He arched a brow. “Is that on the table?”
His boxers had slid disturbingly low on his hips. His body was perfection, hard and deliciously warm, and she wanted it on hers, pushing her down into the mattress, sinking into her… “No.”
“Something else then.”
“What?” she asked warily.
“Truth or dare.”
“Atlanta. The elevator. Just an alcohol-induced fuck, or more?”
She set down her pizza.
“More,” she said, just as softly. “But I really
He absorbed that. “Did it really take you all year to get over it?”
“That’s two questions.” She reached for her slice again, licking cheese off her finger. “My turn. Truth or dare?”
“Truth,” he said, eyes locked on her mouth.
“Why did you ask me that?”
He paused and met her gaze. “I don’t know.”
She gave him a long look, but decided he wasn’t being evasive, he either honestly didn’t know or couldn’t put words to his need to know.
“Truth or dare?” he asked.
“Truth.”
“You could have any guy you crooked your little finger at, but you hold yourself back. Why?”
“I don’t know,” she said, giving him a taste of his own medicine.
He wasn’t as accepting as she’d been. “Maybe you’re afraid.”
“Of what?”
“You tell me. You grew up stifled by alpha males. I didn’t think you were afraid of anything.”
She paused at that shockingly accurate and insightful statement. “Maybe I’m happy to be my own woman. Maybe I don’t want to lose myself again.” She broke off, a little unnerved at what had come out of her mouth. “Okay, that sounded-”
“Honest.” He took her hand and pressed his mouth to her palm. “One of the most honest things I’ve ever heard you say.”
Pulling her hand free, she took another bite of pizza and chewed on it.
“The right man won’t hold you back, Sam.”
“Truth or dare?” she asked, needing a subject change.
“Truth.”
“Your most embarrassing moment.”
He winced and she laughed. “That bad?”
He didn’t say anything for a long moment as he inhaled another piece of pizza. “Would you buy the I-don’t-know excuse again?”
“No.”
He sighed.
“It can’t be that bad.”
He met her gaze. “It’s you thinking I slept with Tia.”
She gaped at him, shocked to her core that he would even give this a second thought. It was nearly as revealing about him as what she’d admitted only a moment before about never wanting to lose herself in another man again.
“You’ve slept with half the women in Santa Barbara county, why would that bother you?”
“Because I haven’t slept with anyone in months.” He paused. “And months.”
She gave him a get-real look. “There were pictures of you with Tia, Wade.”
“Last month we had a three-day break in the middle of spring training. I flew home from Arizona and spent the first day sleeping on my beach. My private beach. The only thing I can figure is that she found me there, dead to the world, and posed next to me, taking the shots herself.” He hesitated. “I haven’t slept with anyone since you, Sam. Truth or dare.”
“Dare,” she whispered around the bombshell he’d just dropped, not trusting herself with another intimate question. She braced for the dare to be something outrageously sexual. She had no idea how she’d get out of it.
Or if she even wanted to.
But he didn’t make a move toward her, just looked at her with those stark green eyes. “I dare you to believe it,” he whispered, and in her stunned silence, he took the empty pizza box, tossed it to the desk, rolled off the bed, and went back to the couch.
In the morning, the first sound Sam heard was someone singing in the bathroom.
Off key.
The bathroom door was open. She could see Wade brushing his teeth as he sang. He wore tux pants and an unbuttoned white tuxedo shirt that revealed a wide strip of broad, hard chest and washboard abs. His hair was wet and silky straight, falling over his forehead.
He lifted his head and took in her undoubtedly bed-head hair and dazed expression, and smiled.
He hadn’t taken advantage of her last night, which meant that in spite of his smart-ass mouth and smart-ass
Unfortunately turned on and not sure what to do with that, she grabbed her last remaining suit and kicked his sexy ass out of the bathroom. By the time she finished getting ready, he was seated on the bed next to her open suitcase, flicking through the channels with the remote. “Daytime TV sucks.”
His shirt was still open, his feet bare, and yet in spite of it, or maybe because of it, he looked worth every penny of the multimillion dollar guy he was. He took in her carefully tamed hair, makeup, and her pale blue silk suit and smiled. “I love it when my date is smoking hot. I’m starving.” He rubbed his belly. “You have anything to eat?”
“I have a breakfast bar in my purse.”
“Is it a nuts and berries number, or something good?”
“Nuts and berries.”
“No, thanks. I’d prefer cardboard.” His hair was still damp, and because he was on the wrong side of a haircut, it lay against the nape of his neck. He smelled like himself, which was to say
Though she wanted to remain far, far away so that she didn’t actually fall to her knees and try to lick him like a lollipop, she allowed him to pull her down next to him.
And then she saw what was in his other hand, the antique pearl pin she always had on her. “That’s mine.”
“I know. I’ve seen it on you. It’s pretty. Soft and pretty.” He cocked his head to look at her, and she knew what he was thinking.
“And I’m not soft,” she said. “I know. It was my mother’s.” Who had been soft and pretty.
At least in photographs.
“I think you’re soft,” he said quietly. “When it counts.”
She ran her finger over the pearls that had once belonged to her great-grandmother, his words meaning far more than they should. The pin was the only thing Sam had of her maternal side of the family. “I wear it because it makes me feel like she’s with me.” She shook her head. “And I have no idea why I just told you that.” She went to move away, but Wade leaned in and held her gaze, then kissed her softly, a kiss that made no sense at all and yet made her ache from the depths of her soul.
He pulled back, looking as thrown as she felt, so she broke eye contact and pinned the broach to her
