Page 63 of Love Walks In


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He nodded and slouched back to the bar.

“You think he spit in my soup?” Hunter eyed the creamy, green soup warily.

“No.” Aria smiled and draped her napkin in her lap. “He’s not that type. But he was the first person to sign my petition. Sorry.” She twisted her mouth with a grimace. “I didn’t mean to bring up thething.”

Hunter shrugged and picked up his spoon. Thethingseemed increasingly less relevant. “We have a truce, so it doesn’t matter. We’ll hash it all out at the debate.”

She spooned up a bite of soup and blew on it. Her lips pursed, drawing his attention to the rosebud of her mouth. His shoulders tensed with the urge to kiss her again.

“You were on your high school debate team, weren’t you?” she asked.

“How’d you know?”

“Easy guess. Ivy Leagues look favorably on forensics, from what I understand.” She rolled her eyes slightly. “Not that I ever thought about the Ivy Leagues. That was Callie’s domain.”

“What was your college major?”

“English literature.” She ate another bite of soup and darted her tongue out to lick her bottom lip. “Because I like to read, not because I thought I could make a career out of it. I didn’t want to be a teacher…again, Callie’s domain…and I couldn’t figure out what else to major in. Then a friend told me about a non-profit animal organization that was looking for help up near Seattle, so I dropped out and moved up there. Not my greatest decision.”

“You wouldn’t have known that if you hadn’t gone, though.”

“Sadly, it was one of many bad decisions.” She blew her breath upward, stirring a tendril of hair at her temple. “I also once joined an adventure travel company that folded six months later. I went broke on a spur-of-the-moment road trip. I’ve put my savings into countless business ventures—a wildlife rescue program, an online macramé art store, a mail-order soap business—but I could never get anything off the ground. Or I couldn’t stick with it long enough. Anyway, I have a terrible track record of going the distance with anything. How’s the soup?”

Hunter blinked. He’d been too preoccupied listening to her and staring at her. He ate a spoonful of soup and nodded. “Really good.”

She tapped the menu at the side of the table. “Grant’s soup always gets the starring role here, but the supporting cast is excellent. When we’re done, we’ll split a piece of olallieberry pie. It’s my sister Rory’s favorite. It’ll ruin you for all other olallieberry pies.”

He didn’t bother telling her he’d never heard of or had an olallieberry pie in his life. As they shared the sweet, tart pie and homemade vanilla ice cream, and as he grew increasingly captivated by her murmurs of pleasure, the way she closed her lips around the spoon, the flash of her smile…he began to suspect he was being ruined in more ways than one.

Smothering his unease, he set down his fork and indicated that she should finish the pie. After they were done and he paid for their dinner, Aria drove him back to the Outside Inn and parked beside the front gate.

“There’s still more to see, and I can even tell you a few things about pirates, believe it or not.” She pulled up the parking brake, her bracelets jingling. “But I hope that was a good start.”

“It was a great start.” He put his hand on the door handle, barely stopping himself from saying that he’d show her the secrets of New York when she came to visit him in Manhattan.

This was totally out of hand. He needed to get a grip.

“Well, thank you.” She shifted, sliding her hand over the steering wheel. “We can do this again sometime, if you’d like to.”

Say no. You’re busy. Work to do. Thanks but no thanks.

“I’d like to,” he said.

“Good.” Her eyes creased with a smile. “So would I.”

He started to get out of the van. His heart began a low, heavy beat. Before he could think, before he could talk himself out of it, he grabbed her shoulders and hauled her against him.

Aria gasped, her eyes widening right before he brought his mouth crashing down on hers. Lust and light exploded through him. He kissed her with a complete lack of finesse, aching only to claim her in the rawest way possible.

She stiffened in shock for an instant before a moan emerged from her throat, and she wrapped her arms around his shoulders. Her breasts pressed against his chest.

Fuck, yeah.

He was already hard, and they hadn’t even done anything. Yet.

In one movement, he grabbed her waist and hauled her over the console so she was straddling his lap. Breaking her mouth from his, she lifted her head and stared at him, her eyes dazed in the dim light.

“God, Hunter.” She pulled in a breath and shifted against his groin, her thighs hugging his hips. “What are we…”

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