She looked at his hand and hesitated. He held his position, praying she’d accept his offer. Tentatively, she placed her palm in his. Reed felt like he’d won a huge victory as he laced their fingers together. They stood there, just holding hands for a few beats, and he was ready to declare his devotion and his intentions. But she walked out of the house, shutting the door behind her. Reed snapped back to the present and escorted her to the truck, helping her inside. He loved the way her trim waist fit in his hands.
He rushed around to the driver’s side, climbed in, buckled up, and pulled away.
“How do you know what I’ll like?” she asked as they drove past her family’s nice homes arrayed in the trees and around the lake.
Should he reveal his inside source? “I’ve got friends in high places,” he admitted.
“My mom and your mom are far too good of friends,” she said, folding her arms across her chest.
He made a show of buttoning his lips closed.
“Come on, what did she tell you?” Esther asked.
Reed chuckled and reached across the console for her hand. Again she hesitated before taking his hand. He didn’t like the hesitation, but he liked the result. Her smaller hand clasped in his made him feel like he was on top of the world.
“First of all, I can’t disclose the source of my intel.”
Esther groaned and rolled her eyes.
“Second, maybe I was simply inspired and I know what you like just because I know and love you so well.” His own eyes widened as that sentence spilled out. Had he really just said he loved her? At the beginning of date two? It was a rooky mistake even if the woman of his dreams didn’t have some three-dates-and-done rule.
Esther stiffened beside him and pulled her hand away, clasping her hands together in her lap. Last night there had been a sweet tension in the truck as they drove to dinner. Right now, the tension was thick and uncomfortable. How could he backtrack? He couldn’t scare her off and lose this opportunity.
“Any word on Garret?” she asked.
Reed wanted to somehow explain away his “love you so well” slip, but he had no clue how to do so without claiming he loved her as a friend or loved her as a sister and he wouldn’t throw out either of those lies.
“He just woke up in his camp and Adam will keep an eye on him.”
“Okay. Do you think he’s a threat?”
“No.” He really didn’t. The only loose end in his mind was if the guy was somehow tracking Esther. “Do you?”
She shook her head. “He’s a smart guy or he wouldn’t have gotten through dental school, but he’s acting pretty dumb right now.”
Garret was smart. That made sense. He probably kept tabs on Esther and had catalogued little details in his head to help him.
They drove through Summit Valley and turned onto a dirt road that led to the trailhead on the northwest side of the valley, west of the ski resort.
“Have other men acted … dumb when you ditched them?” Three dates. What was that about? The only good news about it was it had kept Esther single and given him this opportunity to grow close to her.
She shifted in her seat and looked out the window. “Some of them.”
“What have you done to stay safe?” he asked quietly. He hated the thought of men stalking or bothering her. Since she’d lived in Colorado Springs for years, Reed couldn’t blame himself for not watching over her. There was also the fact that they weren’t a couple. Yet.
She laughed. “I thought you knew more about the Deltas than anybody unrelated to us.”
He wished he could be related. “I only know what Papa shares with me. Not near enough.”
“Well, I’ll share something with you then.”
He liked that.
“I’m a Delta trained fighter and the skills Papa and my dad and uncle taught me were honed by my military training. I could take down any man who bothers me … including you.”
They stopped at the parking lot of the High Creek Falls hike. He put the truck into park and turned to look at her. The confident smirk on her face was so appealing, but he didn’t like the way she’d lumped him into the men who bothered her. “Really?” he asked.
“Really.”