“Leo.” Maria wrapped her arms around him tightly, trying to squeeze the dear life out of him while simultaneous not really. It was her way of quietly telling him thank you for the date Kayne had taken her on. “I love you so much.”
Letting her do it with a smile was his way of telling her thank you.
Maria didn’t even fucking realize that she had used the L-word, not once but twice in one night … but Lucca did.
“This is a joke, right?” Maria stared at the hockey colosseum as Kayne looked for a parking spot in the busy lot.
“There better be a concert going on here,” she warned.
“You don’t like hockey?”
“Do I look like I watch hockey?” Maria waved her hand down at her tiny and obviously overdressed designer dress, silently thanking God that she brought her fur coat.
Kayne took the opportunity to glide his eyes down her body. “Yeah, I should have probably warned you it was going to be chilly.”
Mmhmm ….
She knew damn well he had thought of it but chose not to for his benefit. “Luckily for you, I can’t get cold.”
His brows drew together in confusion.
Maria tapped her head with a slender finger. “If you stay cold, you can’t get cold.”
“I’m going to be honest, Maria; sometimes you scare me.” Opening his car door, he walked around to open hers. “That’s why I brought you here.”
Taking what he said as a compliment, she didn’t, however, understand what the hell that had to do with hockey.
The crowd was so large inside that it was no wonder her family never attended sporting events that weren’t watched from a box. If Lucca knew where she was without her suit, she was pretty sure he would make her finish her last college semester from home.
Shimmying her ass on the cold seat, she tried to get comfortable as the crowd started a chorus of shouts as the players took the ice. She started planning their future dates right then and there, because she had no intention of seeing another one of these.
The crowds were too loud, the players were covered head to toe in a bulky uniforms that she couldn’t see what the men even looked like enough to appreciate the game. When she’d caught baseball at home on TV, the thick, beefy players had turned even her frigid head. Now that’s a sport.
Startled, Maria bounced in her seat when one player smashed into another, both crashing into the plastic glass. Blood splatter sprayed it as a front gold tooth went flying. The only reason she knew it was gold was because they kept replaying it over and over on the jumbotron.
Maria didn’t turn to look at Kayne, afraid she would miss another attack if she did. “I’m buying us season tickets.”
Nineteen
What We Could Be
Maria stared at herself in her full-length mirror, smoothing down her off-white, tweed dress that had gold stitching through it. The stitching had big, matching gold buttons adorning it, which complemented her hair. Plus, the short dress made her look like her three favorite things: smart, sexy, and rich. It was one of her favorite designer’s.
Sliding her slender feet in her nude pumps, she was all ready to make it to her noon class.
Taking one last, conceited look at herself in the mirror, she watched her bedroom door open behind her through the reflection.
Thinking she was now daydreaming, she turned to face her thought-to-be illusion. “What are you doing in here?”
Him coming into her childhood room, and the realization that she wasn’t, in fact, dreaming, didn’t happen until he closed the door behind him.
Maria stomped her heels on the luxurious carpet, not wanting him to come in any farther; she met him before he could walk a foot into her room.
“What the hell are you doing in here, Dominic?”
“Lucca gave me permission.” His hazel eyes assured her, telling her that he wasn’t that fucking dumb after all.
She couldn’t believe his audacity—that he thought he only needed her big brother’s permission to waltz into her room like he had been there before, like he fucking owned it enough that he blocked her from reaching her door. “Then I’ll scream if you don’t leave.”
“Scream,” Dominic dared her to let Lucca save her. “But you won’t ever get ten minutes alone with me again, princess.”
Even in real life, the Luciano must have had a death wish … making her wonder what else from her dream had been real. That wonder was the only reason she didn’t open her mouth to scream.
“I didn’t think you would.” He stepped closer and almost smiled.
Never backing away from someone in her life, she took one step backward, the dense carpet beneath her heels making her wobble as she did so, and thus making her have to take another step, and another, trying to steady herself from not only the floor but from his presence.