Page 46 of Fake Dark Vows
She chews her bottom lip and moves closer. “I should go.”
“Rose.” I close the distance between us and before I realize what I’m doing, my hand is tangled in her hair, and my lips are on hers.
She tastes how I imagined she would. The contours of her body seem to mold against mine, and my free hand instinctively slides down her spine, grabbing her butt and pulling her against me. I don’t know what happened to the bottle of rum. One moment it’s cold and solid between our chests, and the next, her breasts are burning holes in my shirt, and the urge to rip her shirt open and bury my face in them is overwhelming.
I pull away, my fingers groping her buttons.
Her mouth follows mine, her tongue darting between my lips, forging a way in like I’m hers to explore. She buries her fingers in my hair, and I open my eyes momentarily to find hers closed, those incredible eyelashes framing the delicate skin of her eyelids.
Until the first button of her shirt pings open beneath my fingers.
The charged atmosphere inside the gloomy cupboard deflates like a popped balloon.
“No, Brandon.” She lowers her arms and turns away from me, tugging her shirt together, and peering down at the buttons. “I have to go change.”
“Rose, stay.” My voice doesn’t even sound like my own. “I’m sorry.” For pinging a button on her uniform or for crossing a line? She doesn’t ask, and I don’t offer an explanation.
She looks at me, and even in this cramped dark space, I know that she’s torn. In the moment, she wanted me as much as I want her, but her loyalty is to my mom and her guests, and she can’t serve drinks with a button missing—that simply wouldn’t live up to Ruby Weiss’s incredibly high standards.
I let her go.
I don’t want to—nothing could be further from what I want—but I let her go because Rose Carter isn’t like any other woman I know.
And I know what I must do.
Giving Rose a few minutes to get to her room and change her shirt, I pick up the forgotten bottle of white rum and leave the pantry.
“There you are.” Jennifer has one foot in the hallway and one inside the den as if looking for something or someone. “I wondered where you’d gotten to.”
“Replenishing the liquor.” I tap the evidence with one blunt fingernail.
“Don’t we have a housekeeper for that?”
I smile. There isn’t much that escapes Jennifer’s attention. “Just lending a hand.”
“You don’t have to explain anything to me, you know that. You seem … I don’t know … different tonight.”
“How many cocktails have you had?”
“Not so many that you can fool me, Brandon Weiss. What was it, the ruthless determination to win or the silky-smooth charm that won her over?”
I laugh out loud. “One day spent in my brother’s company, and you’ve become embroiled in the family gossip-pot. What did he tell you, huh? That I once spent six hours in a tree because I was determined to climb higher than him and couldn’t get down? Or my favorite: that I refused to eat a sandwich with the crusts on until I was in double figures?”
“Close.” She takes a deep breath. “Your brother took today very personally.”
She doesn’t need to say any more. I can imagine how Damon’s mood alternated between soaring highs when he was confident of victory and brooding lows whenever we crossed paths.
“Speaking of my brother. Is he on the porch?”
“Nope. The last time I saw him he was pouring his own strawberry daiquiri and complaining loudly about the help.”
Rose is already pouring drinks when I head outside. I can’t stop my eyes from traveling down the front of her shirt, and the tension eases from my neck when I see that the buttons are intact.
Damon is holding court with Sumaira and another friend of my mother’s, Roxie. They’re only half-listening to him, while trying not to miss anything important from the conversations taking place around them.
I walk straight over, make polite small talk for thirty seconds—any longer and I’ll be sucked into a discussion that will take me at least ten minutes to extricate myself from—and excuse myself and Damon.
We move onto the lawn, away from curious ears. “The bet’s off,” I say, facing away from the guests on the porch.