Don't Walk Away

by Elle Kennedy

  “It was.” His throat closed up. “I wish we got to do this back in the day.”

  Her smile faltered. “Yeah, we were always sneaking around, huh? Made it pretty hard to cuddle and watch movies.”

  It had definitely been hard. Most of the time he’d only seen Emma at school or when he climbed through her window after her parents went to bed. Sometimes she’d manage to get away on the weekends and they’d drive off to be alone, trespassing on neighboring ranches or hanging out at the local swimming hole.

  Not once had he allowed Emma to come to his house, though. Fuck, even imagining it now made his entire body ripple with anger. Emma gazing at the dirty, ugly trailer he’d grown up in. Cringing when his drunken son-of-a-bitch father pinched her ass every time she walked by. His brothers Joe and Ken undressing her with their eyes. Joe would definitely have brought his bong out and tried forcing Emma to take a hit. Kenny would’ve made snide comments about how Emma should dump the zero and get with the hero.

  God. Never. Dean would have voluntarily shoved his leg into a bear trap before letting his family anywhere near her.

  “But we did have the diner. And we got out to the drive-in a few times,” she added. “Remember?”

  His smile felt forced. “Yeah, I remember.” Another unwelcome image burned in his head—this one entirely real.

  Emma must have been hit with the same memory, because her smile faded completely. “Your father was a real asshole.”

  “You mean because he needed money for more beer, drove drunk to the drive-in to track me down, and crashed his pickup into the concession stand? What, normal parents don’t do that kind of stuff?” He grinned wryly, opting to make light of his childhood baggage because it sure as hell was better than crying about it.

  Sympathy softened her brown eyes. “I honestly don’t know how you turned out the way you did, Dean. Living in that hellhole… A lot of people would’ve gone crazy. Or followed in those destructive footsteps.”

  Yeah, he’d dodged a bullet there. His past was difficult to think about without bringing deep pain and sorrow, but for the most part, he was proud of himself for the way he’d turned out. For getting out when he had. Though that had been equally painful, giving up Emma.

  “I guess I’m a prime example for the nature-versus-nurture debate,” he said in a dry voice.

  She laughed softly before going serious again. “I mean it. I’m proud of what you’ve accomplished, and who you are, Dean.”

  His heart swelled. Feeling pride in himself was one thing. Knowing that Emma was proud of him? It was fucking cathartic.

  Her gaze shifted to the closing credits still scrolling on the television screen. “We should do this again,” she said, although he didn’t miss the hesitant note in her voice. “The third movie in the next trilogy will be releasing on DVD soon.”

  “Sure, that sounds amazing.”

  He was astounded lightning didn’t come out of nowhere and strike him dead. Then he realized he wasn’t lying—he would watch anything if it meant he got to be next to her, spending time with her, just being.

  Only now she was on her feet and headed for the door, and Dean didn’t push his luck by insisting on staying longer. She hadn’t uttered the words booty call once since they’d stepped off the balcony and gone back inside. He had to consider that a mini-victory.

  Dean caught her chin in his fingers and tilted her head so he could press one final lingering kiss goodbye to her lips. When he pulled back, her eyes were sparkling a whole lot more than when he’d arrived.

  “I’ll call you,” he promised.

  Emma nodded. She seemed about to say something, but then changed her mind and simply smiled. “Thanks for coming over.”

  The temptation to do a dance of triumph in the hallway was strong, but he managed to hold it together until he was in the elevator. And then if he happened to do a little undignified moving and shaking, he figured only the security guards would witness his enthusiasm.

  As he rode down to the lobby, Dean pulled out his phone to check his calendar. He still had plans to make, and a woman to win over. Tonight had been a good start, but by the time he was through, Emma was going to remember exactly why she’d fallen in love with him.

  And then she’d fall all over again.

  Suz

  “Really? That was the best you could do?” Chase sidled up to Suz, a bottle of Corona in his hand and a mocking smirk on his face.

