“The wine glasses. We buy Riedel glasses to give customers a better tasting experience, but the bowls are very thin. That’s why they broke into so many pieces when they hit you. If we used cheap, thick glasses, you wouldn’t have so much glass in you. There, I think I got the last one.” He straightens, holding up a piece of glass between the tweezers for me to see.
“Thanks.” I start to push upright, but he keeps me in place with a touch to my shoulder.
“Hold on, let me just check your stomach.” He moves to keep me in the light, his head lowering to inspect the skin exposed under my crop top. When Trevor’s hand touches my stomach, gooseflesh erupts.
“Are you cold?”
“I’m fine.”
He doesn’t answer. I feel the sting of the tweezers. Is his whole hand on my stomach? I tighten my knees even more as the sudden rush of blood makes the skin prickle between my legs.
“That’s the last piece of glass. Stay right there.” Trevor sets the tweezers on the towel and opens another disinfectant packet.
I don’t move as he rubs the wipe across my cuts, his pinkie finger trailing along my skin as he works. Is it completely sad that this is the most erotic thing that’s happened to me in years?
He applies two Band-aids. “There.” He takes me by the shoulder and helps me straighten. “You’re all patched up. Sorry you look like Frankenstein.” He winces when he says that. “That didn’t come out right. You’re too–too–”
“Short?” I suggest.
“No.”
“Too Chinese?”
“No.”
“Too weird?”
He barks a laugh. The sound sends more goosebumps sizzling over my skin. I like that I can make him laugh, especially when I get the impression he doesn’t laugh much these days.
“I was going to say you’re too pretty to look like Frankenstein, but I didn’t want that to come off wrong.”
He thinks I’m pretty? “I’d rather be pretty than too short.”
“You’re not too short, either.” When his eyes travel over me, I feel another rush of blood between my thighs. “I just meant the Band-aids have a Frankenstein-ish quality. I’m going to stop talking now.” He turns his back to me and starts to gather up the first aid supplies.
I take advantage of the moment to gather myself, not wanting him to guess how incredibly turned on I am right now.
“If you ever get tired of the wine industry, I think you could find a job in an ER,” I say.
He flashes me an amused brow crinkle. “Hell, no. I prefer my vineyards to blood any day of the week. At least I didn’t destroy your clothes this time.”
“You think smashing glass all over someone beats spilling wine on them?” I raise an eyebrow to show I’m teasing.
He runs a hand through his shaggy hair. “Maybe not.” His eyes soften when he smiles at me.
The weight returns to the space between us. I feel like giant magnets are dragging me toward him.
Again, I resist. Although he is way sexier and way sweeter than I’d realized last night, and I can officially say I’m crushing. But Trevor isn’t looking to date. What happened last night was the byproduct of how much he misses his dead fiancée, nothing else.
“Trevor?” A booming voice is the only warning we have.
A big-shouldered man steps onto the back porch. Trevor and I jump apart like guilty teenagers. Tequila growls, the hair along her back lifting.
“Trevor, will you please put that little beast away?” a voice says–a voice that I recognize.
My stomach drops as Tim Moretti steps through the back door.
CHAPTER 12