I was already walking toward the kitchen and turning on my phone’s flashlight by the time I finished speaking. Cold had seeped into the breezeway, and I slowed my steps, hoping the chill would help me calm the fuck down. The beer had given me a nice buzz—that wasn’t a total lie—but kissing Delaney had given me an even stronger one.
I misjudged the distance to the doorframe and bumped my shoulder against it, cursing under my breath. Then I pressed the heel of my hand against the front of my jeans, willing my body to cooperate. The last thing I needed was to return with an obvious hard-on.
When I returned to the living room, Teeny was still sitting in the spot she’d claimed, apparently content to observe the weird humans from a distance. Delaney had pulled the pillows off the sofa and sat on the floor with his knees pulled up to his chest. It appeared he’d fetched a fresh bottle of wine and a glass for me.
“You think we need more to drink?” I asked casually as I squatted down to stoke the fire. Though the flames were crackling warm and steady, my pulse was definitely not.
No looking at his legs. No remembering how he tasted.
“I figured more wine would help with all the not-thinking I’m doing,” he joked, his voice rougher than usual. “Unless you can think of a… different way to distract me?”
“What?” I twisted around so quickly I nearly face-planted.
Delaney’s eyes widened. “No! No, no,” he stammered. “I meant distract me with your talents.” His eyes widened impossibly further. “Notthosetalents! I meant dancing! Or singing! Or… magic tricks!”
It was one of the strange truths of my interactions with Delaney that sometimes the more upset he got, the more calm I became. Seeing him now, flushed and mortified, I felt warmth surge through my chest.
“Don’t know any magic tricks,” I said easily. I plunked myself down beside him—close enough to see him in the dim light, not close enough that we were touching—and stretched my legs out toward the fire. “And I don’t sing or dance.”
“Lies.” He looked away quickly and took a deep drink of wine.
I laughed and picked up the second glass he’d poured. “Nope. I suppose I’ve been known to chicken-dance at the occasional wedding, but you’d have to get me a lot drunker or really make it worth my while if you wanted me to demonstrate.”
Delaney darted a look at me. “I meant singing. I heard you sing. The other day at the camper.”
“Oh.” There were a lot of memories his words might have conjured. Shitty, scary ones of the camper burning.
Instead, my brain summoned a memory of Delaney’s finger jabbing my chest, the heat of his touch lingering long after he pulled away, and I had to shift positions to hide my reaction.
“That’s…” I blinked as the full meaning of his words actually made it through my muddled brain. “Wait, what did you hear?”
A slow smile spread across his face. “You. Singing ‘Defying Gravity.’ Pretty convincingly, too.”
“You…” I swallowed. “You were pretty angry, so you might have misheard…”
“Lies,” he said again softly.
My face went hot.
It wasn’t that I was embarrassed about liking what I liked or that I purposely kept it a secret. I didn’t. I just… rarely shared much about myself. Rarely felt close enough to anyone to share. Hell, Reed had known me a lot longer than Delaney had, and he didn’t have a clue.
“I sort of wondered,” he continued, “if it was a hallucination brought on by smoke inhalation, but your face right now confirms it.”
I ran a hand over my face like I could rearrange whatever he saw there. “Great.”
Delaney’s answering laughter was warm, not mocking. He shifted his body so that instead of facing the fire, he was now facing me. The movement made his knee brush against my thigh. The contact, small as it was, sent electricity up my leg. “Okay, I have a distraction idea. Ready?”
I shot him a look. He was smiling, his posture relaxed, and I wondered for a second if that strange inverse effect worked both ways—like the more off-balance I was, the more he chilled out.
“Ready for what?” I demanded. “I’m not singing for you, so get that idea right out of your head.”
“Not that.” His smile widened. “I think we should play a game. My very first editor used to say that you can get to know anyone by asking them five good questions. So let’s test the theory. Answer honestly and fully, or…” He shook his glass slightly. “Drink.”
“A drinking game?” The idea felt… dangerous. Though, honestly, any damn thing that kept Delaney in proximity felt dangerous at the moment.
Which was, as a voice in my head that sounded like Hayes and Kel mashed together pointed out, just another form of deflection.
“Or,” Delaney said, smile fading, “I guess we should probably talk about the renovation, huh?” He darted a glance toward the darkened kitchen, where the red cabinet monstrosities were hanging.
