At Any Turn (Gaming The System) by Brenna Aubrey Page B

frown crossed her face and then vanished.
    “You’re pissed off that I moved out.”
    Well, that was leading. How to answer that without getting my head bitten off? “Does that surprise you?”
    She shook her head. “It’s just that this is so hard for both of us. Things were moving quickly and—I thought this would be a good chance for us to take the pressure off a little.”
    “So I take it you aren’t planning to come back soon.”
    Now she gave me a look indicating that she, too, was afraid to say the wrong thing. “Not for now. The whole living together thing, and then…” She let her voice die out before mentioning the doomed marriage proposal.
    That fear was back again, gripping me at the base of my throat.
    “So where are we?”
    She reached out for my hands and took them in hers, looking down. “I don’t want to lose you.”
    “You haven’t lost me.” Yet .
    And I guessed we were going to let this whole medical school question hang in the air between us like an executioner’s axe because I sure as hell wasn’t going to bring it up now. I wasn’t that stupid.
    I cleared my throat. “I’m going to be honest with you. I want you at the house. I want you to come back. I won’t tolerate this separation over an extended period of time.”
    She squeezed my hands. “It’s not a separation. Adam, let’s take it slow. Please . I’m not expert at this relationship thing, but you aren’t either. We both get to steer.”
    “Okay,” I said in a flat voice.
    She raised her brows at me. “Okay?”
    “I’ll let you handle this. You can steer for now. But I’m not going to hold back on what I want. And what I want is you .” My hands tightened around hers and I pulled her toward me until her body was flush against mine. My arms wrapped around her, tight.
    I turned my head and laid my mouth on hers, coaxed her to open to me. My tongue slid into her mouth, declaring my wishes with my body to echo my words. I could feel the thready beat of her heart on her lips as they moved against mine, fluttering like a butterfly wings. My breath caught.
    Her sweet, soft lips. Her unique taste. I wanted what was best for me. What was best for me was her . And this was a setback, but I wasn’t going to give this up. Not for anything. Emilia was strong-willed and stubborn, but she’d met her match in me. And deep down she knew that damn well.
    I finally let her pull back, relaxing my hold on her and we stared at each other for a long, tense moment. She seemed to be holding her breath.
    “I—um—I still need to wipe the floor with you on Dark Escape.”
    I relaxed, stepped back, shrugged. “Not gonna happen.”
    She raised her brow. “It’s on like Donkey Kong. Come on.” She grabbed my elbow and led me back toward the restaurant entrance. On the way through the arcade toward the machine, she handed me a game card, mentioning that she had recharged with money herself.
    I gave her a sharp look and she shrugged. “Just wanted to make sure you didn’t have any excuses, like you had forgotten your Dale and Boomer’s uber express triple platinum card.”
    We slid into the dim booth that housed the game Dark Escape. Donning 3-D glasses and grasping our mounted rifles, we began our war against the zombies—and each other. After almost forty-five minutes, she finally emerged victorious. Because of the headache and the medicine I’d taken, my accuracy was off. However, another way to get points was to maintain a low heart rate, because the game measured fear. And mine stayed much lower than hers as we wasted zombies left and right. Only when I yanked off my 3-D glasses did I realize that it had been a big mistake for me to play the game. My head was pounding again.
    “You okay?” she asked, tucking her 3-D glasses where they belonged. She sat, pressed closely to me inside the small, dark game booth. I could smell her hair, her skin, and I was reminded of the fact that I hadn’t had her in over a