  Suz scowled at her brother before following his gaze across the backyard, where her father had cornered Suz’s date by the barbecue and was spending more time grilling him than the steaks. Poor Charlton looked like he wanted to be anywhere but here, and Suz didn’t blame him. She didn’t particularly want to be here either.

  “You’d be amazed how hard it is to find a nice, respectable man these days,” she said glumly.

  Her brother snickered, his blue eyes fixing on Charlton’s salmon-colored polo shirt and perfectly starched khakis. “Where’d you find him? Please don’t tell me you stood outside a country club holding a sign.”

  “He’s the son of the new editor-in-chief of the paper. He’s been hanging around the office getting in everyone’s way, so I told him I’d show him the ropes if he did me a solid.” She drained the rest of her Diet Coke before reaching for another can from the cooler on the oak deck. That was the other requirement in the deal she’d made with her brothers—if you were the one bringing the date, you had to stay sober.

  Her male siblings were definitely taking advantage of their free pass this evening. Mike, the eldest, was already on his way to getting totally sloshed, his cheeks flushed and arms gesturing rapidly as he regaled Jake about his latest arrest. Through the glass doors, Suz could see her baby brother Dyson sneaking sips of his rum and Coke while their mother chatted his ear off as she tossed a salad. Gage, as usual, was on the deck texting on his phone, most likely to one of his numerous admirers.

  And Chase was living up to his pain-in-the-ass status as he sipped his beer, then said, “What kind of name is Charlton, anyway? Is his last name Heston?”

  “God, I wish.” She heaved out a big sigh. “At least then he’d probably have a gun on him, and I could shoot myself in the head.”

  Chase burst out laughing. “Ever the drama queen, aren’t you, Susie?”

  He tugged playfully on her hair, and she resisted the urge to smack him. Suz loved her family. She really, truly did. But these monthly gatherings took a toll on her sometimes. That thing called privacy didn’t exist in the Jones family. She couldn’t take a step without bumping into one of her brothers, or so much as cough without her mother appearing at her side asking if she was coming down with something.

  It was exhausting at the best of times, but when her thoughts were already muddled and her mood started in the gutter, the family stuff became unbearable.

  Damn Colby for twisting her up in knots like this. Except…well, no, this was nobody’s fault but hers. She never should’ve asked him to be her date—in hindsight, it had been a seriously crappy thing to do—but she was still powering forward under that old Colby-is-just-a-hot-friend mindset. She’d worked so hard to keep him in the friend zone she sometimes forgot just how much she was attracted to him.

  And he was attracted to her, too. No, even worse—he liked her. As in, he wanted to be her boyfriend.

  Before her panicky mind could obsess over that, her brother proved his annoying interruptions could be good for something, at least today.

  “If you were hurting this bad for date options this month, you should’ve brought a friend instead,” Chase told her. “You know, Lynn, or that Pepper chick, or…I don’t know…some other acquaintance.”

  Suz’s eyes narrowed. “Some other acquaintance, huh? Anyone in particular?”

  “Naah. Just…whoever.”

  Her brother donned an indifferent look, but she saw right through him. And since she was tired of obsessing about her own romantic issues, she immediately pounced on the opportunity to focus
on someone else’s love life.

  Tormenting Chase was infinitely more satisfying.

  “Hmmm. By ‘whoever’, do you mean the very hot brunette whose assignment you botched last week? The one who goes by the name of Gillian?”

  Chase blinked innocently. “She was hot? I didn’t notice.”

  Suz snorted. “Uh-huh, I’m sure you didn’t. Dude, she makes me drool.”

  His expression turned painful. “Don’t fucking do that.”

  “What? You don’t want to play Marry, Fuck, Kill with me? You and the guys do it all the time.”

  “Not the same.”

  She grinned. “It’s because of the boobs, right?”

  Her brother blanched. “You’re my sister. You have no sexual parts whatsoever.”

  “Unlike Gillian, who has a very nice rack,” Suz offered.

  “Incredible,” Chase agreed before slamming his lips together and glaring at her. “You’re nasty.”

