Superb and Sexy (Sky High Air #3)(22)

Not good.

In fact, this was the opposite of good. Her mind raced, and it came to her, the one and only way to get Brody to back off. It was cruel and low, even for her, but difficult times called for difficult measures.

“Ow,” she murmured very softly, wincing, grimacing. “You’re hurting me.”

Before her heart hit its next beat, anguish crossed his face, and his body lifted off hers so fast her head spun.

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “I—”

“Just give me a minute.” She let out a long, slow breath. “I need to just lie here a minute.”

His eyes were tortured. “I’m sorry, so sorry. You were moving like you were fine, and—”

“I’m okay,” she said weakly. “Really. I’ll be fine in a minute—” But she broke off with a gasp when he scooped her up in his arms. “What are you doing?”

“Putting you to bed.” His jaw was tight, the muscles jumping with tension as he headed to the stairs. “Where you are going to be a good little girl and stay.”

“Put me down.”

Instead, he strode up the stairs like she weighed less than a gnat, which she definitely did not. “Seriously, I am not going to bed with you.”

“You know, you’re the second person today to turn me down for sex when I didn’t even offer it.”

Odd, that quick stab of hot emotion that she refused to acknowledge might be jealousy. “Who was the first?”

Only his eyes cut to hers. “Why?”

“Because if it was that bimbo you were dating before I got shot…Bambi? Barbie? You could do better.”

A corner of his mouth quirked. “It was Shayne, actually.”

“Oh.”

“Bambi?” he repeated, definitely sounding amused. “Barbie?”

“Whatever.” It wasn’t easy to maintain her dignity, but she managed. “You can see whoever you want.”

“Yeah. I can. Funny how I don’t want to.”

Though he’d spoken lightly enough, she swallowed hard because nothing in his eyes said light. No, those eyes were all flinty steel, and not cool steel either, but smoking hot.

“Where did you learn to fight like that?” she asked.

“Where did you?”

She closed her mouth.

So did he.

Fine. A crossroads. The story of their lives.

He strode down the hallway with her in his arms as if she weighed nothing. After the surgery, she’d definitely lost some weight. She wasn’t fully back on her game, and yeah, she might never be, but she could handle herself. “This is really going over and above the call of duty.”

“Which you would think would bring me some gratitude,” he said.

“I don’t do gratitude. You must really have hated those temps.”

“Actually, they were all quite polite. Not one of them argued with me on a daily basis.”

“And yet you scared them all away.”

He didn’t say anything to that, and she didn’t know what she’d expected. A confession that he’d done so because he’d missed her? She might as well wait for an invitation to fly to the moon. “I can walk.”

He shot her a quick glare, then stopped on the landing, still not winded.

She really hated him.

“I assume your bedroom is up here. That’s where you were watching me from when I first got here, right? Probably having a helluva laugh over sending your sister to the door instead of coming yourself.”

“I wasn’t laughing.”

He slanted her another look, also unreadable. “Where’s your shoulder brace?”

“My physical therapist said I could go without it now, unless I’m hurting.”

“You are hurting.”

“Yes, because some idiot decided to wrestle with me.”

“Who’s the idiot with the knife?”

Before she could object to his calling her the idiot, he went on in a scathing tone. “A knife. You held a f*cking knife on me like I was the f*cking bad guy.”

“I’m out of the airport for a month, and your language goes all to hell.”

“Six weeks.”

“What?”

“You’ve been out of the airport for six weeks, and you’re still in pain.” At that, he stopped talking. Just stopped and put his forehead to hers. He didn’t move a muscle, but she could feel the tension in his big, tough body. They stood just like that, utterly still, for that one beat in time united in their frustration.

“You’re killing me,” he whispered. “You know that?”

His misery stopped her cold and drained her temper. Somehow, her hand came up and touched his jaw. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“You should have been safe there.”

“It wasn’t your fault, Brody.”

He shouldered open her bedroom door and then stopped short in the doorway at the sight of Cowgirl Central, complete with leather and pink lace everywhere. “Your bed.”

Oh, God. She’d forgotten. “It’s not mine.”

“It’s pink,” he said, sounding as stunned as he looked, which pissed her off. “Lace.”

“I didn’t pick it.”