Page 3 of Forever Defiant
Dustin shrugged. “Fast, slow — does speed matter?”
Yes, you dirty ho-bag.
“We could try a date?” I hadn’t even finished the sentence when I saw him shut down. I needed him back to being interested. “Or a conversation.” I laughed as I stroked my hand down his arm.Flirtatious, not desperate.
He caught my hand, brought it to his lips, and smiled. “Maybe next time, beautiful.”
He left me standing in the dark. He didn’t look back, and I had the distinct impression that Dustin Slater never looked back. I was left wondering whether I’d just blown my chance at a story.
Chapter 1
Dustin
Now . . .
“Hello, boys.”
I could see the amusement dancing in her whiskey-brown eyes as she looked at Noah and me.
Of course it was her. Of all the women in all the bars...
“So, how’s the football program? Still rotten?” Hadley’s question had been enough for Noah to straighten to his full height and shoot her a wide smile.
“Rotten that it’s over for the season, you bet.” He made a show of checking her hands. “You want us to sign something?”
“Excuse me?” Her frown was brief, but we both saw it.
“Hey, it’s cool,” Noah said, again with that wide smile. “Maybe another time.”
Then we were walking away from her.
“What just happened?” I mumbled as he set a fast pace beside me.
“You wanted to dip your wick in the wrong honey pot, that’s what.” He didn’t look over his shoulder, but I knew he wanted to; hell,Iwanted to, and I knew it was for a whole different reason from Noah’s.
“You can see why though, right?”
He sighed. “Yes, she’s very pretty.”
I glanced at the linebacker beside me. “That sounded patronizing.”
“Imagine that.”
“Thatsounded sarcastic.”
“And Coach said you missed all the signals this morning in practice,” Noah tutted.
“You’re being a dick,” I told him reasonably. “I didn’t do anything stupid. I hooked up with her, we made out, it won’t happen again.”
“You sure? Because you didn’t know who she was.”
“I don’t usually need to know who they are. That’s the point.”
“You didn’t speak about anything?” Noah asked. He shoved his hands into his pockets as we walked, his shoulders stooping a little. He did it a lot, I’d noticed. He was six four, and he always seemed to be curling down to make himself smaller.
“You need to walk with your back straight,” I told him. “You got a few inches on me, man, I don’t need you trying to make yourself look small. It’s bad for your posture to be walking like Quasimodo.”
Noah frowned, then he shook his head. “I’m hunching my shoulders because I’m cold and I’m hungry. Twice I’ve missed food tonight. I need food.”
