Page 64 of Delivery After Dark
“It already is.”
Game. Set. Match. This guy was next-level, she decided. Not only was he incredibly sexy, but he had good banter, which was super attractive to her. She loved to spar with her friends, and to do that with a guy who interested her was a new experience. Most guys were too easily butthurt by a cutting comment that was intended to be funny.
Not Morgan. He got it, and that was a huge plus in his column. Add that to the lovely manners, the sense of humor, and his obvious interest in her, and a girl could be bowled over by a guy like him.
“Is there significance to those?” she asked of the black bracelets adorned with silver beads he wore on both arms.
Morgan ran his fingers over the beads on his left arm. “After our sister and parents died, Billy and I had these made. Their initials are on the beads. One is mine, and the other was his. I was glad to get it back after they found him.”
“That’s incredibly sweet.”
“It made us feel connected to them. I guess I need to add a bead to them now.”
Her heart broke for him. There was almost nothing she wouldn’t do to make him smile. Slow down, woman. He’s here temporarily and going through hell. Don’t get overcommitted only to end up heartbroken.
The waitress delivered their drinks and took their dinner order.
After she walked away, Morgan took a sip of his beer. “Did something upset you before she came to the table? You had an odd expression for a second there.”
She stared at him, astounded by his insight and how he paid attention—another thing that made him different from other men she’d known.
“Sierra? Are you okay?”
“I was moved by what you told me about the bracelets, and I was thinking about how much fun this has already been and that I need to proceed carefully with you since you’re a short-timer around here.”
“Ah, I see how that could be a concern.”
“Indeed.” She took a big drink of her wine after sharing more with him in an hour than she had with other guys she’d dated for months. Something about him made it easy to open up in a way she never had before.
Sierra appreciated that he didn’t immediately try to defuse her concerns with platitudes. That, too, made him different. Most guys would say what they thought she wanted to hear to ensure they ended up in her bed at the end of the night—not that many of them did, but a few had snuck past her defenses only to let her down eventually.
“Hey.”
She looked up, realizing she’d settled into a full-on brood.
“I don’t want you to worry about anything. This place I used to hate is looking better and better to me all the time. Anything can happen.”
“You hated it?”
“Intensely. I thought it was the most boring place in the world to grow up. There was absolutely nothing to do, or so it seemed to me at the time. I had a literal countdown to graduation on the wall of my bedroom, and two days after that, I headed for the mainland to find a job and a life that didn’t take place on a small, remote island.”
“What did your parents say?”
“I made them sad with my disdain for our home. I regret that now. Big-time.”
“I’m sure they understood. They were kids once, too.”
“True, but I was mean about it. I can’t even think about that without cringing. If I’d known then what I know now about how fleeting time and life can be, I would’ve behaved differently.”
“You ought to forgive yourself for that. We’re all selfish when we’re young. How could you possibly know you’d lose them all by the time you were… what…”
“Thirty-nine.”
That made him seven years older than her. “That’s not fair.”
“No, it isn’t. What about you? What were you like as a kid?”
“Hell on wheels, as you guessed earlier, and I’m not proud of that. I was sneaking out of the house from the minute I figured out how.”
