Page 9 of Something Borrowed

“I look forward to seeing you both grow as a family if I’m ever lucky enough to get stationed close to home in Algiers, MARFORRES is right around the corner after all.” Lifting his glass he was shocked to see Kailey tearing up. “To the happy couple!”

The words were echoed back as everyone shouted them after before taking a drink. He threw back his glass of champagne and silently thanked whatever god or gods had helped him make his sister happy. All he wanted to do was finish what he started with Adrianna.

Setting the microphone down on the table he crossed the space to her, loving the shock in her expression as he did. Extending his hand to her he smiled, “I think there is a conversation we need to have. Join me for awalk?”

Smiling, she sipped her champagne before placing the glass down and taking his hand. “I’m surprised there is a conversation that would follow something likethat.”

Snorting, he escorted her back toward the house so that they could walk on the streets, away from the wedding fiascos. He enjoyed watching her and the careful way she moved past the furniture to the frontdoor.

“I think that had we been anywhere else, the talk would have been preceded by something else, but it would have happened.”

She flushed a brilliant scarlet that climbed up her neck and onto her cheeks as he opened the front door forher.

“Thank goodness for small miracles then,” she joked. “I don’t need to be another notch on the infamous Donovan bedpost.

“You wouldn’t be.” He responded thoughtfully, not liking the way she referred to a potential night betweenthem.

She gave a harsh bark of laughter. “Jaxon, I know you. I’ve known you since before we were even old enough to know what sex was. You’re charming, handsome and wonderful at getting girls of pretty much any age intobed.”

He flinched, knowing she actually believed those words, and that they were indeed true. “I’m not like that anymore.”

“Sowed enough of your wild oats,” she teased, giggling at herself a little.

“No.” He shook his head adamantly. “I know I was a jerk in high school. Fuck, I was probably a jerk until around twenty. That’s not who I am anymore. It’s not who I want to be, and it’s absolutely not how I want you to remember me as.” The words came out harsher than he’d intended, but he’d spent a decade running from the younger version of himself.

“Why would it matter how I specifically remember you?” She asked, stopping at the corner of Webster and Patton Street, the warm spring breeze blowing wisps of hair out of the polished wedding styling.

“Didn’t you hear what I said back there?”

She nodded skeptically, looking himover.

“I meant that, Aid. I’ve been dying for a chance to kiss you since you were about seventeen. Granted, I thought you were utterly repulsed byme.”

“It was intentional. You were not someone I should be mixed upwith.”

“Because I was a playboy?”

“Because you are my best friend’s brother.”

“You know that is the making of every great romantic comedy out there?” He didn’t quite grin, but he felt some of his seriousness shifting away with the need to lighten the situation, to defuseit.

“That, Jaxon Donovan, is not the point.”

“I think it’s very much the point.” Leaning forward he grabbed her, tugging her close against him before dipping his mouth to capturehers.

He smiled against her lips the moment they touched, feeling the same jolt of attraction from the chaste kiss as the heated one earlier. It didn’t matter that they were standing on a street corner in outfits sure to call enough attention to themselves, he wanted to taste her. Running his hand down her back he pressed her against his body, growling deep at the surge of lust that washed over him as hedid.

She groaned once before putting her hands on his chest and pushed backward, breaking the connection.

“That merely proves my point,” her voice was husky, tinged with the very desire he felt from the simplekiss.

“I thought it merely proved I was serious.” He trailed a hand down her face, cupping her chin in one hand. “I’ve been attracted to you nearly my entire adult life. I’ve gone into combat zones thinking about what it would be like to have you waiting back home for me. I’ve fallen asleep wondering if you were seeing someone when I had no business doing so. There have been moments when I’ve seen families, even saved families, and thought about you. I won’t lie and say I don’t want to fuck you because I absolutely do. But it’s not just aboutthat.”

She shifted where she stood. “I don’t know whether this is wedding madness or years of waiting for you to say anything remotely like that, but I believe you.” She took a step closer to him. “I believe you, and I think there’s a certain wedding scandal between the Best Man and Maid of Honor that I wouldn’t mind living out with you.” She winked, though her voice had been shaky as she spoke.

“It’s not just about that for me, Aid.”

“Then you can prove it after you make my deepest, sexiest fantasy come true.” She put her hand on his chest and used her leg to force him to open his stance a bit. “You might have left out that you had dreams of us fucking, but since you’ve started this conversation I don’t mind finishing it.” She leaned up, nipping at his ear as her hand slid over his growing erection.

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