Page 28 of The Sun & Her Burn (Impossible Universe Trilogy #2)

So I steeled myself before tipping my head back to smile up at Savannah.

The woman who had broken the heart of two men I was intrinsically linked to.

My momentary insecurity crumbled to ash in the wake of the anger that built around my heart.

“Savannah,” I greeted, much as Adam had in a pleasant but dull tone.

She did not spare me a glance.

“I telephoned you,” she told Adam, smoothing a perfectly coiffed curl back behind her ear. “You haven’t called me back.”

Adam didn’t look at her, his tiny smile stretching into something more like a grin. He lifted our conjoined hands off the table to showcase them. “I have been rather busy the last few weeks. You’ll have to forgive a man in love.”

I had the deepest pleasure of watching Savannah’s eyes widen to dinner plates, their bold color seeming to dim with displeased surprise.

“I had heard rumours you were dating,” she demurred, looking at our hands before shifting position to look down at me, gaze narrowing as she took me in. After a long pause, she raised both brows and asked, “And who is the lucky lady?”

“I assure you, I am the one who is lucky,” Adam said smoothly, lifting our hands again to bend forward and bite one of my knuckles.

I had expected a kiss, maybe, but the shock of his teeth against my skin sent a very genuine shiver through my body.

Adam’s smile turned wolfish.

I could feel a blush work its way into my cheeks, but boldly looked back at Savannah with a demure smile.

She was staring at Adam with barely concealed shock.

“I’m surprised you don’t remember me,” I told her sweetly. “Though, I suppose you haven’t been by to visit Miranda in ages, and the one time you came, we didn’t interact.”

Savannah blinked at me before her mouth fell into a little moue.

“Linnea Kai?” she breathed, doing another scan of my person, lingering at my breasts and the ends of my beachy waves. “Miranda’s daughter.”

“And Adam’s girlfriend, if you want to identify me by relationships only,” I agreed.

Adam bit the edge of his smile, trying to hold it at bay, and then, catching my eye, gave up with an exhale of laughter. His eyes sparkled with mirth, a boyish contentment I’d never seen in him before.

It was intoxicating.

“You seem surprised, Savvy,” Adam said, the frost thawed from his tone because he was more amused by me than he was irritated by her, and that felt like a wonderful gift. “Did you think I would wait around for you to come back to me?”

It was my turn to blink.

What in the world could have possessed Savannah to leave him?

Sure, he was grumpy, a little arrogant, and more than a little stuffy.

But he was also brilliant, charismatic, complicated, and gorgeous with what I more than suspected was a secret streak of tender loving kindness buried beneath it all.

Savannah seemed surprised by his candor, too, more thrown off balance than I had ever witnessed before.

It took only a moment for that hard gleam to descend over her eyes, though.

“Of course not. Only, I never suspected you would be the type of man who has a midlife crisis and dates someone young enough to be his daughter,” she rejoined coolly, unconsciously rubbing a finger over the enormous diamond ring on her left hand.

“Twelve years old is a little young to be fathering a child, don’t you think?” he asked acerbically, all joy gone. In its place was the British Lord, and even Savannah, with all her pretense of nobility, was not blue blood enough to stand up to that.

Savannah’s knuckles were white around the grip of her Chanel bag.

“I did not venture over here to fight with you,” she managed, each word clipped. “I came because I wanted to say what you obviously did not care to hear over the phone. I am here, Tate and I, if you need anything. I heard about the…unsavory chatter around town, and I wanted to lend my services.”

What kind of woman , I thought, said something like “lend my services” to their ex-husband?

Staring at them both, I could imagine how the marriage dissolved.

Their defense mechanisms were too similar, their baggage expressed too coldly, to ever breach that void between them.

“I have no need of your services,” Adam promised, dismissing Savannah as if she were no less than a hovering server, turning slightly but obviously in his chair so that he was wholly focused on me. “As you can see, I have everything I need.”

“It was lovely to see you again, Savannah,” I said kindly, even though I was already leaning toward Adam, enclosing us in a little bubble of our own making.

“Likewise,” she said quietly, almost wistfully. I could feel her gaze on the side of my face like a scalpel for a long moment before she finally clipped away on her high heels.

Adam blew out a long exhale when she was gone, but his shoulders were still up near his ears.

I pinched my lower lip between my teeth for a second before saying, “Right. I’m afraid sushi is ruined for me now. How do you feel about fried foods?”

Adam stared at me, his eyes roving my face as if searching for something elusive. Finally, the corner of his mouth curled.

“Favorably. Just don’t tell my agent.”

I crinkled my nose. “The same agent who had what looked like chow mein spilled down the front of her blazer last time I saw her?”

He laughed again, a little smoother than before as if he was starting to understand the practice again.

And I thought again what an absolute idiot Savannah must have been to let him go.