Page 38 of Trip Me Up

“You’re making a mistake. She is, too.” His emerald-green eyes glittered.

“I don’t think so. I think you made a mistake by coming here.” I grabbed both suitcases and strode to the hotel desk to check us in. My body vibrated like I’d been struck by lightning.

Sensing Sam at my elbow, I muttered, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. You?”

“I guess so.” I rubbed my chest, right over the spot that ached because I’d discovered—again—my dad didn’t give a shit about me.

“You were great, standing up to him. That must’ve taken a lot of courage.”

“I wish—” I stopped. Sam was into tech like he was. She wouldn’t get it.

But she looked up at me with those otherworldly eyes, the same ones that had bewitched me all those months ago at that fundraiser where neither of us belonged, and set her hand on my forearm. Sparks traveled all the way up my arm to my chest and set my heart rabbiting. She asked, “What do you wish, Niall?”

It had to be a spell she’d cast on me because my mouth opened and I said, “That he’d come for me.” The last time I’d said that, I’d been ten, crying into my mother’s shoulder because Santa Claus hadn’t brought my father home for Christmas. I’d never, ever said it to another adult. Not even Gabi.

Sam pushed up on the toes of her combat boots and stretched her arms around my shoulders. The tightness of her embrace made it hard to breathe. Or maybe that was the woodsy smell of her hair. When I ducked my head down to chase the scent, she whispered in my ear, “Paul Swift is an asshole who doesn’t deserve you.”

A surprised laugh bubbled out of my chest, and I hugged her back. “Thank you.”

She didn’t let go right away, and I let myself savor the moment of human connection. I had to bend a little, but we fit together, her head against my shoulder, her spine curved so her torso pressed to mine. The tingles spread from my heart out to my fingertips. Could she feel them, too, where my hands prickled against her back?

Maybe she did because she gently wriggled out of my arms. She bent her head to fuss with Bilbo’s carrier, but her chest heaved just like mine, like we’d been running and not standing in the hotel lobby.

A run. That was exactly what I needed to dispel the weird energy.

The desk clerk handed over the key cards, and I followed Sam toward the elevators, dragging our bags.

Who the hell was my tour partner? She was no flighty socialite like Gabi had tried to portray her. She wasn’t a tech wheeler-dealer like my father thought she was. She was smart. Independent. And soft as a warm bed on a snowy night. If she hadn’t been my tour partner, I’d have asked her to get a drink with me, and we’d have talked until I figured her out.

But she was my tour partner. And though my skin tingled again when she handed me my key card, I fumbled it into the door and entered my room alone.

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