Page 44 of Breaking Emily's Rules
“I’d know what to do with you.”
Of this I had no doubt. It was in the way he kissed me, in the certain way he held me that told me he knew very well what he was doing. What’s more, he’d do it slowly and methodically.
“Yes, you implied that the first night you met me.”
The light teasing tone in his voice changed to something quite a bit more subdued. “I should apologize for that.”
“For what?” But I had a feeling I knew what he meant. He’d been very forward that night, not that I wasn’t used to getting hit on at the bar.
“You know what. I’m surprised, actually, that you didn’t slap me silly that night.”
“I wanted to.” I laughed a little, because he looked so humbled that I wanted to lighten the mood.
“What can I say? I was alone, and I saw what I wanted. So I reacted like a horny teenager. In other words, I let my hormones rule the day.”
I let that settle in—he’d seen what he wanted.Me.“You’re not the first man to let your hormones do the thinking.”
“You make that easy.”
“Well thanks, soldier.”
“Airman,” he said with a wince.
“Right, sorry.”
What I wanted to do was ask more about the lawsuit, about his sister, everything. But this probably wasn’t the right time. Eventually he took an exit off the freeway in Sunnyvale past Moffett Field and soon after pulled into a parking lot with a sign that read Air Borne Bar & Grill.
“Here we are.”
CHAPTER11
Emily
Aman cave.He’d brought me to a man cave.
The place looked small from the outside, like there should be a neon cocktail sign hanging at its entrance. But as we walked inside, the size of it surprised me. It was shaped like a hangar. One end had a bar and the other end the grill. Big screen televisions hung from every wall, interspersed with pictures of planes. Small scale replicas of B-52 bombers and other planes hung from the rafters. A lone pool table stood nearly hidden in a corner.
“Um, am I the only woman here?”
I scanned the room and fought the urge to cling to him. For cover. All the testosterone in here was bound to cause some kind of explosion.
He slipped off his shades. “Nah, but you might be the only Greenie here.”
“Greenie?”
“Noob, rookie, fledgie.”
He kept throwing out nonsense words. From the look on his face, he found comfort in this place. The planes of his face had relaxed somewhat, and his eyes weren’t filled with that constant edge. Less than a minute after we’d walked in, we were surrounded by three large and buffed men.
“Oh, damn, it’s Stone,” one of them said. “I thought you’d be long gone by now. Isn’t this the longest you’ve ever been grounded? Must be driving you crazy.”
“Who said I’m grounded?” Stone asked the man he introduced to me as “Crash,” leaving me to wonder how many of them had earned him that nickname.
“Don’t forget he’s running the aviation school,” another man said while he practically wrestled a grown man to the ground.
Stone made introductions all around. I would have to remember Crash, Dave, Matt and someone they called NFG for some odd reason.
“This is Emily Parker. She’s going to be a pilot,” Stone said.
