Twice as Hot (Tales of an Extraordinary Girl #2)(23)
Author: Gena Showalter

Rome’s gaze was in the process of raking over me, heating from cold ocean to azure fire. He lingered on my calves, where the chocolate ribbons x-ed a path to my knees, and ran his tongue over the seam of his lips. "What are you wearing?"

It was a question laced with some sort of husky promise. I gulped again, this time for an entirely different reason. Maybe the dress hadn’t been such a bad idea, after all. Maybe Rome liked me no matter what I wore.

"This old thing? Oh, it’s just something I threw on."

Tanner snorted. Thankfully, he kept his mouth shut.

"You look very…pretty." Rome’s voice was low, raspy now.

Clearly, his first choice had not been "pretty." Maybe I’m an idiot. "Thank you," I said, raising my chin.

Whether he’d meant to say "amazing" or "wretched" I didn’t care. Really. He’d either like me or he wouldn’t, and there was nothing I could do about it.

Now, that is. There was nothing I could do now. When his memories returned – and they would, I refused to believe otherwise – he would pay for all of this and assuage my stinging pride.

I stretched my arm around him, careful not to touch him, and closed the door. "How did you see us through the glass?" I asked. I had to keep the conversation rolling or I’d find myself sidling up to Rome and resting my head on his shoulder out of habit. No telling how he’d react.

"I told you. Eye enhancements. Two-ways are not a problem for me."

"You never told me – " Wait. Yes. Yes, he had. I gasped as the implications hit me, hope infusing my every cell. While we were "dating," a.k.a. while he chased me so that PSI could neutralize me, he’d told me all about the voluntary procedures he’d undergone to increase his physical strength and scrim-hunting skills. "You remember telling me about the procedure?"

Confusion settled over his gorgeous features. "I – I – "

Right on cue – because she’d known how close we were to a breakthrough, the bitch – Lexis opened the door and stepped into the hall.

"What’s going on?" she asked in a snotty tone far worse than her usual smugness.

Beside me, Tanner went rigid.

"Do you remember?" I insisted, keeping my attention centered on Rome. "We were in a car, being chased by Pretty Boy. I was snuggled into your side and you were trying to distract me from my fears so I wouldn’t ice the car. My head was resting on your shoulder, my hand on your chest, so I could feel your heart drumming and – "

"Great story." Lexis ran her palm up and down Rome’s arm, petting him. "But it isn’t as though it can possibly be verified."

"I can verify it," Tanner told her, the words more a growl than anything. "I was in the backseat listening." Damn, I loved him. "Rome," I said. "Do. You. Remember?"

The confusion faded from his face and anger returned. He shook his head. "No. I don’t. I don’t know why I said what I did."

Still, my hope remained. My fiance was in that head somewhere. Whether his memories had been erased or borrowed didn’t matter. Somehow, a part of him did remember me.

He placed an arm around Lexis’s waist – my hope blended with a fiery prong of rage – and tugged her closer to him. For comfort? My hands burned. Then he released her to close the door behind her. He’d only meant to move her out of the way. The burning subsided.

"What’s going on?" Miss Know-It-All repeated. She focused on me, blinked when she spotted my outfit, then smirked. She ran a fingertip along the buttons of her shirt. "Nice dress, Belle." My cheeks heated with embarrassment. "I’d tell you those jeans look nice on you, but they make your ass look fat."

"Truth," Tanner said with a grin.

Lexis paled but didn’t offer a retort.

Tanner reached for me and squeezed my hand in comfort, and I noticed he was trembling. Not by word or deed did he betray it, though. With his neutral expression, he appeared every bit the confident man.

I’d never been prouder of him.

Suddenly Rome’s lips pulled back from his teeth in a show of aggression.

"Sweetheart?" Lexis said.

His gaze never left me.

"What?" I demanded.

"Nothing," he snapped, though his eyes were glued to Tanner’s and my joined hands.

Wait. Was he jealous, as he’d been with Cody? Or did his anger stem from the insult I’d dealt his precious Lexis? I opened my mouth to say something – what, I might never know – when Rome’s voice lashed out.

"Where’s Cody?"

"I sent him out on assignment." He’d sent himself, but whatever. "So what’d you guys learn from Tobin?"

Lexis rested her head on Rome’s shoulder, as I’d wanted to do earlier and as I’d just told him I’d once done in his car, and patted his chest. To his credit, he shifted uncomfortably. Even disengaged from her to peer inside the interrogation room at Tobin, who had not moved from his chair.

Lexis couldn’t mask the hitch of her breath.

I suddenly couldn’t stop smiling.

Her eyes homed in on my smile like a missile just before impact. "He stayed at my house last night."

"We slept in separate rooms," Rome said before I could react. He turned back to her, frowning. Upset by what she’d insinuated? "I asked you to stop that."

Stop trying to distress me? And they’d stayed in separate rooms? Thank God! I’d tried not to worry about it, had managed to suppress any mental images of the two of them together, naked, but the worry had been there, deep in my heart.

"You did?" I asked, then cursed myself for how needy I’d come across.

"We’re working on the emotional aspects of our marriage before we get physical," Lexis retorted, defensive.

"You’re working on your marriage?" I’d known that. He’d implied it before, but still. Knife…twisting…

Rome shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other and tangled his fingers through his hair. "Yes.

No. I don’t know. I told you I was going to remarry her." This time, at least, he didn’t sound so sure.

"God, I can’t believe I ever dated you." Tanner, too, tangled a hand through his hair, dislodging the blue locks and causing them to stand on end as he scowled at Lexis. "Every day, hell, every hour, I get over you a little more. Were you always this manipulative and nasty? And how the hell did I miss it?" As he spoke, I studied Rome’s face, watching for any sign of acceptance, any sign that he realized the truth of Tanner’s claim, that he was being manipulated in the worst possible way. But while he appeared hard and uncompromising, he did not appear enlightened.

"Watch how you talk to her," he said.