Page 33 of Fighting for Brielle
He tilted his head as he regarded her. “Now, that’s interesting. Any chance with your family connections you could wrangle an invitation to the next party the mayor throws on his yacht? Gage dislikes me, by the way. He resents Washburn forcing me on his city.”
Their eyes met. The warm blue heat Brielle perceived in them caused her heart to skip a beat. She swallowed the emotion rising in her throat and said, “Madam Secretary made a wise decision, even if she’s keeping you in the dark about her true motive. Something is definitely going on here, and Ferguson is either part of it or turned a blind eye to it when she was chief. In any case, she’s been ineffective for a while now. I think…” Her eyes grew soft. “I think you’re good for Laguna Beach.”
He smiled, revealing perfect, even white teeth, and her pulse leapt in her veins.
“Thank you. I appreciate your confidence in me. Now about securing an invitation to the mayor’s next party. Will you call Brendan?”
“Don’t need to. I have a closer connection to Mayor Gage,” she revealed, grinning at him. “His wife and fifteen-year-old daughter are taking my self-defense class at the Y.”
Justice lifted an eyebrow. “Perfect. When is your next class?”
“Well, unfortunately, not until next Saturday. I’ll see if I can wrangle an invitation. Care to be my plus one?” Brielle’s eyes sparkled with a teasing light.
He chuckled. “The mayor might throw me overboard.”
She laughed. “You’re a Navy boy. You can swim. But I’d still throw you a life preserver.”
“You would? Then, count me in.”
Drowning in the dark blue depths of his eyes, Brielle didn’t want to be saved. At all.
Chapter 9
As they continued their discussion, Justice rubbed his forehead before he popped two Advil liquid-gels. He didn’t complain about having a headache, but Brielle wondered if he was experiencing some pain. His thoughts and his speech were slowing down, too. After tossing around a few theories Justice recorded on the white board, they’d run out of ideas.
Brielle glanced at her watch and rose to her feet. “I have to leave,” she announced with regret. “I scheduled training time at the police academy. Somebody should be there I can spar with.”
“I can spar with you,” Justice replied without hesitation. “If you don’t mind my company.”
Mind his company?If he hadn’t offered to be her sparring partner, she would have suggested it herself. Oh, this was dangerous. Freefalling without a parachute.
Her eyes glowed with intense interest as she answered him. “No, I don’t mind. I…I enjoy being with you…Beach Boy.”
He laughed low in his throat, a gravelly, sexy laugh that caused her stomach to curl with a sharp stab of desire she’d never felt before. Certainly not with Malcolm. With her, he’d turned foreplay into art, like one of his paintings. But Justice aroused fluttery feelings in her with just one look. Or smile. Or throaty laugh. And she was hooked. She was afraid it wouldn’t take much to reel her in.
“I brought a change of clothes with me,” she continued, trying to cover her reaction to him. “What about you?”
“Wait here. I’ll be right back.”
Justice returned five minutes later with a pair of gray sweatpants and a white LBPD T-shirt.
“I raided the uniform shop,” he explained, grinning. “I’ll have to let Sally, our seamstress, know I took these. And this.” He plopped a LBPD baseball hat on her head.
She returned his grin. “Aw, thanks, Chief.”
“You’re welcome. You look really cute, by the way.”
He handed her the clothes to put in her backpack and reached for his cell phone. Justice took a picture of the white board before he erased it, which caused Brielle to wonder why he couldn’t just memorize it. She already had. But she had no intention of asking him about any residual effects of his brain injury. If he wanted to tell her, he would in his own time.
However, when they reached his bike, Justice hesitated. He gazed at her, a stricken expression on his face, and opened his mouth to say something, but Brielle stopped him before he could get a word out.
“I think you should let me drive your bike up to LA. You command it like an old woman.”
Relief and gratitude peppered his light laughter. He tossed her the keys. “Go for it, Beach Girl.”
When Justice slipped his arms around her waist, Brielle’s breath hitched in her throat and nearly choked her. Curls of pure pleasure spiraled through her entire body. The feeling of his muscled chest pressing against her back brought visions of him shirtless from the previous evening. Fantasies of running her hands over his naked torso, his naked body, occupied her mind on the ride up to LA. And if she leaned forward just a little, her breasts would brush his forearms. Oh, God! No! It was bad enough she’d actually caressed him when their positions were reversed.
By the time they reached the police academy, she felt a fire burning in her, and she knew her face was flushed again. She also knew Justice noticed, but merely quirked an eyebrow at her this time as a slow smile crossed his face.He knew what caused it, too. Damn him.
