Page 14

What just happened?

The question echoed over and over in Lucy’s head. She didn’t understand.

Why had Dax’s anger and their ugly argument ended with them kissing?

She brought her shaking fingers to her lips and stared at the door, where Dax had disappeared. Her whole body tingled. She was electrified from the top of her head to her little toes. Dax’s smell clung to her like dirt to her car. So did his touch on her skin, on her neck and back. He was gone, but his heat remained—just like his words.

You shouldn’t believe everything you hear, Lucy .

He hadn’t kissed her because he’d really wanted to, he’d done it to teach her a lesson and prove to her that she wasn’t in control of their relationship. He’d wanted to show her she couldn’t cross the line without being punished for it.

And she had kissed him back because she couldn’t help it. He’d robbed her of oxygen, taken away her reason, and stolen her principles. If she was finally being honest, she’d wanted to kiss him ever since he told her he respected her and trusted her word. She simply didn’t want to admit it.

“Wasn’t that Dax Temple?” a voice said, snapping her out of her trance. Blinking, she turned.

“What? Who is Dax Temple?” she replied quickly, although her voice sounded strangely metallic and hollow.

“The hockey player,” the bar owner insisted, frowning at the door.

She laughed. A little too high, a little too fake, but the people here wouldn’t know the difference. “No, that was…Steven. He’s a tiler. I wish he was a hockey player.”

The corners of the bar owner’s mouth twitched. “Ah, yes. Don’t we all? I must have mixed him up.”

She nodded absently and looked at the stool in front of her. Dax had left his coat behind. He’d been too eager to leave to remember it. She slung it over her shoulder and left the bar.

Cold hit her face, helping her organize her thoughts and distinguish between the important and the unimportant. Bottom line, there was only one way to sum it up: She was ridiculous.

One rule—she only had one rule: She didn’t date hockey players. And kissing a hockey player definitely fell into that category. It didn’t matter whether he had just pressed his lips against hers to get his point across or not.

She inhaled deeply. No, that was the first and last time she’d let Dax Temple kiss her, the first and last time she let him leave her speechless.

She walked along the sidewalk, rubbing the back of her neck, running her hand over her mouth, trying to wipe every hint of his touch from her body and banish every idea of his kiss from her mind. No man should have such power over her. No human should have such power over her.

Her phone vibrated with a message. She jumped as if the sender had caught her in the act of the reprehensible kiss.

Shaking her head, she fished her phone out of her pocket and glanced at the screen. It was Leslie.

After tonight, the press fervently believes that West and Temple hate each other and won’t be able to work together. Please take countermeasures.

Groaning, she put the phone away. Only Leslie would phrase a PR stunt like a Secret Service message. What countermeasures ? It had just become obvious that she had no means of countering Dax. And for once, the press was right: West and Temple hated each other. How was she supposed to convince a bunch of journalists and pissed-off fans otherwise?

She walked faster, and by the time she reached the warm lobby of the hotel, her mind was raging. But what kind of attitude was that? She was a PR consultant. It was her job to find a way. And to hell with Dax Temple and his intense stares and even more intense kisses! Yes, she had gone too far, but so had he! She wasn’t going to let him make her feel insecure simply because she couldn’t control her body.

It is said that when two people argue, the third wins. Well, she would end up the third, because there was a simple solution for giving fans a better image of Jack and Dax—literally taking a picture of them! Dax wouldn’t like it, but so what? The man was impossible to please!

You’d be the last woman on Earth I’d want to take to bed!

Asshole.

Not that she wanted to be first, but being, say, second-to-last would be nice.

She laid the coat in front of his door and slipped silently into her room, having no desire for another confrontation. Tomorrow she would apologize to him. Her conscience was gnawing at her and she couldn’t live with feelings of guilt towards an idiot.

Did he say my father was addicted to gambling and we regularly had to drag him home from the casino?

She swallowed. She had never thought about the fact that so little was known about Dax’s past. But now she understood. He didn’t want people to judge him before they knew him—not more than they already did.

Was he afraid that she would do that now? Judge him?

God, he had been so incredibly angry. Anger had pulsed against her lips during the kiss, along with destructive desire and…more. She couldn’t say what it was, just…more.

A shiver ran through her body and, annoyed with herself, she took off her clothes and got into the shower. She wanted to wash his touch from her skin and the memory along with it. She had to forget it—what had happened. She had to forget her wish he would never stop kissing her.

Yes. Forget. Apologize. Forget again. Prepare a photo shoot. That was the plan.

Lucy dreamed of Dax’s hands on her body.

His fingers were in her hair, on her stomach, and between her legs. His lips on her breasts. His teeth nibbling her earlobe. She dreamed she was writhing beneath his heavy body, her hands pinned to the mattress until she melted with pleasure.

She dreamed that she wanted to ask him to stop, because she knew that was the correct thing to do. And yet with every moan and every sigh, she had to admit how much power he had over her. How dependent she was on him. She had to admit that, in reality, she was completely at his mercy and he could control her as he pleased, not the other way around.

Every time she opened her mouth in the dream, he sealed it with his. And every time she felt his greedy gaze on her and his hot breath on her thighs, any objection vanished from her lips. She was unable to say no.

She woke up sweaty and unsatisfied, needing to take another shower. But the memories wouldn’t rinse off. His touch was burned into her skin, like a tattoo.

She skipped breakfast and instead used the time to come up with a battle plan. When she finally boarded the Hawks’ private jet two hours later, she had practiced an indifferent expression and prepared her words. She had even practiced keeping her voice from trembling.

With her heart fluttering, she walked down the narrow aisle, searched for a dark head, and found him in one of the middle seats. Alone.

Dax returned her gaze as if he’d been looking for her, too.

His eyes were unyielding but free of judgment.

He no longer appeared angry. No longer frustrated. He was a blank canvas. At that moment, she hated him for being so good at hiding his emotions, because she felt like her expression was screaming her emotions at him.

But it didn’t matter. Normality—that was her goal.

So she walked down the aisle with wobbly knees and stopped in front of him; spoke before she lost her courage and before he could confuse her with one of his looks.

“I’m sorry.” It was merely a whisper, barely audible to her ears, but she knew he heard her. She recognized it in his dark expression as he looked at her. “I am truly and sincerely sorry. I went…too far. You were right.”

He didn’t reply, just continued to stare at her face. But it was okay, he didn’t have to answer her.

“That’s all,” she whispered, nodding firmly. She wanted to continue down the narrow aisle, but his hand shot out and wrapped around her wrist.

Electrical impulses jumped from his skin to hers, coursing through her blood, and causing her heart to skip a beat. But she didn’t reveal anything, didn’t flinch like she wanted to, just turned back to him.

“I did too. And…I am too,” he murmured, pressing his thumb against the sensitive area inside her wrist. As if he had to emphasize his words.

She swallowed, ignoring the goosebumps climbing up her arm. “I know.”

She truly did. He hadn’t been quite himself and neither had she. It had been an accident. A glitch in the system.

He nodded and hesitantly added so softly that no one else could hear, “I would have bought you a bigger ring.”

She raised her eyebrows in surprise. “What?”

“If I had truly been your husband, I would have bought you a bigger ring.” He briefly ran his index finger over her ring, now back in its original place, before releasing her hand.

The corners of her mouth twitched and she glanced down at her hand. “No,” she whispered. “If you had truly been my husband, you would have given me this exact ring because you would know that it was my mother’s and that it means everything to me.” She smiled cautiously at him and continued on her way…letting out the breath she had been holding.

She probably wouldn’t receive a better peace offering, but it was fine. At least now they could get back to normal.