“Um, no. I’m not a big seafood fan. I just grabbed it thinking you’d prefer something…fancier,” she told him, realizing that there was a little bit of a hidden meaning underneath the statement, if he dared look hard enough. What was a guy like Bellamy doing with a girl like her, anyway? They couldn’t be more opposite.

He tore his insightful gaze from her face and seemed to hide a grin as his eyes dropped to the spread in front of them. As if he’d read her thoughts and agreed with them.

The silence worked away at Rose while they ate—in her case, nibbled. She'd read somewhere that only ten percent of human communication was verbal. The rest was body language and those almost imperceptible signals sent and received by the most primitive parts of the brain. If a picture was worth a thousand words, one of Bellamy's intense gazes was worth the entire Mills & Boon catalog. Strangely, the less he said, the clearer she could read him, the closer she felt to uncovering his secrets.

Yes, those darn secrets.

But Rose realized she did trust him, perhaps she had from the beginning, and it scared her a little. She'd done casual thing before, she'd done inconsequential. Bellamy was neither. This thing they had, whatever it was between them, felt forbidden somehow, not intended. Maybe that was why she wanted it so much, because she wasn't supposed to have it. Wasn't supposed to get involved with a guy so out of tune with the world around them. Indulging in her dark side was something people had always assumed she'd done, but this time they had a point. Bellamy was sweet, but there was also something primal about him. A driving force that didn't yield to gunmen, police, private detectives, or asshole brothers. It was like catnip to Rose. She wanted to see it up close, taste it, feel it inside her. Find that delicate spot where the sweetness became hard and the hardness dissipated to sweet.

She swilled the thought away with a mouthful of Pino Grigio, but the longing persisted. It had a hold of her now. She shrugged her leather jacket off and adjusted her tank top and her bra strap that had become twisted during her near-fall in the boat. Bellamy's gaze explored her shoulders and neck, even dipped into her cleavage. Their eyes met when his lifted from their gaze, and she gave him a devilish glare. B-cups with attitude. Take no prisoners.

The wine went to her head, seeming to cast a misty haze over the intense moment. Rose nearly forgot where she was, but never forgot who she was with. It would take more than Pino to change that. And it was time to quit stalling. Time to make a move. Bellamy’s good intentions and old-school ways weren’t getting them anywhere.