Before Daylight. Andie J. Christopher

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СКАЧАТЬ the start, thinking he would be good for a fun night on the beach. A wedding fling. She hadn’t realized that he was dangerous to her peace of mind.

      “Are you hot?” He didn’t keep the amusement out of his voice.

      The problem with a guy like Charlie was that he snuck up on sexy. He was like a chili pepper that didn’t hit the taste buds right away, but turned into a five-alarm emergency after thirty seconds of slurping up whatever it was in.

      “It’s 95 degrees and a hundred percent humidity.” She glared at him, angry that he could see how disheveled she felt around him. He made her feel as though someone had ransacked her insides. “What do you think?”

      “Aren’t you used to that, growing up here?”

      “I never spent much time outside as a kid.”

      “That’s a shame.”

      She shrugged. “I was busy dancing.”

      “You sound sad when you say that.” Irritation had her digging her fingernails into her palm, a habit she’d picked up to deal with jerky dance partners to prevent herself from yelling at them and risking one dropping her on her ass at the first opportunity.

      “I’m not sad. It’s the truth.”

      He moved his right hand to the top of the wheel, sort of creating a shield between him and her. She should like the fact that she’d put him on the defensive, but it disappointed her. Part of her wanted him to probe and find out more about her. She wanted to know more about him. Sure, they were getting an annulment as soon as possible, but she should know something about the man she’d married other than the fact that she was going to regret not consummating the marriage.

      “Where did you grow up?”

      “Just outside of Chicago.” His body loosened, encouraging her to ask for more.

      “Not quite as hot there.” She looked down at her hands, not sure what she should say next. She didn’t really know anything about this man, and she was curious as to why she’d done something so terribly impulsive with him. “What’s your family like?”

      He shifted his hands on the steering wheel again, and his body was more open to her. “Really normal.”

      She snorted. “What’s that like?”

      “Your family seems pretty normal to me.”

      “You haven’t met my parents then?”

      “No, just Mr. and Mrs. Hernandez.”

      “The Delgados are nothing like the Hernandezes.”

      “Really, how so?”

      She paused, not quite ready to open up. “I asked you about your family. Tell me about normal.”

      “When I was growing up, my dad ran a newspaper, which is now a media conglomerate. All my brothers work for him.”

      “But not you?” Charlie’s brow furrowed, and Laura wanted to run her finger across his forehead, smoothing the creases. She wanted to soothe him, but didn’t know how. It wasn’t often that she didn’t know how to fix something.

      “I didn’t exactly meet my father’s expectations.”

      “They were demanding?”

      “Yes.” He sighed and moved his hand as though he was about to touch her, but stopped and put his hand back on the wheel. They were close to the restaurant now; traffic had been mostly quiet. Laura had this feeling of time slipping away, as though she was about to lose an opportunity to really get to know this man.

      “My parents didn’t expect much.” She said it, hoping maybe that if she showed him a bit of herself, that he would do the same. It didn’t make any sense—this prying—but she had to know more about this man who filled her with delicious feelings, even though any involvement with him would be deeply inconvenient.

      “But look at what you’ve achieved.”

      “It’s not really important.”

      “More important than what I do.”

      “Maybe.”

      They both went silent, but she felt bad about him thinking that his work wasn’t important. As a dancer, she often felt like something pretty and frivolous. A luxury, not a necessity. With previous boyfriends—few and far between as they had been—she’d felt like a trophy. Guys liked to say they were banging a ballerina, but they didn’t so much like the long evenings alone. Every relationship she’d ever tried to start had stalled when the guys realized that ballet was her true love.

      And she didn’t dare date other dancers. The competition and vanity didn’t make for anything healthy.

      Sitting in the car with Charlie, talking about their families, felt kind of nice. Normal. She’d never even thought she’d get married and have kids when she was done dancing professionally. But the thought of it often made her feel as though she was facing down a prison sentence.

      Normal for Laura felt like a punishment. From the few words Charlie had said on the subject of his normal childhood, they didn’t see things so differently.

      Chapter 4

      Charlie wasn’t sure where this date had gone off the rails. Maybe it was when she walked out of her front door, looking stricken by the sight of him. Her fear had thrown him. The last thing he wanted was for her to be afraid. Maybe it had been a mistake insisting that she go out to dinner with him before signing off on an annulment. She did look gorgeous, but she’d winced when he told her so. She seemed to be the only woman he’d met in the last few years who vexed him completely.

      He had trouble forming whole sentences around her. His palms were sweaty, and not getting a hard-on when touching her lower back had been a feat. He was never this uncouth. After his ex told the whole world that he was a terrible lover, he’d tried to re-build his reputation. Never a dissatisfied customer.

      But he had a formula, and he purposefully never talked about anything controversial. Nothing that could get too deep. And that was why none of his relationships ended up very deep.

      He’d thought he liked it that way.

      And then she had to go and ask about his family. The people who thought he was a commitment-phobic dilettante. His older brothers and his parents thought that moving to Miami had been all about putting off growing up. In reality, it had been the opposite. He wanted to settle down and have roots somewhere. But he didn’t want his roots to be underneath the stifling canopy of being a Laughlin in Chicago. His father’s reputation was so overpowering and lofty that it would always overshadow anything that Charlie did.

      Her asking about them hit a nerve, and he was at a loss for how to respond.

      Instead of trying and failing to make conversation during the rest of the ride to the restaurant, he brooded about his family instead. Laura sat with a serene demeanor, having no idea that she’d picked at something that had been bothering him his whole life.

      His father’s shadow didn’t bother Jack, СКАЧАТЬ