  “You’re just discovering this? I’m so disappointed. I thought you were the smart one of the bunch.”

  She was ready to go in for the kill and find out more about his obsession with the ex-military sniper when he ducked away from her, raised his hand in the air and shouted, “Yo, Charlton!”

  He didn’t get another word out before the man was jogging across the yard to join them.

  Chase snorted, turning to offer her a bemused smirk. “Jeez, Suz, what do you do to get them this obedient? Puppy treats?”

  “Nope. It’s the boobs you pretend I don’t have.”

  “Nuh-uh, can’t heeeeear you!” Chase was already plugging his ears and racing away.

  Suz grinned after him. In spite of the hours she still had to endure before she could go home and drink the memories of the evening into oblivion, at least she had new intel. Information that should be very fun to exploit at the appropriate moment.

  It made it a little easier to offer a bright smile to the eager young man prancing up to her like a golden retriever puppy—and she had Chase to thank for the images of dogs in bowties that popped into her head every time she looked at Charlton now. Still, every raincloud had a silver lining if you poked around hard enough. Intel plus future bribe material equaled not a total waste of her time and energy.

  She took a deep breath, resisted the urge to scratch her date behind the ears, and slammed the door on the part of her brain that wondered what Colby was up to that night.

  Chapter Thirteen

  The sketches were too…cute.

  Emma released a frustrated breath as she examined her morning’s work, but she didn’t need to go over it with eagle eyes to know the designs she’d been sketching weren’t her typical Fire and Ice creations. The company was known for its racy haute couture garments—and these bright, airy dresses staring up from the pages of her sketchbook were in no way racy. They looked more like the costume designs from a movie like Pleasantville. Sweet and adorable and wrong.

  It was Dean’s fault. She had no other explanation for why she now possessed the creative instincts of a Disney cartoonist. The man was distracting her with his toe-curling kisses and contagious enthusiasm, making her feel like a damned teenager again.

  “Em?”

  Speak of the devil.

  Irritation and amusement warred inside her as Dean strode into the suite like he owned it. For the past week, he’d dropped by so often she’d finally given him his own key card so he would stop picking the lock and shorting the system. He always gave her a heads-up before showing up, though, so she’d been expecting him today, and she rose from her seat to greet him.

  “Hey.” After a beat of hesitation, she planted a kiss on his cheek.

  God, this was weird. Neither one of them had mentioned the D-word—dating—but Emma was having trouble thinking about him in terms of just sex anymore. Sure, he rocked her world every time she saw him, but they were engaging in a heck of a lot of nonsexual activities too. Watching movies. Cuddling. Running on the boardwalk.

  She had no idea what it meant, and a part of her was too afraid to ask him. No—too afraid to know the answer.

  Did he want a relationship with her?

  Did she want one with him? If this was any other man, at this point the answer to that would be hell yes, but this was Dean, damn it. The guy who’d broken her heart and left her in the lurch all those years ago. She might have forgiven him, but that didn’t mean she was ready to trust him with her heart.

  Eventually she wanted forever with a man she could count on, and Dean’s track record didn’t exactly mesh with happily ever afters and other fairy tales.

  “Hey.” His gorgeous smile made her pulse speed up. “Whatcha working on?” Dean wandered over to the dining room table before she could protest, his dark head bending over the designs. “Nice. These are hot.”

  Emma smiled wryly. “They’re sweet, that’s what they are.”

  “Who says sweet can’t be hot?” He flashed another grin, and her heart raced even faster. “Actually, the more innocent a dress looks, the filthier it is.”

  She had to laugh. “That’s because you’re imagining ripping it off a woman with your teeth.”

  “Not just any woman,” he corrected. Heat flared in his eyes. “You, Emma. I only imagine doing that to you.”

