All around them, people screamed and cheered, blowing noisemakers and throwing confetti, and for a split second her addled brain thought it was for them. It felt like they deserved a celebration.
They stood back and breathed hard and stared at each other, which in some ways was hotter than kissing, because he wouldn’t break eye contact with her, even though he’d have a perfect right to refuse to look at her after the way she’d grabbed and licked and bitten and—
“Wow,” he said. “Um, more?” He plucked confetti from her hair.
She laughed. “We jumped the gun.”
“Hell, yeah. That was …” He seemed genuinely at a loss for words.
“Better than the average midnight kiss with a stranger?”
“I was going to say something more like, ‘really hot.’ ”
“That works.”
“Hey,” said a voice behind Nora, and when she turned, a big guy with a beer gut was right up in her personal space, so close she couldn’t back away quickly enough to avoid—
Eeuww. Beer breath and poky tongue.
“Leave her alone, asshole.”
Oh, shit.
The two men were squared off, Beer-Gut Guy and Sad-Eyed Guy, and—oh, crap. She’d never asked his name.
“It’s New Year’s Eve, dude, lighten up.”
She took a step back, but not fast enough to avoid Beer Gut’s vengeful lunge at her for a second smelly, damp kiss. And then Sad-Eyed Guy was hauling Beer Gut off her by the back of his shirt and shoving him, hard, away from her.
The crowd was close, and the shove bowled over several bystanders. Suddenly the room was dead still and dead quiet, all the celebration brought to an abrupt halt. All eyes were on the man who’d kissed her so spectacularly less than two minutes earlier. His scruffy blond friend—he’d told her his name was Owen—scrambled to his side. Several huge friends hauled Beer Gut up, asking after his health and well-being, a rising mutter of deep discontent coming from their ranks. Nora’s heart beat in a different way. Fear.
“Hey, man, we’d better get out of here,” Owen said. “He’s got friends. Lots of very big, very drunk friends. Boston College football. You can choose ’em.”
“But I need to—”
Beer Gut attained standing, and his crew advanced as Owen and Sad-Eyed Guy backed away.
“No, man, we’re outta here.” Owen tugged his friend’s arm.
“I—”
“Don’t be an idiot, dude. They’re going to kick our asses.” Owen yanked him, hard, and the two of them turned and ran.
“Wait!” Nora called. “Wait, I don’t know your—”
They were not waiting. They were running, pushing through the crowd, heading for the door as fast as they could go, and by the time her legs started to work, they’d already disappeared from her sight.
Chapter 3
“What the hell happened back there?”
Miles and Owen had taken the elevator down twenty-two floors and run full tilt toward the Kendall Square stop for several blocks, ducking through parking garages and hotel lobbies to stay off the street, before they were able to convince themselves they weren’t being pursued.
“That asshole kissed her. Twice.”
Owen regarded him levelly. “It is New Year’s Eve.”
“She was with me.”
As he said it, Miles recognized the total absurdity of it. But she had felt like she was with him. She had been hot and vibrant and his while he kissed her, and funny and adorable when he’d let her go, and he’d been two seconds from asking her to leave the party with him and become more his. All his.
Probably it was a good thing fate had intervened in the way it had. Fifteen minutes and he had gone Neanderthal-possessive. The events of the last month had apparently unhinged him.
“You work fast, man,” Owen said mildly. “Also, you’ve got confetti in your hair.”
Miles shook it out, a slight rain of silver, and ran his hands through his hair to get the rest.
The train car they were riding in had been packed to the gills when they boarded it. An earthy scent blend of beer and hard alcohol and vomit and sweat permeated the air but was starting to fade as the car emptied out. They’d managed to snare two seats side by side. There were still people in the aisles, though, loud and jovial, as the car made its lurching way over the tracks, screeching and squealing as it cornered.
“Are you going to see her again?” Owen asked.
“I don’t know her name,” Miles confessed. All he knew was the precise way her smile bloomed, starting with the lift of her upper lip, finding her eyes last. He knew the shape of her fingers on another woman’s arm, telling her it was okay, she belonged. And he knew the thoroughness with which she inhabited a room.