Page 44 of Beautiful Harmony

“Are you fucking kidding me right now?” Emma didn’t care that she was talking to an empty room. “Now is not the time for our fucking libido to -”

The doorbell rang, and she muttered a curse. She should have known that Rayna wouldn’t leave. She was just as stubborn as Emma.

She stomped over to the door and yanked it open. “Rayna, I don’t want company right - Lucas?”

He stared at her from her front step, anger still lurking at his edges. “Can I come in?”

“No,” she said.

He caught the door when she swung it shut. “I want to come in, Emma.”

“Fine,” she snapped. “Come in because God knows you’ll do what you want anyway.”

She swished away, nearly tripping over her fairy skirt and catching one wing on the door frame to the living room.

Lucas shut the door with a hard bang and stalked after her. She glared at him as she yanked the wings from her back and dropped them on the chair. “I’m so angry with you.”

“I’m not exactly pleased with you, Emma,” he said.

“What did I do?”

“Every time we have a disagreement, you walk away,” he said. “That isn’t what friends do.”

“That wasn’t a disagreement. That was you breaking a man’s nose!”

“He deserved it,” Lucas said.

“That’s not the point,” she said. “I hate being stared at, and you doing what you did meant every person in that damn room was looking at me. I’m so tired of being looked at, Lucas!”

“I know, and I’m sorry that was the result, but I won’t apologize for showing Brad what happens when he talks shit about my friend.”

“It’s such a Neanderthal behaviour, and that isn’t you,” she said.

He shrugged. “Sometimes it is.”

She made a little screech of frustration before stomping forward until she was only inches from him. “Only because of me. You don’t have to defend me. I’m perfectly capable of defending myself. And do you think what he said to me isn’t anything I haven’t heard a thousand times before?”

“That doesn’t mean he should get to say it without any consequences,” Lucas said. “If you’re not going to stand up for yourself, then I will.”

“I stand up for myself every fucking day in ways you couldn’t even imagine,” she said.

“Okay, you’re right. I shouldn’t have said that. I apologize,” Lucas said. “You go through shit on a daily basis that I can’t imagine, and I know how strong you are. I do.”

“So, we have an understanding then?” Emma said. “You’ll stop going all punchy-punchy with people when they insult me?”

“Nope,” Lucas said. “I’ll always stand up for you. If that means punching some asshole in the face, I’m gonna punch some asshole in the face.”

“Lucas!”

He shrugged, giving her a small grin that made her want to punchhimin the face.

She kissed him instead.

* * *

Emma might have kissedhim first, but the speed at which Lucas took control of the kiss made her head spin. He cupped the back of her skull, his long fingers holding her immobile as he slanted his mouth over hers and pushed demandingly at her lips with his tongue.

When she didn’t part them, he drew back enough to say, “Open, Emma.”

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