Page 51 of Promise of a New Beginning
She looked up at him, and the fear in her eyes fell away. “Don’t be. I’m glad you were here. He’s the last person on earth I want to kiss.”
Jack’s boots added an inch to his height, and with Savannah in her bare feet, she was a good eight inches shorter than him. She looked vulnerable and small, and even though he knew she was anything but, the urge to protect her was strong no matter how fierce she might be in a courtroom—or when pulling herself away from him in the mountains. He leaned down and placed his hands along the curves of her cheeks and the sleek line of her jaw and pressed a gentle kiss to her lips.
“I don’t think anyone has ever protected me like that other than my brothers.”
Jack took her hand and led her into the apartment. “I can’t lie to you, Savannah. There was a jealous streak that ran through me. I haven’t been jealous in…man…ten years or more.”
Savannah ran her finger down the center of his chest. “Jealous, huh?”
Jack scrubbed his face with his hand and breathed out a long sigh, allowing his muscles to unclench and his eyes to take in Savannah’s minidress, which hugged every inch of her alluring figure.
“It’s not nice to stare,” she teased.
“Holy…You…Savannah, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a woman look as beautiful as you do right now.” He gathered her hair and held it in his hand, then leaned down and kissed her neck. “Mm, and you smell sinfully delicious.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him just below his earlobe.
Jack closed his eyes, enjoying the thrum of desire that coursed through him. He drew back from her and smiled. “We have dinner plans, remember?”
She looked up at the ceiling. “Ah, yes, dinner.”
“Do you want to talk about that guy?” Jack couldn’t even say his name.
“How about on the way to the restaurant? I was just going to throw on jeans, actually.”
She started toward the hall, and Jack grabbed her wrist and spun her back to him. He put one hand on the small of her back, and with the other, he held her hand against his chest. “Don’t,” he whispered.
“Don’t?”
Jack shook his head. He loved seeing the curves of her lithe figure, feeling the arc of her hip and the dip at the base of her spine beneath his hand with only the thin fabric between them. Most of all, he loved knowing that in a few hours they would be alone in her apartment again, and all that waiting would be worth every blessed second when he finally got to take that little dress off.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
USUALLY WHEN SAVANNAH walked down the street, she had a million things she had to do running through her head. She was always planning or strategizing, thinking several hours, days, or weeks ahead. Tonight, holding Jack’s hand and walking beside him, she could not hold one clear thought in her mind other than how happy she felt. All her life, her brothers had stepped up to the plate for her, and in watching them, she’d learned to stand up for herself. Before meeting Jack, Savannah might have clocked Connor in the jaw when she’d finally been able to separate his lips from hers, but when Jack appeared and she’d seen the anger and jealousy in his eyes and how quickly it turned from venom to worry for Savannah’s safety, she’d turned into a…girl.A girl!And it felt darn good to let her guard down and allow someone else to care for her for a little while.
“So, this guy, Connor. Is he someone I have to worry about bothering you in any other ways? Would he ever force himself on you…you know, in worse ways?” Jack’s serious tone had returned.
“No. He’s harmless. He’s a playboy. Women don’t tell him to bug off and I did. He came bearing roses, Jack, and all he did was kiss me. I don’t mean to minimize it, but he wasn’t trying to have his way with me. He wanted to woo me back just long enough to sleep with someone else again.” She watched his eyebrows pull together. “What?”
He looked down at her and dropped her hand, then put his arm around her waist. “I was just thinking about the two of you. It was weird to see someone else kissing you, but it was even weirder to feel jealous. And that jealousy brought me back to the idea of you and him—”
Savannah cringed. “Jack.”
“What? I just can’t picture it. I know you’ve been with other guys, but when I try to put the picture together of you and other men, I can’t hold on to it. I only see you in my arms.” He smiled, and it lit up his entire face. “It’s funny, isn’t it? I can hold on to guilt and anger like a lifeline, but try to grasp an unpleasant thought about you and I haven’t the slightest chance.”
Savannah felt her heart open up a little more. She remembered what he’d said about being in the city, and as they strolled toward the restaurant, she hadn’t felt any tension in his body or seen any in his face.
“Do you feel the eyes of the city on you?” she asked.
He laughed. “No, but I thought I would. I thought a lot of things that apparently were skewed by my guilt.”
She tossed the worry that Aida had sparked earlier in the afternoon to the curb. They stopped at an intersection to wait for the light to change, and Jack pulled her against him. After she’d seen how her dress affected him, she’d decided to amp up the tease and she’d slipped on her four-inch heels, bringing her much closer to his lips, which she loved.
“Everything is better when I’m with you,” he said before kissing her.
The lights from the nearby restaurants glistened in his dark eyes, and as his gaze fell upon hers, she felt warm all over. In all the years she’d lived in Manhattan, never once had the city felt so romantic. The lights, the sounds, the cool air against her warm skin, even the busy streets carried an aura of romance and love. How could she have missed it for so many years? Or was that what love did to a person?
“Savannah? Is that you?”
