Page 11 of Nothing to Tell

Damon gaped.“You’re Bastian Hunt,” he said as though he couldn’t quite believe it.

“Yes, I am.”Bastian lowered his mouth to her hair.“Where would you like to sit, Sweet?”

“Your choice,” she said, sipping her drink again.

“If I had my choice, we’d be upstairs in bed and you’d be sitting on me.”

FIVE

SHOCK BURST IN her stomach, opening her mouth, dropping the straw from her lips.No man had ever said something so daring.Not about her, and definitely not in company.

And her reaction was new too.Her inner thighs tingled, a rousing heat jolted up through her core.This was good, it was… Who was this guy?

Okay, yes, it was a ruse for Damon’s benefit.Intellectually, she knew that.Uh huh.Yeah.Yet her body squeezed backward, following its instinctive need to get closer.Something primal in her liked Bastian’s direct words and the conjured possibilities.At that point, she was a passenger to her body’s awakening.

A man as charming and attentive as Bastian could never be enamored with her for real.Tonight was simply a chance to dream.She’d take it.

Fizz of desire aside, it was no hardship to see Damon at such a loss either.Ha!Take that!

Damon scoffed.“I can’t believe—”

“I’ve heard a whisper,” Adara sang, appearing behind Damon, beaming at the group.“It’s great to see everyone getting along.”Adara pinched Damon’s cheek much to Damon’s chagrin.Ah, what a cutie-cutiepie.“And it looks like that whisper is true.”

Adara didn’t disguise her open appraisal of Bastian.

“Bastian Hunt,” he said.

Again, he reached around her body to offer a hand.

Though Adara gave it a loose shake, her narrowed eyes weren’t so sure.“Yes, I heard that,” her sister said.“But what are you to our Harper?”

“The whole world,” he proclaimed.With a nudge, she cast a smile in his direction.“No point lying to them, Sweet.”

“Your significance is shrinking by the second,” Harper teased, enjoying the theme of their banter.

“No, it’s not,” he murmured on her scalp, though the others must’ve heard it.

Was that for show or could he sense her bubbling hormones?Please embarrassment, take a vacation.

She laughed and nudged him again, which tightened his embrace just as Carnell came to join them.

“This is Carnell,” Harper said to Bastian who shook the man’s hand.“He’s the hopeless puppy marrying Adara.”

“After you plan the big day,” Adara said to her, cozying into her fiancé.

“I am not a wedding planner,” Harper said.“How many times do I have to tell you that?”

“You organize parties and stuff,” Adara said.“You wouldn’t help out your own sister?”

“I’ll help you as much as a sister can, but not to the detriment of my business.”

Her sister filled in some blanks for the three men.“She’s freaking out about this big launch event thing next month.”

She sighed.“I am not freaking out,” she enunciated every word.

Not that her sister was listening.“She was up at four thirty this morning working.Four thirty!What on earth would possess anyone—”

“It’s always office hours somewhere on the planet,” Bastian said.