Free Rock Courtship Rock Courtship (Rock Kiss #1.5) by Nalini Singh Page B

body a glossy black and the windows tinted, he opened the passenger door for her before loading her luggage in the trunk and getting in himself. He smelled so good that her mouth actually watered. What would he taste like? What would he feel like if they did the things they’d written—spoken—about?
    Having waited until after they’d passed the cashier of the parking lot and were stopped at a traffic light, David unzipped and removed his hoodie. Running a hand through his hair as he threw the gray fabric into the backseat, he gave her another smile that twisted up her insides.
    She couldn’t bear it if he never smiled at her that way again. The months when he’d distanced himself from her, she’d missed him so much. It’d be even worse now, after she knew so many pieces of him, after he’d sent her flowers with thorns included. In the fear, she found her voice. “What are we doing David?” The butterflies grew silent inside her, their wings heavy with worry.
    Smile fading, David’s hands clenched on the steering wheel. “Have you changed your mind about seeing where this leads?”
    Thea half-turned in her seat. “If we screw this up, it won’t affect only the two of us. It’ll ripple through every one of the people closest to us.” But that wasn’t her biggest fear. “We could lose our friendship forever.”
    “Could you stop?” Quiet, intense, his tone demanded attention. “Walk away and go back to how we were?”
    Thea thought of the memos she’d saved in a private folder, of the thorn-laden red flower she’d pressed in the pages of her day planner, of the smile that made her breath catch and her stomach flutter, and knew there was only one answer. “No.”
    “Then I guess we better not screw it up.” David reached over to touch his fingers to her jaw before turning his attention back to the road, the fleeting contact a sizzling brand against her skin. “You want to do anything special tonight? If you want to catch up with everyone, I bet they’re in one of the hotel suites, eating real food.”
    Thea laughed through the renewed crackle of nerves, the butterflies taking flight with a vengeance. “Gerald and A.J. serve their pretty but inedible canapés again?” The older couple was flamboyant and hopelessly addicted to the spotlight, but they were also mad for one another.
    “I tried one of these bread things with little orange balls on it because it looked the most normal.” He shuddered. “After I nearly gagged, Abe told me they were some kind of special fish eggs. I say fish should be allowed to keep their eggs.”
    Her shoulders shook; David was so not a canapés kind of a guy. “You’re hungry?”
    “Yeah. You?”
    “I could eat.” But she didn’t want to meet up with the others. Not tonight. This, what was happening between her and David, it was new and fragile and private. “Did you book a suite? Let’s go there.” She hadn’t made a hotel booking, having realized that there were only two possible outcomes once she stepped off the plane.
    One: she and David came face-to-face and decided they were making a huge mistake. In which case, she’d have caught the next flight to L.A.
    Two: they decided to continue on, in which case it would be pointless to have a room of her own, because if they were together, there would be sex. Weeks of delicious, long-distance foreplay had left her a frustrated wreck. If David was feeling anywhere near the same, they’d spend most of their time together, naked.

Chapter 7
    “I have a place here, remember?” David said, breaking into her thoughts.
    “I forgot.” Probably because her brains were scrambled with a mix of nerves, lust, anticipation, and breathless hope. “How are your parents?”
     “I was thinking of going to see them tomorrow.” A glance from those golden-brown eyes that kept tangling her up. “Want to come? We don’t have to say anything about us—you know my folks like you.”
    Thea had met Mr. and Mrs. Rivera enough