  A tight knot formed in her throat and she had to swallow hard to knock it down. Crap, when he said stuff like that, it only confused her all the more. She knew for a fact he wasn’t seeing anyone else—not just because he was over at her place every night, but because she’d grilled Suz about it over lunch the other day. The other woman had staunchly insisted that as big of a hound dog as he was, Dean only slept with one woman at a time, and Emma had taken serious comfort from that information.

  Still, knowing all that potent sexual energy was focused solely on her was a tad unnerving. She was only in town for two more months, and then she’d be heading back to New York and Dean would stay here. They were supposed to be having a fling, just some uncomplicated sex before she went back to her very complicated life, and she was worried he might be getting too attached.

  She was worried she might be getting too attached.

  “This doesn’t look like the usual Fire and Ice stuff, though,” he remarked, his expression going serious as he studied the sketches. “Is Lorenzo letting you design a special line or something?”

  Her chest stiffened. Letting her? If Dean only knew—

  But no, Dean didn’t know. And he couldn’t know. Nobody could know that the entire foundation of Fire and Ice was based on a lie.

  She forced her tone to stay vague and said, “We’re talking about experimenting with some new lines for the label.”

  “Cool.” He straightened with a smile. “So how does it work, anyway? Does he design all the clothes, or do you both do it? I assumed you were his assistant, but every time I’m over here you’re sketching.”

  The knot of discomfort in her belly wound tighter. “I wear a lot of hats in the company,” she said, as elusively as before. Then she pasted on a smile before he could press for details. “So, what, you didn’t bring any lunch today?”

  Dean shook his head. “I was hoping we could go out. I have a business errand to run, but I didn’t want to miss seeing you, so I figured you could come along and then we’ll grab something to eat. What do you say?”

  Her gaze drifted to the pile of sketches, which were pretty much useless since they didn’t fit the company’s current brand. Useless drawings meant she had to start all over again, and in the past she’d found when she hit a dead end, the best thing to do was regroup and clear her head before diving in for take two.

  “That sounds good,” she admitted. “I need a break.”

  A few minutes later, he helped her into his SUV. “We need to get the job done first, and then I’ll take you anywhere you want for lunch.”

  “Anywhere? Don’t tempt me—what if I ask for liver and onions?”

  Dean made a face, somehow still looking amazingly sexy even a
s he made his opinion clear regarding her lunch suggestion. “Please don’t tell me you still eat that crap? I thought that was an affliction of small towns that would have been washed away while traveling the world.”

  “What? You don’t think the menu at our mom-and-pop diner back home can compare with Paris? Where’s your sense of loyalty?”

  “I traded it in for a new set of taste buds.”

  She laughed, and as Dean found the shortest route into the downtown core, Emma played with the radio, deliberately putting on a country station to poke at him.

  He gave her the evil eye. “I was hoping for some fun, but I can see how it’s going to be. You’re feeling nasty.”

  It surprised her how much energy she had to burn all of a sudden. “Tell me what we’re going to do,” she suggested. “That’ll distract me from coming up with ways to drive you crazy.”

  Dean pulled into a parking space outside a small tapas bar, tilting his head toward the place. “One of our customers is planning a big event for his lady friend, but he doesn’t want us doing any recon without her being one hundred percent in the know about it.”

  Emma considered for a moment as he made his way around the vehicle and opened her door. “Do you often have to spy on the ladies?”

  “Public places only, sweetheart. There’s nothing illegal or immoral about what we do. Besides, you’d be surprised how many times filling in that questionnaire helps trigger ideas. Making observations in the field are just another way to help fill in the blanks. And when we brainstorm with the guys so they end up enjoying the activities as well, we hope that maybe they get it together and do a better job all on their own the next time.”

  “Sounds as if you’re trying to put yourself out of a job.”

  Dean chuckled, gesturing to a couple standing in the middle of the sidewalk not even twenty feet from them who were shouting at the top of their lungs at each other. “Sadly we have lots of other potential customers.”

  He linked their fingers together and guided her into the warmth of the restaurant, the spicy scents of curry and ginger mingling in the air as they made their way toward the hostess. “So what do I need to do?” Emma asked.