Now, there’s a first, she couldn’t help thinking. She and Dave in agreement—and there’d been no choking involved. Would wonders never cease?
“I think he was off and running when she started to nod her head.” A great deal of fondness flooded his eyes as he glanced back at Ryan. “You’re only eight once.”
Something in his voice piqued her interest. Kara slanted a glance toward Dave even as she watched Ryan tearing into his gifts with the innocent gusto only an eight-year-old could display.
“You actually remember being eight?” she asked him, curious.
“Vaguely,” he admitted. Then he looked at her, his expression becoming more animated. “I remember you at eight.”
She wasn’t expecting that. Surprised, she asked, “You do? Why?”
That, as he recalled, was the year she really went to town on him. The year that she seemed determined to drive him insane. “Because you made my life a living hell that year.”
Maybe she had been a little too forceful, but only because he seemed so intent on ignoring her. She’d already felt like an ugly duckling, and his treatment of her—acting as if she were invisible—was the precursor to her exacting revenge on him.
She’d implemented a lot of pranks that year. And he’d deserved every one of them, she added silently. Out loud, she apologized. But the words lacked heart.
“Sorry about that.”
“No, you’re not,” he told her, turning to face her now. “You’re grinning.”
She did her best to dial it back a little, but she could feel that she was still grinning. And really enjoying herself. Her mind cast about for a good cover—and she found one.
“Just happy to be here, watching what is actually my core audience getting ecstatic over the games the company’s been producing this last year,” she said. To prove her point, she motioned toward Ryan.
When Dave turned around to look, he saw that his cousin’s son was surrounded by a flurry of wrapping paper. The expression on the boy’s face could only be described as pure rapture. The object of all this unbound excitement was now in his hands, and, Kara noted with deep satisfaction, it was the game that had initially started this particular complex ball rolling.
“Looks like our game is a hit,” she murmured more to herself than to Dave.
But Dave did manage to hear her. Moreover, he looked very pleased, whether with her or himself, it wasn’t clear. But he gave her shoulder a quick, reinforcing squeeze, saying, “Thanks for getting it. The look on his face is absolutely priceless.”
His cousin was in obvious agreement because she seemed to be in her element, filming her son and his joyous unwrapping frenzy.
Glancing over toward him and Kara, Melissa mouthed, “Thank you,” to both of them.
Kara suddenly realized that Dave had misunderstood her use of the word our. She’d said it referring to herself and the team she’d headed up that had done the testing and retesting of the game until they all but hated the mere mention of the title. He, obviously, had taken it on a far more personal level, which was fine for the charade they were undertaking, but not so fine if he began to believe it.
It was a problem inasmuch as she had no plans of ever being attached to anyone. She’d learned early on that the consequences of using her heart for anything other than pumping blood were daunting and came with a dark promise of being hurtful somewhere down the line. She didn’t need that. Ever.
So instead, she concentrated strictly on Dave’s cousin and smiled in response to the silent thanks, mouthing back, “Don’t mention it.”
Melissa’s happiness at her son’s joy was utterly obvious. Kara couldn’t help wondering, just for a second, what that had to feel like. What was it like, having someone you’d given birth to, someone created out of a surge of love, and then nurturing that little being until it was all knees and elbows and someone you would gladly give your life for?
No point wondering, Kara told herself sternly.
Sorry, Mom, she thought, glancing in her mother’s direction. No kids for me, no grandkids for you. She felt guilty that her mother, suddenly aware of the eye contact, smiled at her.
“Thank you, Uncle Dave!” Ryan cried as the last of the wrapping paper fell away. He dashed over and, still clutching the prized video game, threw his arms around Dave’s waist.
Dave put his arms around the boy, momentarily relishing the hug before saying, “Don’t thank me, Ryan. Kara’s the one who actually got her hands on the video game to bring it to you.”
The fact that he was actually willing to share the glory surprised Kara. But the fact that, within less than a heartbeat, Ryan shifted his assault and threw his arms around her waist, crying, “Thank you, Aunt Kara!” surprised her even more.
She assumed that Ryan called Dave “Uncle” as a term of endearment and because there was no official title to describe their actual relationship. But calling her “Aunt” had a whole different meaning in this context. It bound her to Dave. Her natural reaction was quick and firm: deny.
“I’m not—” she began to protest, but her voice was partially drowned out by the excited squeals of Ryan’s friends, who were dying to try out the game with Ryan, and partially cut off because, for such a little guy, Ryan squeezed as tightly as any metal-shop vise. He completely stole her breath away.
“Ryan, there’s more,” Dave coaxed, peeling back the boy’s arms from around Kara’s waist.
Kara tried not to be too obvious as she sucked in her first lungful of air. Dave’s grin didn’t help matters too much.
“Not as super as this!” the boy cried with the unabashed certainty of the very young.
“I wouldn’t go betting on that, big guy,” Dave warned him, a secretive smile on his face.
