Page 2 of Full Mountie

It’s also been one year since I made myself promise I’d never act on those feelings.

“Sure, after the party,” she says, lightly touching my forearm.

I lock down the part of my brain that thinks about Beth non-stop. The part that wants to turn in to that touch, let her fingers sizzle my skin.

The next ninety minutes tick by exactly as expected. Gavin pulls out a two-four of beer for those who don’t want champagne. A cheer goes up for that, yet another example of how he knows how to read a crowd just right.

They have good reason to celebrate. This is a government nobody thought would be formed. The underdog prime minister and his merry men. In the past year, Gavin Strong has proved himself a confident international diplomat and a caring national leader.

And personally, a good friend.

As soon as he says a final thanks and heads inside, members of my team with him, I allow my gaze to snap back to Beth.

She’s hopped onto a table to sit, her legs swinging gently as she leans back on one hand. After a long winter of tights, tall boots, long skirts, and heavy wool pants, the dirty dog part of me is fucking pleased to see her in flirty summer dresses again. Ottawa winters are too damn long when all one gets is lusting from afar.

Today’s dress is floaty and soft looking, a couple of layers of flower print fabric over a slip of silk against her skin. Earlier she had a blazer on over it, but she’s taken that off now, and has it bunched up in the hand that’s leaning on the table.

In the other hand, there’s a nearly-empty champagne flute.

She’s talking to Gavin’s chief of staff, Stewart Rochard, and as she nods her head along to the conversation, her short, dark hair swings around her face in a sharp bob.

Not long enough to wrap around my fist, but the perfect length for her to role-play a sexually adventurous flapper girl.

Not that I’ve had any speakeasy fantasies about Beth or anything. Ha. I don’t kid myself. When she sets her glass down and shimmies off the table and saunters towards me, I let myself go there, just for a second.

And then, as always, I lock it down.

I nod when she stops in front of me.

“Done being the guy in charge?” she asks lightly.

“For now. Do you want to get a cup of coffee?” Technically I’m still on duty, but I’m not on Gavin’s personal guard at the moment, and I can walk across the street with Beth.

She parts her lips, then stops and shakes her head. “Not today.”

“Of course.”

“I do…”

“It’s okay.” This is another reason why I haven’t asked her out. Because we can’t even coordinate going out for coffee and we work together every single day in a high-level way. Things getting awkward between us is not an option.

“Actually, I have a date,” she says, her eyebrows tugging in ever-so-slightly as she holds my gaze. “That’s what I wanted to tell you.”

A date. It’s a punch to the gut that I deserve, and one I saw coming. I manage to make a guttural sound of acknowledgement, but nothing else comes out.

“I’m hoping it won’t be awkward.” Her voice is smooth, practiced. How did we end up in this place, where she’s had to rehearse how to tell me that she’s seeing someone else?

Let me take you out instead,I want to say, but it’s too late. I had my chance. Three hundred and sixty-five of them. “Not awkward at all. You don’t need to tell me about your private life, either. I mean, I’m happy for you. But—”

“It’s just that it’s—” She stops and glances behind me.

I realize who her date is with before I turn around. I can feel Hugh’s smug grin penetrating my back, and when I do glance back, there it is—but even though his expression is entirely meant to set my brain on fire, and it does, his gaze is locked on Beth like she’s the only person in the world he can see.

I know that feeling well.

She’s hypnotic.

There’s only one other person that has ever made me feel anything close to what I feel for Beth. And it’s entirely because of how explosive—and disastrous—my affair with Hugh was ten years ago that I can’t allow myself to go there with Beth.

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