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Chloe shrieked with excitement. “Do we really?”
Man, I loved her energy. “You sure do. You aren’t six though, are you?”
“No. We only just turned five.” She held up the fingers of one hand to illustrate her point.
“Well, you look very grown up.”
“Your hair looks very pretty.”
“Aww, thanks Mila. So does yours. Did you girls want me for something?”
“Yes, we wanna dance with you.”
“Awesome! Let’s go.” I took their hands and let them lead me onto the dance floor, thinking maybe I wasn’t such a loser after all.
CHAPTER2
Gabe
Allegra. Allegra D’Angelo. What a perfect name for a pocket goddess. All fiery black eyes, wild hair, and curves a man would die for. I was drawn to her light like a moth to a flame, or some other dumb cliché I couldn’t think of right now because she was so distracting. There was a good chance that flame would incinerate me, but I had a feeling it would be totally worth it.
I watched Allegra move onto the dance floor with Chloe and Mila. What else could I do but watch her? I was desperate to get my hands on her, bury my fingers in her hair, tilt her head back and claim her lush lips with my own. My blood was humming and I stirred restlessly in the chair, painfully aware that I was less than three feet away from Mario D’Angelo while I was perving on his daughter. Yeah, that killed the buzz. “I’m just gonna go grab a drink, if you want one?”
“No, Mario’s about to ask me to dance,” Giulia answered, humor and a slight Italian tinge in her words.
“So I was!Bella,will you dance with me?”
“Certo!”
Once they’d gone, I moved over to the portable bar and asked for a soda. “Hey, you want one too?” I asked my brother Jake when he joined me at the bar.
“Sure.”
“Two Cokes, thanks.”
We drank in silence for a few moments, while I searched my mind for something to say. I guessed these sorts of functions were hell on Jake, between the presence of alcohol he shouldn’t drink and the proximity to Emma. He’d flirted with an actual drinking problem for years and I guessed his current abstinence might be related to Emma, but he wouldn’t talk about it, and I wasn’t going to pry. Still, “I’m proud of you, man.”
He gave a start of surprise. “Yeah?”
“Yeah. This is the longest I’ve seen you stay sober since the accident.”
He shrugged, like it was no big deal.
“I mean it, Jake.”
“Thanks.”
I felt, more than heard, someone approaching us. The look on Jake’s face and the tension that slammed into his body told me it was Emma. “Hey, you two.”
The look in her eyes mirrored Jake’s and I had to work hard to suppress a frown. It had been ten years since they’d broken up, and to be fair Emma had spent a lot of that time living overseas, but come on. They’d had a decade to resolve their differences. But they seemed no closer to that now than they were on the day they split.
I wondered what Emma was thinking, since she practically never approached Jake if she could help it. But here she was, champagne glass in hand, her pale gold lace dress glinting in the candlelight, watching the dance floor.
“You wanna dance, Em?”
Not much surprised me, but that question from Jake had me raising my eyebrows. What happened next startled me even more.
“Sure.” Emma set her champagne glass on the nearest table and followed Jake onto the dance floor. He pulled her into his arms, holding her like she was made of Swarovski crystal and he was afraid she’d smash into a thousand pieces.