She looked at Dave, puzzled. Leaning into him so he could hear her, she asked Dave, “How do you know that he’ll think they’re cool? I mean, I know, but you don’t even know what I brought,” she pointed out.
He looked at her as if he was just humoring her by answering. “You work for Dynamic Video Games, don’t you?” It was a rhetorical question. Or at least, it would have been, had it come from anyone but Dave.
“Yes, but how would you know if he’ll even like the video games I picked for him? I mean, like I said, I know,” she repeated with a casual certainty, “but isn’t this a little out of your sphere of knowledge?”
Not in her wildest dreams would she have ever imagined Dave even knowing how to take a video game out of its box, much less playing one or knowing which game was the current rage. Not without help.
“Why?” he wanted to know. “Doctors play video games, too, Kara.” He saw the dubious look on her face. “What, you think all I do is go to the hospital and then come home? I work in the E.R., which means that my shift can either be incredibly boring or so tense and frantic I don’t get a chance to draw two breaths in succession and hope to God I made the right judgment call in a time frame where most people just have lunch.” A smile played on his lips. “After a day like that, how do you think I unwind?”
“By lying in your crypt and having electrodes recharge you?” she asked innocently, keeping a straight face.
He disregarded her sarcastic reply. “I play video games.”
He was serious. This was going to require a little bit of mental readjusting on her part, she decided. Kara looked at him as if she’d never met him before. Because, she thought as she took the first bite of the birthday cake he’d handed her previously, maybe she really hadn’t. Apparently some people could change if they wanted to.
He could feel her eyes scrutinizing him. Delving into him as if to burrow down beneath his top layers. “Something wrong?” he wanted to know.
She shook her head, lowering her eyes back to the quickly disappearing piece of cake. “Nothing’s wro
ng. Just trying to figure out if you’re pulling my leg or not.”
He took his time responding, choosing instead to let his eyes do the initial talking for him. He knew that silence, that pretending to study her, would drive her crazy.
Finally he said, “Don’t worry, when I’m misaligning any part of your body, I promise that you’ll be the first to know it.” And then his smile widened. “Or maybe the second, but definitely one of those two numbers.”
Why did that sound more like foreshadowing than a glib comment? she wondered. And why did she feel as if she’d just been placed on notice? Something hot jumped over her spine. She congratulated herself for not reacting, at least not noticeably.
Rather than answer him, she pretended to be utterly taken with the last of her slice of birthday cake and also with Ryan’s revelry. He was still ripping the wrapping paper off the video games she’d bought at the company store at the last minute.
His friends cheered with each unveiling. The discovery of the Holy Grail could not have been greeted with more enthusiasm than this pint-size crowd had for these games. The shouts of encouragement and urgings to “play one of them already” were all but deafening.
Almost loud enough to drown out the special feeling growing inside of her. Unfortunately, the latter was rather overwhelming and all her attempts to ignore it were proving to be futile and useless. But she went on trying nonetheless, giving it her best shot.
Her best didn’t feel nearly good enough.
Several hours later, the party began to peter out and guests left with thanks ringing in their ears and doggie bags comprised of warm leftovers placed in their hands. Kara had been elected to safeguard theirs.
Something had been weaving its way in and out of Dave’s thoughts for a good part of the evening, plaguing him. He found that the answer wasn’t easy and it had pushed him to teeter on a fence.
He looked at Kara somewhat uneasily as they walked down the darkened block toward his car. Unlike when they’d first arrived, there were now a great many parking spaces available. The car that had been parked behind him as well as the one that had been parked in front were gone. Pulling out was going to be easy.
Other situations remained a bit more complex.
“This isn’t a real date,” Dave said to her, wanting to both get her reassurance and place her on notice in case there was any sort of doubt as to what he’d signed on for. To be honest, when he’d said yes to her plan, he’d felt as if he’d been backed up against a wall. In theory, it had sounded like a good idea. In action, he wasn’t so sure. Not the part about deceiving his mother—at this point she should know better than to feel a need to play covert matchmaker. What he wasn’t sure about was being thrown into Kara’s company time and again. It was asking for trouble.
Kara rolled her eyes. “Oh God, no. If it was a date, there’d be that first-kiss syndrome hovering over us in the background. Making us edgy.”
He had no idea what she was talking about, but that was becoming par for the course. “First-kiss syndrome?” he asked. Ordinarily, he wouldn’t have, feeling that by asking, he was only encouraging her. But this, he had to admit, had stirred up his curiosity. He knew he wasn’t going to have any peace until she explained.
“Yes.” She looked at him as they walked by a streetlamp. She couldn’t believe he was actually asking. Was the man sheltered, or made out of iron? “You know what I’m talking about.”
“If I did, I wouldn’t be asking,” he pointed out, trying to be patient.
