A Defender's Heart by Tara Taylor Quinn

Author:Tara Taylor Quinn
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2018-03-07T19:41:20+00:00

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

HEATHER WASN’T READY to leave. They were at their cars. It was getting late, and she had an early flight in the morning.

Knowing Cedar, he probably had a full day of work booked the next day.

Still, she didn’t want the conversation to end yet. The decision to be friends wasn’t enough. She wanted to talk a little more. Actually become friends.

He might want to get back to whatever he’d been doing. Might need a break from her intensity.

His new way with her appeared to be a matter of letting her call the shots. She didn’t like it.

Having him more aware was one thing; docility...uh-uh.

A few cars lined the parking lot. The beach was open all night now, with patrols and stipulations, but the town was small enough, tourist trade minimal enough, that it was still quiet. Peaceful.

At the other end of the lot, a car had parked, and two couples were milling around the trunk. A girl pulled out a blanket and...

“I have a blanket in the trunk. You want to go back out and sit for a little while?” she asked Cedar. Going to her house, or his, didn’t seem like a good idea. Especially when it was dark, and the late hour could give them the feeling of being in their own little world.

When trust didn’t carry as much weight as getting naked and feeling his skin against hers again. His hands on her body...

“Okay.” There was no inflection in his voice, no indication of whether he wanted to sit with her. She decided not to make an issue of it. He’d said he unequivocally wanted to be her friend. She felt as strongly about it. Establishing a new them was critical.

She got the blanket. Walked with him toward the bonfire. Far enough away that they weren’t impinging on the other group’s privacy, but close enough to see the flames.

It wasn’t a cold night, but California evenings were generally not all that warm. Sixties was plenty cool, in her opinion, for a fire. And yet...she wasn’t freezing without one.

They laid the blanket together. Sat down. There was a coolness to the sand, in spite of the sun’s heat that had been warming it all day.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” she asked after a few minutes of silence. “Be friends, I mean? You aren’t just here because you think I want it?”

His glance, warm and far too familiar, answered her question.

“It’s going to be weird at first, I guess,” she said aloud. Going from lovers to friends...nothing she’d ever given a lot of thought. Perhaps she should’ve given it more thought. “But like any relationship, if we both want it, work at it...”

He nodded, looking out toward the ocean, leaving her with doubts that he believed it could work.

But then, she doubted him, period. Which was why they could only be friends.

Still, something deep inside told her she couldn’t give up on this.

“Tell me what you’re thinking.”

He glanced her way again, as though assessing...her? What

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