Page 25 of Love & Rockets

“Moooom.”

“You don’t own it, you know,” she shot back.

“Now, girls,” Jake interjected.

“I want to look again. He brought the telescope for me to use, not you.” Grace throttled the complaint back so it fell short of a whine.

He chuckled. “Don’t make me take my toy away.”

Reluctantly, Darla straightened. She looked up and found his dark eyes riveted on her. “Amazing.”

“Sometime you all will have to come over to my place. The one I have on the roof is even more powerful.”

She wanted to press her hand to his mouth to muffle the invitation. Instead, she settled for giving her head a sharp shake. The last thing she needed was for him to dangle the whole frickin’ universe in front of her space-hungry kid, then yank it away. At Grace’s insistent nudge, she relinquished the telescope. Darla nodded to the other end of the room. Quick on the uptake, he followed when she moved away from the window.

Careful to keep her tone neutral, she stole a glance at him as she started gathering the last of the detritus from the table. “Isn’t there some old line about not asking for the moon when you have the stars?”

“Why can’t you have both?”

Huffing, she jerked her head toward the kitchen and took off without looking back. When he placed the breadbasket and empty wine glasses on the counter, she whirled on him. “Don’t make promises to my kid.”

Jake took a step back like she was some kind of crazy woman. As he had the night of the benefit. Her cheeks started to burn as he raised his hands in what was becoming an all-too-familiar calming gesture. “I didn’t make any promises,” he said. “I was simply bragging.”

Shocked by his spin, she fell back against the counter, her jaw dropping as she stared up into his utterly sincere face. “Bragging?”

He shrugged. “It’s not uncommon to brag about how big your telescope is.”

A helpless laugh escaped her. Darla searched his eyes for a hint of... something. Something she could use as a valid excuse for not taking this surprising man up on anything and everything he had to offer. Duplicity. Calculation. Even some good old-fashioned smarminess would do. But, of course, she found none.

Jake Dalton was one of the good guys. Genuine, if a bit oblivious at times. Charming as all get-out. And handsome. So knee-knockingly handsome her wine-addled brain was having a hard time finding reasons to resist. And he’d come so close to kissing her. Right here in this room. Steeling her resolve, she asked the blunt question.

“What do you want from me?”

“What do I want from you?” he repeated, then gave a husky chuckle. “Where do I start?”

“I mean, what are you after? Me or Grace? Are you here to help her, or are you trying to get into my pants, because you wouldn’t be the first.” She launched her little salvo with raised brows.

“Clearly.”

Her temper flared. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

He gestured toward the living room. “Well, obviously I’m not the first, you have Grace. What I’m trying to figure out is why being here has to be an either-or thing. I’d assume the two of you are a package deal no matter what.”

Planting her hands on her hips, she thrust her chin into the air. “We are.”

“There you go.”

She squinted at him, annoyed by his cavalier tone. “There I go what?”

He exhaled long and loud, then closed the distance between them. Darla yelped a little when he pulled her flush against his body. Again. God, he was tall. And taut. She thought about running her hands all over him like she had earlier. But without the clothes. Apparently, he was thinking the same thing, because he shifted to bring their bodies into perfect alignment. Her breath caught and held when he lowered his head. His was warm and damp against her skin. She could almost taste a hint of the wine. She called on every ounce of her reserve not to purse her lips in a silent plea.

“I want the package deal.”

The breath rushed from her lungs. His mouth was a surprise. Soft. Unspeakably soft. But the kiss was firm. Commanding. It took a few seconds for her brain to catch on, and the second she reacted, he pulled back.

“Have dinner with me.”

She blinked. Not an invitation so much as a command. Darla didn’t know what to think. Not when she was struggling to latch onto any coherent thought. “We just had dinner.”

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