She sighed and began to explain. “It comes packaged in a box filled with a whole bunch of anticipation. You always imagine that first kiss is going to be far better than it could possibly be so that when it finally does happen, well—” she shrugged “—it never lives up to all the preperformance hype.” A glib smile played on her lips. “Kind of like most movie trailers. Anticipation embodies the very best, reality turns out to be, well—” she shrugged again, a bit more helplessly this time “—disappointing.”
In his opinion, the whole process sounded much too complex and draining. For once she was the one overthinking something. A kiss should just be spontaneous. “And this is what you go through?”
He made it sound as if he’d never experienced that first-kiss anticipation. Still, she gave him the benefit of the doubt. “Don’t men go through the same thing?”
They were still within the scope of the streetlamp, not to mention that there was a full moon. Both illuminated her. His eyes swept over Kara.
For just a lingering moment, he could see himself anticipating sampling the taste of her mouth—purely on an experimental level, of course. For scientific purposes. “Well, I can’t speak for most of the species, but I know I don’t.”
Was he that jaded? Or that innocent? It was a hard call, but with a face that Michelangelo would have been thrilled to have before him as a model, Kara had a strong feeling that it wasn’t the latter.
“That’s because you obviously haven’t held anything in your hands that can’t be found in a medical supply closet.”
His mouth curved. He was not about to rise up to the bait and start citing what he had held that was not found in a medical supply closet. But he couldn’t just let her challenge go completely unanswered, either. “You’d be surprised.”
Her eyes met his. What would it be like to— Nope, she wasn’t going to go there. She didn’t care what kissing him felt like, she told herself firmly.
“Yes,” she told him. “I would be.”
“What do you say,” he proposed, pushing a strand of hair off her forehead and tucking it behind her ear, “just for the sake of this charade, and to get it out of the way, we go through the motions of this first-kiss thing?”
She tossed her head, freeing the newly tucked strand of hair. “Syndrome.”
He gave a careless, impatient shrug. “Yes, that.”
“Well—” she pretended to consider “—I guess there won’t be any disappointment involved, seeing as how I’m not anticipating anything.”
“A win-win situation,” he replied.
She was about to ask exactly what he meant by that when he leaned in, took her face in his hands and then pressed his lips against hers.
She was expecting something simple and braced herself for the usual disappointment. Though what came next was anything but disappointing.
Chapter Seven
Her skin on fire, her mind gone, Kara could feel herself free-falling.
Or was she actually just leaning into him as she desperately attempted to absorb every beat, every nuance of whatever this was that was happening?
And all because Dave had upped the ante, increasing the depth and scope of what had been, up until this very moment, a cherished if somewhat disappointing ritual.
This wasn’t even a real date, for pity’s sake. The realization drummed through her head and then vanished.
Maybe, Dave thought, he was just trying to get this over with. Or maybe, his ego battered, he was attempting to teach the brat from his childhood a lesson not to write him off so cavalierly.
It might have started out being a little bit of both. He really didn’t know, couldn’t remember. What he did know was that he could almost literally feel his blood rushing madly through his body. Could feel a cache of needs suddenly come spilling out, tumbling to the foreground. All while his head was spinning like an old-fashioned top, snatching away his breath, not to mention his better judgment. Hell, snatching away any kind of judgment at all. Because if he’d had a shred of that left, he would have backed away.
Instead, rather than fleeing, he was moving forward, reaching out for the mind-scrambling experience—and for her—so that he could continue this. Whatever the hell this was.
The closest thing he could liken it to was being drunk. He’d been in tha
t state only once before and had vowed never to be like that again. He didn’t enjoy the feeling nor the fact that he was not in control of his own actions.
Just the way, Dave realized with a start, he wasn’t in control now. And though that deeply offended his sense of order, the rush kissing this woman created was instantly, incredibly, completely addictive.
All he could think of was getting more. And that there had to be a way to make it never stop.
Those desires and passions that had risen up within him were demanding he do something about them. Demanding that he explore exactly what it was that this otherwise exceedingly irritating woman with a face like a mischievous angel and a body that could lead a man happily to sin was doing to him. Then do it back to her. In spades.
But the edge of his cousin’s block was not the place to find out, his common sense insisted.
And so, even though his body was begging for satisfaction, Dave summoned every ounce of strength within him and abruptly pulled his head back. He was surprised that his neck didn’t snap.
He saw confusion and wonder in Kara’s bright blue eyes—why hadn’t he ever noticed how blue her eyes were before? They seemed to delve into him and go beneath all the layers he’d carefully placed between himself and the world, leaving him not just naked but in the state he hated most of all.
Vulnerable.
He did his best to sound nonchalant, as if his insides were not still on fire. “Well, we got that out of the way.”
The words hit her like a water balloon, and it took Kara a second to find her tongue. And then another second more to remember words and how to form them.
“Yes,” she agreed, her throat so tight it was almost choking her, “we did.”
Didn’t you feel anything, you bum? her mind screamed.
She felt as if she’d been fried to an absolute crisp, and he looked as if he’d endured something necessary, but annoying, like an inoculation against the flu.
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