Brave Enough (Tall, Dark, and Dangerous #3)(5)

“Maybe I know what’s best for me, Mom. Did anyone consider that?”

“You’re not a selfish woman. You never have been. I know you’ll make the right decision.” Her tone is certain, so certain it sets my teeth on edge. Is everyone so convinced that I’ll succumb? That I don’t have the intelligence or the backbone to figure out another way? That I can’t devise a plan to keep the family intact without prostituting myself?

Well, to hell with that! To hell with them! I will find another way. I just need time. And maybe the nerve to call my father’s bluff.

“Maybe it’s time to be selfish, Mom. Maybe it’s finally time. I’ll talk to you later.”

I hang up before she can say anything else and I immediately put my phone on silent. If I’m to get anything at all accomplished on this reprieve, I’ll have to avoid talking to my parents. At least until I have some inkling of what I’m going to do.

I head back inside, making my way to the kitchen once again. I’m surprised to find Tag rather than his mother dumping dry pasta into a pot and tasting the red sauce. His hair is wet, the ends just long enough to curl around the collar of his loose white button-up shirt, and I can smell the clean scent of his soap above the spicy notes of oregano.

“You looked much different a few minutes ago,” I say from the doorway, leaning one hip against the counter.

“Shorter? Older? Nicer?” he asks as he licks tomato sauce from his full lower lip.

“Definitely shorter and older, but I’m not sure yet about the nicer part.”

“Oh, I think you are,” he says with a wicked little half smile.

“Are you trying to tell me that you aren’t nice?”

He shrugs his big shoulders as he sprinkles a pinch of something into the pan and gives it another stir. “I guess it depends on how you define nice.”

“And how do you define nice?”

He turns his smoky-gray eyes back to me. “I don’t think the thoughts I’ve been having about you could, in any way, be considered ‘nice.’”

My mother and my current troubles are forgotten as heat creeps into my core like the lightest of caresses. It makes me feel careless. Daring. A little wild. “I suppose it would be rude of me to ask about those thoughts.”

Ohmigod, what am I doing?

I know I’m playing with fire. Within minutes of talking to Tag today, I quickly surmised that he’s dangerous. To hearts, to minds. Certainly to panties. Mine feel in danger of combusting just watching him, for heaven’s sake. Which is unlike me. In fact, all of this is pretty unusual for me. I can’t remember the last time I was so immediately and thoroughly intrigued by a man, or the last time I considered doing anything with such reckless abandon. I don’t even flirt! Maybe that’s why this is to tempting to me—it’s not something I would ever do. He’s not someone I would ever do.

And maybe that makes him perfect.

“I don’t think it would be rude of you. Dangerous, maybe, but not rude.”

“Dangerous, how?”

Tag wipes his hand on a towel and turns toward me. With his eyes on mine, he takes a few steps to close the gap between us. “Are you sure you want to know?” he asks. My body is like a tuning fork, reacting to the vibration of his gruff voice in a quiet shiver that moves all the way through me.

“No,” I answer honestly, realizing that I’m probably way out of my depth with a man like this.

“Well, when you are sure, you just let me know. I’d be more than happy to . . . educate you when you’re ready.”

With him so close, I feel claustrophobic. But in the best possible way. His eyes are glued to mine, the silver of his irises appearing to flow around his dilated pupils like mercury. I can’t look away, even though it’s hard to breathe. But now, I’m not even sure I want to. I like the feel of him crowding me. I like the feel of his body heat radiating into mine. Plainly put, I like the way he makes me feel.

“What makes you think I need educating?”

“Maybe I’m just hoping that you do.”

“I could always lie.”

“And I could always believe you.”

Stella’s soft voice interrupts from somewhere behind Tag. “Is this why you were shooing me out of here?”

I hear her, but I can’t see her. Tag is so big, his presence so consuming, I’m not sure the world even exists beyond the breadth of his shoulders.

Beautifully sculpted lips tip up at one corner before he replies to his mother. “No, Mom. I was just getting the bread.”

Tag leans in to reach onto the counter behind me, his chest brushing mine and his arm grazing my hip. I hear the rattle of a bag and then he’s leaning away, a ring of Italian Ciambella bread gripped in his long fingers.

When he steps away, air rushes back into my lungs as though he had consumed all the oxygen around me when he was near. I sag ever so slightly against the counter and plaster a polite smile on my face.

“I can finish,” Stella tells her son when he returns to the stove with the bread. He holds it aloft, out of her reach.

“You need to rest. I told you I’d take care of this. But thank you for watching it while I showered.”

She gives him a stern look, but she doesn’t argue, and even now, I notice the unnatural pallor to her skin. “At least let me set the table.”