Breaking Danger by Lisa Marie Rice Page A

but still wounded and bleeding. She needed to help the way she needed to breathe.
    â€œLet me go, Mac.” She turned and met his dark eyes. “If we all work together, maybe we can ensure there are enough people to start again. I don’t want to think about what the world could become. I don’t want our child to grow up in the Dark Ages.”
    She was still holding his hand and she could feel the emotions in him, strong and pure. He was so easy for her to read. Love. Pride. Fear.
    Love won.
    â€œOkay,” he grated. He stepped away. “Go save the world, Catherine.”
    She smiled sadly at him. “Just our corner of it, my love.”
    She tugged at the front of his shirt and stood on tiptoe to kiss him. When their lips broke apart, she hooked a hand around the back of his neck and put her lips to his ear. “Thank you, darling. You are definitely getting lucky as soon as I can take a breather.”
    San Francisco
    Beach Street
    If they could tune out the sounds of violent mayhem from outside, it could almost have been a . . . a date. A romantic one, at that. Sophie had pulled her curtains and lit candles. No real way of telling if the infected had a tropism toward light, but better safe than sorry.
    And it did create an atmosphere.
    If it weren’t the end of the world, it would be pretty cool. Jon Ryan sitting next to her at her table—he refused to let her set his place across from her. He wanted to sit right by her. As dates went, he was a ten, an impossibly handsome and attractive man. The candlelight just loved him. He was so attractive it was almost overkill. Strong, sharp features limned in the glow of the candles, which picked out the gold highlights in his long hair. Much, much more handsome than Brad Pitt had been, back in the day.
    For all his looks, he didn’t have an actor’s softness. No, this guy was all tough male. Hard muscles that didn’t look like they’d been built in a gym. They looked like they’d been won in battle. Hands not actor-soft but hard and callused and nicked. Hands that were used.
    Hands that knew what they were doing.
    Heat flashed through her body at the memory of him touching her as they made love. Hard and callused, yes, but his hands had also been expert and tender. She’d felt clearly the calluses on his fingertips as they circled her where she had been so slick and tender . . .
    Sophie’s face was probably beet red by now.
    She worked with people who had special psychic gifts. She’d worked with empaths, who could read a person’s emotions with a touch. Thank God Jon didn’t give any signs of being gifted in that way because she would just sink to the floor and die.
    â€œHere.” She gently pushed the platter with her zucchini omelet over to him, afraid that if she held it out, he’d see that her hands were trembling. “Have some more.”
    He’d already eaten half of her eight-egg omelet. His manners were impeccable, but clearly he’d been hungry.
    â€œDon’t have to ask me twice.” He smiled at her and cut himself another wedge.
    Oh God. It was the first real smile she’d seen from him and . . . he had a dimple. It appeared, unexpectedly, in his right cheek. A dimple. Oh, this was too much. She took in a deep breath and slid the wooden cheeseboard over to him as well.
    â€œThese are all great,” he said as he cut himself a slice of goat cheese.
    â€œYes, well, it’s San Francisco,” she said before she could think her words through. “Was San Francisco,” she corrected. Who knew when the Ferry Building Farmer’s Market would open again. If it could ever open again. To open, it would need the rebuilding of a subculture of farmers and cheese makers and vintners. She gave a crooked smile. “Maybe rat brains cooked over a trash fire will figure large in our future.”
    Jon put his hand over hers and squeezed gently. His