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“No. For your period,” Kingston says, and I blink at him stupidly, the gross straws forgotten in my hand.
“My period?” What period?
“It can hurt, right? Heard you tell Charlene about it.” Oh, yeah.Thatperiod. “Well, I brought you some painkillers. Just basic stuff.” My boss rocks back on his heels and digs in the front pocket of his jeans, and I frown up at him in a daze.
“Here.” The dirty straws are plucked from my hand, and a cardboard box drops onto my palm. My knees throb against the floorboards. “Take two with water. And sit down if you need a break anytime this shift. Or wait, do you need to go home? I’ll drive you.”
I can smell him again in these close quarters. Spice and cedar wood cologne: as delicious as I remember. Blushing in the dim light, I wet my lips.
“It’s not really my period.” I try to give the medicine back, but he waves me off and my hand drops into my lap, thumbnail digging at the cardboard. “Charlene saw I was acting weird, and I… I panicked.”
“Oh.” Kingston scratches his stubbly jaw, and he seems weirdly disappointed that I’m not riding the crimson wave. What, was he actually excited about fussing over an achy, ill-tempered gremlin? Because that’s what I’m like on the rag—but I guess navigating thatisa husband skill of sorts. “So why are you acting weird?” he says.
And it’s such a boneheaded question. So ridiculous that it’s either scream or laugh, and I choose laugh, cackling like a crazy lady. Kingston rears back in alarm.
“Why?” I hoot, swiping at my eyes, my medicine box rattling, and though this laughter is real, the brewing tears are too. “Why do youthink, you big lug? You took me on one practice date then dropped me like a hot potato. Haven’t spoken to me since. Hot tip for dealing with your future wife: women don’t like that much. It sucks ass.”
“I didn’t drop you.” My boss is all huffy, but he lets go of my hand when I tug the straw pot away, tossing it in our to-be-recycled box, and he lets me use his shoulders for balance as I wobble to my feet. “I was giving you space, Dani. Didn’t want to make you uncomfortable. When I dropped you home the other night, you acted more skittish than a wildcat.”
“Because you—you flustered me!” And Kingston is doing it again, damn it. Melting my brain with his proximity. Chasing away all the sensible thoughts in my head and leaving me with nothing but bone-deepyearning, logic be damned.
Kingston doesn’t want me.
He’s never claimed to want me.
But he’s so tall and strong. So masculine and stern. He could lift me up easier than a pillow and press me against the stock room door. Kingston could kiss me senseless in here, and no one would know. Doesn’t he want to practice those skills too?
“I’m not done if you’re not done.” Kingston pushes to his feet, my neck twinging as I stare up at him. He sounds pissed off, though god knows why. “I got tons more skills to practice, Dani. Plenty of rough edges to smooth.”
And call me an idiot, but I’m so relieved. Even as I die a little inside, my heart blooms in my chest, and I nod up at him.
Maybe none of this is real.
But we’re not done with each other yet either.
Eight
Kingston
Locking up alone with Dani has always been a special kind of torture, even long before things got complex between us. It’s… otherworldly, you know? Too tempting by far when it’s just the two of us in the whole bar, with starlight shining through the open windows and the doors propped open to coax in a breeze.
The dishwasher humming.
Her soft breaths.
Her shy smiles in my direction.
Thoseare new—but fuck, it’s hard to focus tonight. And I should get my numbers done, should finish all this endless goddamn admin that no one tells you to expect with running a business, but there’s only one thought pulsing in my brain right now and it’s this:Dani. Dani. Dani.
She really thought I dropped her? All because I kept my distance for a few days?
Wasn’t trying to put her off or hurt her feelings. Anything but. No: I figured here I am, her big, too-old, surly boss, and theresheis. Too sweet for me by far. And it was kind of her to help me out with that practice date, but from the way she skittered away from me at the end of the night, I figured she’d had enough already.
When it comes to Dani, I swore to myself that I’d never, ever push. I’d never make her unhappy.
So I held back. Went back to being her boss and nothing more. But maybe I should’ve talked to her about it first—cleared the air.
Christ. This relationship stuff is worse than balancing the books.
