city before returning his eyes to mine. “Yes, but not in the way you probably think.”
“Did she break your heart?”
“We broke each other’s.” He cleared his throat and took a step back. “How about we go eat?”
“Okay.” I followed Hunter to the kitchen and offered to help. But he’d already done all the prep work for a dinner of chicken and broccoli pesto bowtie pasta. It was put together in a sauté pan, and all he needed to do was warm it up. He turned the gas cooktop on and filled my wine glass again while I sat on a stool at the island, watching him.
“Do you cook often?” I asked his back while sipping my wine and admiring the way his ass filled out his jeans.
He glanced back and caught me checking him out. Flashing a knowing, cocky half-smile he said, “Only when I want to eat.”
“You don’t order in a lot?”
“I like to try to eat healthy when I’m home. I travel a lot, so I have no choice but to eat out a lot. So when I’m home, I attempt to avoid eating crap. Plus, I like to cook. How about you?”
