Page 28 of The Billionaire's Kiss
“I think so too. I’m very proud of it.” I took her to the den, where I spent the majority of my time. A large television hung on one wall and two recliners sat in front of it. “This is where I hang out the most when I’m not outside.”
“So, you watch a lot of television then?” she asked, as that was the main item in the room.
“Not a lot of it. Mostly, I work. But I come in here to watch television most nights before bed, to help me wind down.” Grabbing the remote, I turned the TV on, then handed it to her. “Here you go. Watch something to entertain yourself while I go change clothes.”
“Okay.” She took the remote from me, our fingers barely touching. Our eyes met. Her lips parted a bit as if she were about to say something. But then she just sighed and took it from me. “Thank you.”
Gulping, I found my hand shaking and shoved it into my pocket. “I’ll be right back.”
Hurrying away, I wondered why I had such strong reactions to her. With even the tiniest of touches, I found myself craving her luscious lips with an intensity that nearly turned me into some savage.
Flashes of ideas flooded my head as I walked away from her. Ideas about how I could take her by the hair, yank her head back and kiss her like no one had ever kissed her before. Images came too, and I felt my heart pounding as I went into my bedroom, closing the door behind me. I felt like some giddy teenage boy who couldn’t tell his ass from a hole in the ground.
I need a cold shower.
Twenty minutes later, I’d showered, calmed down, and dressed for a walk in the park. Joining her again, I found her reclined in my favorite chair, watching a documentary on the Philippines’ indigenous people.
She looked at me as she pushed the button to bring the recliner back to its original position and asked, “Did you know that Filipinos are not the first people to inhabit the Philippines?”
“I did not know that.” I offered her my hand to help her up after she clicked off the television.
“The first people there were theAustronesians, and they’re still there to this day.” Her hand curled around mine as she and I headed for the front door. “My question is, if they called the people who were there originally Austronesians, then why not call the place they live in something like Austronesia, instead of the Philippines?”
“Perhaps it comes down to history, like it did in America. You know, the native people who lived here were called Indians. Which couldn’t be more inappropriate, as this land was not India as Christopher Columbus had thought it was.” Closing the door behind us, I took her to the truck.
But when I went to help her up, she just shook her head and reached inside, grabbed the bar above the door, and pulled herself up. “I’ve figured it out, Warner.”
“You sure have.” Closing the door, I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face, even if I’d tried. I admired women who liked to do things for themselves instead of waiting for someone else to do it. I didn’t need a woman to pretend to be too weak, petite, or feminine.
As soon as I got into the truck, she asked, “How do the Indians—I mean, the Native Americans—feel about things here in America now?”
“That’s a hard question, Orla.” I wasn’t knowledgeable about that at all. “That’s not my forte. The only thing I know for sure is that the government has given them some pieces of land, that they call reservations, to live on.”
Her jaw dropped. “And they can’t leave those places?”
“No, no, it’s not like that.” I had no idea what she knew about America. “Of course they can leave the reservations. They can live wherever they want. But again, I don’t know much about it.”
“It’s your own country, and you know so little about these people?” Her raised brows told me she wasn’t impressed.
“They don’t teach us a lot about that in our schools.”
“And why not? It’syourunique history and no one else’s. Don’t you want to know about the people who lived on this land long before you did?”
“If I say not really, are you going to punch me in the arm?” I had a feeling that she might.
“I don’t think I’ll resort to violence over it, no.” Laughing, she lightened up a bit. “It’s just odd to me that it’s not taught in schools.”
“Well, our history doesn’t exactly make us look good. We did take their land away from them and commit genocide against them. And I think there are plenty of unresolved issues between many of the existing tribes and the government. Maybe it’s because we might come off as the bad guys that we’re not taught about them in school.” That’s about all I could come up with. “You know, like who wants to find out that our country was created in such an immoral and even evil way?”
“But aren’t most nations formed that way?” she asked with one raised brow. “Wars have ravaged the entire world since the beginning of mankind.”
The woman was smart, I had to give her that. “Perhaps you were taught to embrace that knowledge because you come from such an old world with tons of history. This country is relatively new in comparison.”
As we pulled into the park’s parking lot, I couldn’t help but notice that she hadn’t even grabbed theoh shitbar once on the way over. “Hey, we made it without you breaking out into a sweat.”
“I guess I’m getting used to your driving.” She opened the door and hopped out of the truck.
Meeting her in front of it, I draped my arm around her shoulders while she scanned the scene before her. “That’s the Colorado river you’re looking at. We’ll walk over to Barton Creek, where Barton Springs feeds the water source. The water is so clear that you can see right through it.”
