Page 36 of Made for You
Bruce had good hands.
Big. A little rough, like he used them, but not pure callouses or anything insane. Warm. Steady. Strong.
Really?Two beers and I was rhapsodizing about the man’s hands? I’d enjoyed the pretzel bites and chips and guac we’d ordered, but my appetite had flagged considerably after the news of Rosie’s stroke, even as my desire to guzzle about ten beers had grown. Granted, I didn’tactuallywant to do that, nor would I—a key difference between Nikki at thirty-three and Nikki at twenty.
But two beers had been enough to drown out the peevish little voice in my head that told me I shouldn’t be close enough to touch Bruce. It wasjustenough to let me relax and enjoy that he held my hand on the way to his car, and apparently enough to send me into paroxysms of admiration over his hands. Granted, were I a poet rather than an accountant, I could’ve written sonnets about his forearms and odes to his biceps. I’d jot down haikus for his jaw and scribble an elegy for the loss of my reason thanks to the knowledge of his cut chest and abs my very first view of him had given me.
I must’ve made a sound, because Bruce glanced at me. “You good? Going to be sick?”
“Gosh, no. I’m not drunk. You really think I pounded through enough alcohol to be that inebriated? I would’ve had to make drinking my job over the last hour.” He couldn’t see my mildly irritated expression, but I caught the flick of a smile over his face.
He chuckled low. “You’ve clearly never been in charge of a bunch of soldiers before. They often do drink like it’s their job.”
I grinned at that. “Best not to disappoint Uncle Sam.”
“Indeed. Just so long as I’m not on cleanup crew.” He shook his head like the memories had taken ahold of him. “I do not miss those days.”
“You got out last year, right?” I asked, though Gram had mentioned it.
“A little over eighteen months now, actually. But my days babysitting soldiers came to an end quite a few years ago. In the unit where many of us served out our more recent years, there aren’t many lower enlisted soldiers. Of course, there are idiots everywhere, even when we specifically test and assess to avoid them, but it’s nothing like a bunch of homesick eighteen-year-olds who suddenly have steady paychecks and can’t wait to buy a fifty-thousand-dollar brand new pickup and blow the rest on video games and Rockstar energy drinks until they’re old enough to get beer.” He shuddered.
I laughed. “Should I be concerned I reminded you of all of that?”
He pulled onto his and Rosie’s street and grinned, full-out. My stomach flipped.
“No. You don’t remind me of that at all. But sometimes, Kenny does, and sometimes bars do, and sometimes the memories just hit, you know? Funny how that happens.”
He eased into his driveway and parked, then slipped out of his seat, and before I realized what he was doing, he opened my door.
I unbuckled and turned to get out, yet he stood there, brown eyes set to stun.
“Uh, hi,” I said, because it’d been so brilliant when I’d said it earlier. Nerves shimmered through me, and my heart pattered.
“I should let you get out,” he said, eyes tracing over my face one feature at a time.Eyebrows. Eyes.
“You could,” I said.
Nose.
“I could.”
Right cheek. Left.
I nodded.
“Or,” he said in that low, rich voice that made smoke curl in my belly.
Chin.
“Or.” It was all breath out of my mouth. Pure anticipation.
Lips.
But he didn’t lean in yet. His head notched to the side like he was disappointed in himself. “Or I could kiss you.”
That smoldering gaze found mine, and I pulled in a breath, trying to steady the riot inside me at his close attention, the way he’d stepped between my legs.
“That is a thing you could do.” I couldn’t have repeated whatever weird sentence I’d cobbled together to save my life.
