The Billionaire Gets His Way(41)
Author: Elizabeth Bevarly

“You should still put something on it,” she told him.

“It’s not necessary.”

Feeling responsible for the injury somehow, Violet said, “Look, my place is closer than yours. I have some antiseptic and Band-Aids. At least let me put something on it to be sure infection doesn’t set in.” And then, not quite able to help herself, she grinned. “I don’t want you suing me for being the cause of some heinous wound that will leave you scarred for life. I’ve had enough grief from your legal department to last me a lifetime.”

He made a face at that, but said nothing. Instead, he only touched the tissue to his cheek again, holding it in place this time. Violet took his free hand in hers and tugged him to the curb, then hailed a taxi parked on the opposite side. The cab ride to her place, too, was spent in silence, but neither of them released the other’s hand. Violet couldn’t remember the last time she’d held hands with a man. Maybe she never had. Holding hands was an affectionate gesture, something two people did when they cared about each other in a way that went beyond the sexual. She wasn’t sure she had ever had a relationship like that with any member of the opposite sex. One that included both desire and affection.

She didn’t ask herself why Gavin continued to hold her hand, too. Probably some misplaced leftover chivalry from the club—something about which she was still thinking and remained confused. Nevertheless, they left their fingers entwined even as they climbed the five flights of steps to her apartment. The only reason Violet finally—reluctantly—released him was because she had to retrieve her key.

Inside the apartment, she tossed her purse and coat onto the sofa, then told Gavin to follow her into the bathroom. There was barely enough room for both of them to squeeze inside, but she directed him to sit on the commode lid while she rummaged through the medicine cabinet for a half-empty tube of antibiotic cream and a wilted Band-Aid. Upon opening that last, she realized it was a pink Hello Kitty Band-Aid—well, they’d been on sale the last time she went to the grocery store—and when she held it up to show Gavin, he chuckled once and shook his head.

“That’s okay. The antibiotic cream should be fine by itself,” he said.

“But—”

“No, Violet,” he stated decisively. “No pink Band-Aids.”

She sniffed indignantly. “Fine. If you’d rather risk infection than be man enough to wear a Hello Kitty Band-Aid, it’s no skin off my nose.”

“Violet, no man is man enough to wear a Hello Kitty Band-Aid.”

“I bet Chuck Norris is.”

“I bet not.”

“Fine,” she repeated, a bit more petulantly. “It’s stopped bleeding anyway.”

She wet a clean washcloth and gently wiped away a smudge of dried blood, then dabbed a dot of antibiotic onto her fingertip. Lightly, she wiped the ointment over the wound. As she was dragging her thumb over the ridge of his cheekbone to swipe away the last of the excess, she felt his hands settle lightly on her hips, and she abruptly stilled. Her heart rate tripled at the simple touch, and her breath caught in her throat, and heat flared up from deep in her belly to warm her entire body.

“What…what are you doing?” she asked a little breathlessly.

He didn’t say anything for a moment, then, very quietly, he told her, “I was beginning to get a little light-headed.”

Oh, good. Then it wasn’t only her.

“I just…” he continued, “I need to hold on to something for a minute. Until I get my bearings.”

She dropped a hand to his hair, threading her fingers through his silky tresses. To straighten the mess Mullins had made, she told herself. That was the only reason. But he glanced up at her touch, his blue eyes looking deeper and more troubled than she’d ever seen them.

“I guess that’s understandable after what happened,” she said softly. “Your entire world was turned upside down tonight. That’s bound to make a person feel flummoxed.”

“No, that’s not it,” he told her. “What happened at the club tonight…” He shook his head. “I don’t even want to talk about what happened at the club tonight.”

No, he was probably already looking toward the future, trying to figure out how he was going to rebuild his credibility in his social circle again.

“That isn’t important,” he said.

Waitaminnit. Not important? How could he say that wasn’t important? It had destroyed everything he wanted most desperately to preserve.

“I want to talk about what is important, Violet,” he hurried on. “It’s why I invited you to the club tonight. I want to talk about us.”

“Us?” she echoed, even more confused now. “But, Gavin, there is no us.”

He braved a small grin. “I know. That’s what I want to talk about. Creating an us. I was hoping maybe you’d like to be an us, too. Because I’m tired of being me.” He lifted one shoulder and let it drop, his grin growing broader. “In more ways than one.”

Now Violet smiled. “Well, you were certainly someone else tonight,” she said, dropping her hands to his shoulders.

“But I was still being me.”

“Yes, you were,” she agreed enthusiastically. “And I very much enjoyed meeting you.”

He stood, looping his arms around her waist. “Enough to want to maybe help make me an us instead of a me? I mean, it would mean you’d have to become an us instead of a me, too.”

She moved her hands to his nape and wove her fingers together. “I think we can still be a couple of mes and be an us, too.”

He smiled at that. “As long as we’re a couple of something.”

He dipped his head to hers and kissed her lightly, gently, almost as if he were sealing a pact with her. But then, she was kind of sealing a pact with him, too.

“You really did mess up your social standing tonight, you know,” she said. “You might never be able to come back from a scene like that.”

“Sure, I will,” he told her.

“How? Because you have as much money as them?”

He smiled again. “Sweetheart, I have way more money than them. But that’s not how.”

“Then how?”

“I’ll do it by association.”

She nodded at that, a small thread of disappointment winding through her. She supposed he would never reach a point where he wasn’t convinced that, in order to be respected, he had to move in the right social circles.