Page 96 of Angel In Armani

Disability aids? Why hadn’t she thought of that? Maybe because she’d barely had time to breathe. But Lucas had. Lucas was fixing things for her. Even though she’d run out on him. She bit her lip.

“Sara?”

“How did you hurt your shoulder?” she asked suddenly. “Maggie said you used to play baseball in college but you hurt your shoulder.”

Lucas nodded. “I did.”

“How?”

He sighed. “It was a long time ago.”

“How?”

“There was an explosion at a game. A group of those survivalist-type wackos tried to blow up the stadium.”

“You got hurt in the explosion?”

“No, I got hurt helping people afterward. Pulling them out of the wreckage.” He rolled his shoulder suddenly. “I don’t actually remember what I did. Alex says we lifted a concrete beam off someone and that’s what did it. But I don’t remember. Don’t remember much after running back into the bleachers. Not until I woke up in the damned helicopter being medevaced out of there.”

The man ran into burning stadiums to save people. Sara sat down suddenly. Grateful for the sofa behind her so she didn’t just sink to the floor. God. She was an idiot.

“Sara?”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot.” He came closer then. Not quite close enough.

“I am. But I can’t help it. You scare me, Lucas. This”—she flipped her hand at the room—“scares me. I’m just an ordinary girl from Staten. I never imagined anything like this would be part of my life.”

“And that’s a bad thing?”

“Yes. No. I don’t know.” She laughed then, and wasn’t sure it wasn’t half a sob. “I’m an idiot.”

“It’s just money, Sara,” Lucas said. “It’s not me. It’s nothing to be scared of. Money is just a tool. It lets you do good things. It makes life easier in some ways, yes, but it doesn’t have to change who you are. Like I told you, you’re not your brother. History doesn’t have to repeat itself. I won’t let it. We won’t let it. So what if you never expected me? Sometimes the unexpected turn is the best thing. I never expected to be a doctor. I never expected to own a baseball team. I never expected to fall in love with someone who flies goddamned helicopters.”

“I never— Wait, what did you just say?”

“I never expected to fall in love with a chopper pilot.”

“It’s helo pilot.”

“I don’t care,” Lucas said.

“You’d care if I called baseball softball.”

“Well, yeah, maybe. Okay. Helo pilot. That’s not the important part. The important part is that you scare me, too. All my life I’ve had people running after me because of my name. Because of my money. But you. You don’t care about that. In fact, you want to run away from it. And apparently that makes me want to run after you. I want to be the guy who makes you happy, Sara Charles. Because I’ve fallen hard for you and these last few days nearly killed me. Losing you nearly killed me, and that’s pretty scary.”

She wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. Maybe because of the blood suddenly roaring in her ears. The world narrowed to one very specific spot. The one where Lucas was standing. “You’ve fallen for me?”

He nodded. “Yes. And don’t say you don’t believe me, or I’ll have to agree with you that you’re an idiot.”

“I believe you,” she said. She did. Because he was the guy who meant what he said. Who came through. Who ran into burning buildings. Who saved people.

Who wanted her. Who would keep running after her.

“So then, the question is, do you feel the same way about me?” he said, eyes very blue. “Scary or not, have you fallen for me, Sara Charles?”

She was never going to get tired of that blue. Or the way he said her name. Or the fact that the only possible answer to his question that she could come up with was yes. She stood up and he moved closer. So close. “Yes,” she said and heard her voice quiver.

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