“I do.”
“Then Chinese it is.” He pulled out his phone and made a call before he left to order their hot drinks.
They said little as they sipped their hot chocolate. Lucy was surprised how quickly she’d become comfortable in Ryan’s presence. They had bonded in a way she’d never expected they would or could. After their first meeting she would have said it was impossible for them to find common ground.
“Look here,” Ryan said.
“What’s wrong?”
He leaned over and kissed her, his tongue lightly brushing her upper lip. It was quick and warm and, oh, so short.
When he pulled away she said, “Why did you do that? You could have told me and I would have used a napkin.”
His blue eyes danced with mischief. “If I’d done that I wouldn’t have gotten that last extra sweet taste of chocolate.”
“No, I guess you wouldn’t have.”
She was having fun. She looked into the eyes of the big, sensitive, caring and highly intelligent man beside her with the devilish sense of humor and knew she’d lost her ability to be rational about him. She had real feelings for the guy. It was an intoxicating while at the same time disturbing reality. Would there be more heartache in her future?
* * *
Ryan licked his lips as if getting every last drop of chocolate from them and grinned at her. “You have any more to share?”
“I do not.” She looked so indignant that he laughed. She grinned at him.
He couldn’t believe that he’d told Lucy so much about his father. He’d never confided to anyone outside his family and for the most part he’d not even done that. His father had been an intensely proud man and Ryan had been gifted with that same propensity, good or bad. It was an issue of pride for Ryan that he could handle his own problems. He’d never shared his innermost feelings with anyone before but Lucy made him feel secure enough to do so.
Why had he? He should feel naked and vulnerable now that she knew so much about him. Instead, relief had washed over him at being able to tell someone about the burden of loss and pain he carried. He found it rather liberating.
“Hey, I’ve been meaning to ask you where you learned to speak Spanish so well. I don’t think of Georgia as the go-to place.”
“I learned it from my father’s Mexican housekeeper at his home in LA. Alexis and I spent a lot of time with her. I just picked it up.”
He pulled her to him and smiled down at her. “And it came in handy a few times.”
“Just a few?” She smiled shyly back at him.
He wanted to kiss her, not a quick peck or a teasing brush but a real kiss right there in front of everybody. He brought her against him. His lips met her soft warm ones that tasted faintly of chocolate.
She grabbed his coat and pulled, going up on her toes. Her acceptance fed his desire. He requested admission with the end of his tongue, and she granted it. Entering, he found a heated cavern of pleasure. This was a kiss.
“Hey, buddy. Get a room,” someone called.
Lucy jerked away, but she still had handfuls of his coat. Her eyes were large and awestruck, her lips cherry red from his kiss.
“Was that a friendly kiss?”
He laughed. “The friendliest. Come on...” He took her hand.
“Where are we going?”
“My place.”
“I’m going to see those lights?”
“Yes.”
“Ryan, I don’t think—”
“I said fun and no pressure, remember? I keep my word.”
“That would be the O’Doherty way.”
“Yes, it would.”
* * *
Lucy was still reeling from Ryan’s kiss as she followed him out of the subway into the early evening air.
They had shared a real kiss. The kiss of a man who wanted a woman. Was she stepping into water over her head? If she was, would she sink so far under Ryan’s spell that she’d never come up?
They were in an area of small privately owned stores. People milled on the sidewalks in front of the stores. She’d never been to Brooklyn but she’d not expected to find the small-community feel within a large metropolis. Ryan’s stride changed, became more leisurely, as if he’d returned home.
“I live about a half a mile from here. Would you like to walk or should I call for a taxi?”
“Walking would be nice. I’d like to see where you grew up.”
As they strolled hand in hand Ryan spoke to a shop owner, introduced her to a former high school teacher and her husband. Others waved or called out to him. It was a community proud of their home-grown boy done well.
“You love living here, don’t you?”
“What’s not to love? And I’ve known nothing else.”
“Never thought of moving on up? The super-neurosurgeon who outgrew his roots?”
“No, here suits me just fine.”
And it did. What was it like to be that secure in those around you that you knew you belonged?
They walked down a small hill that had a line of new-looking condos that had not been constructed to look so modern that they didn’t blend with the rest of the buildings along the waterfront. At the one closest to the East River, Ryan stopped in front of a door stained a dark color. He fished in his pocket and pulled out keys.
“You live here?” Lucy made no effort to hide her amazement. “What a beautiful spot.” Across the East River was Lower Manhattan with all its enormous buildings, including those around Wall Street.
“Come on in,” Ryan said as he opened the door. “Our Chinese should be here soon. We’ll eat out on the deck.”
He led her straight through the living room, stopping long enough to flip on a light in the kitchen before they went out a glass door to a deck. It ran the length of the condo out the back and had a privacy fence separating him from his neighbor. There was a small table with two chairs and an oversized and wide lounge that faced the city.
“I think we timed it just right for dinner and a show.”
She put her hands on her hips and gave him a skeptical look. “So you’re sticking with that story?”
“I am.”
“We eat and then the light show begins.”
The
