Total pages in book: 146
Estimated words: 141951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 473(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 141951 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 473(@300wpm)
Lucas delivered exactly what she asked for, but the gentle press of his soft mouth against hers still shocked Delaney all the same. Enough that she jumped a bit in her seat, giggling and grinning wider until the first sweeps of his lips along hers coaxed her mouth open for him, and she gave into his silent demand. The first stroke of his tongue along her own dragged a shuddering exhale from her chest, but that could have been the way he grabbed her thigh harder while his other hand caressed the line of her jaw.
She shivered.
His kiss slowed to soft pecks until his chuckles rocked them both. He left her with the distinct taste of mint lingering on her tongue. Compliments of the wrapped candies he’d taken from the bowl on the podium on the way out of Manger.
Delaney had to fight the desire to reach out in the space of darkness around her to find him and pull him back for another kiss. One that bruised and left her breathless. One that wouldn’t leave her aching for more.
Maybe this was better.
She’d come running back for a second.
“Okay,” she heard him mutter, “you might as well take that off, now.”
Really?
“Now?” she asked faintly.
Why did all the blood in her body suddenly decide to rush in her ears?
“I might like another kiss, you know.”
“Yeah, definitely now or we’re never leaving this car,” Lucas said, the huskiness coming back thick in his voice.
His hand left her thigh, too.
A shame, that.
Delaney, left with no other option, decided to give into Lucas’ request for her to remove the scarf blocking her vision. If only to tell him she wanted his hand back where it had been, and another kiss to make it worth her while.
Except the sight she found waiting beyond the parked vehicle stopped her from saying anything at all, and suddenly, his reason for asking about her shoe size made a whole lot of sense. The arena complex couldn’t be mistaken against the backdrop of the dark sky with its towering height and domed roof.
She turned to him with a big smile. “We’re going skating?”
Lucas shrugged, his gaze darting from her to the building as he tried to explain, “I know it’s not something crazy. Maybe we didn’t need the blindfold, huh?”
He had no clue …
“I haven’t been skating since I was like thirteen,” Delaney said, her memories rushing back to a different time in her life.
“That long?”
“It’s a bit of a story,” she admitted.
“You don’t need to tell me if you don’t want to.”
That was the thing, though.
She did want to tell him. His gentle kindness radiated, and he seemed like exactly the type to be a strong shoulder to cry on over her lost girlhood dreams that had been replaced by a cold reality. It just didn’t seem like the right time to tell him.
“We can skate, that’s what we’re here for, sweets.” Lucas dazzled her with a lopsided grin. “I’ve got brand new, freshly sharpened skates in the back. I booked the whole rink out for the next two hours. It’s just you and me.”
Strange, she thought.
Just him and her sounded perfect, actually.
*
“This is definitely not the right outfit for skating,” Delaney said as she did the final lacing on her new, sleek figure skates. Lucas winked, unashamed, at her from where he already stood on the ice with his arms resting one on top of the other on the sidewall of the rink. She pretended not to notice, even if her body broke out in goosebumps to say she’d seen his suggestive gesture perfectly well, and admired the skates that did great things for her bare calves and legs. “I’ve never had a pair in black before. They weren’t standard in competition back then. You lose points for that.”
“You did figure skating?”
Ah, shit.
She hadn’t meant to go there.
The man listened better than she assumed—most men only heard what they wanted.
“I did,” Delaney eventually said, opting to stand on the skates so she could get a feel for the tightness around her ankles. Good support was a must in skates someone might be jumping or spinning in. Nothing could ruin a skate faster than a broken ankle on ice.
“How do they fit?” he asked.
“Perfect,” she beamed.
Lucas, clearly pleased with the answer, offered her a hand from over the wall even though she didn’t need it to keep herself steady as she walked along the rubber coated floor under the benches to where the door opened to the ice rink. Nonetheless, she liked her hand tucked inside his, and those first few seconds after her skates hit the ice required a bit of adjustment from Delaney.
Mostly, getting used to the sensation of gliding across crisp, clean ice on thin blades again.
Remembering.
It took her a minute.
Just a bit to get the hang of shifting her weight from skate to skate to propel over the ice and maintain her balance without barely lifting a blade. Lucas patiently waited, his shiny, new hockey skates keeping him upright and alongside her as they headed for the red center in the middle of the ice.