WITHOUT WORDS
Sometimes love speaks for itself…
After an accident in the line of duty, firefighter Roberto DeRosa’s life is turned upside down. His career fighting fires is over, and he’s left with an uncertain future and an injury that makes communicating difficult for him. The only time words flow easily is when they’re lyrics and he has a guitar in his hands. Talking to women is definitely out, especially if they have bright blue eyes that seem to see right into his soul.
Dani Hodge is on the brink of realizing her dream of opening a small combination wine and book store in San Diego’s funky Ocean Beach neighborhood. But before she can open the doors, there’s work to be done, more work than she can do herself.
When the tattooed guy who completely ignored her at a bar walks by and offers her a hand wrangling a tile saw, Dani can’t afford to say no—and why would she say no to Mr. Strong and Silent when his stare conveys more than words could?
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Excerpt
I
caught Trent’s attention at the bar, putting my back to the girl and focusing
on getting my heart to slow down, letting my blood cool.
And
just when I’d gotten control of myself again, she was right fucking next to me,
and my mind went blank.
Or
most parts of my mind, at least. The parts in charge of caveman stuff—the parts
that screamed at me to pick her up, throw her over my shoulder, and find a wall
to fuck her against—those parts were working fine. Unfortunately.
“Hi,”
she said.
Shit.
Shit, shit, shit.
I
stared at her. I was blank. I reached for a word to give her and my mind was
empty. Even the one word she’d said would have been fine. I could have parroted
it back to her. But it had fluttered up into the noise and light inside the bar
and evaporated. Even that one simple word was out of my reach.
I
watched her expression change. She’d said “hi” like she was extending a bridge,
a thin filament I might just be able to risk stepping onto. But as she waited
for me to return her greeting, to say fucking anything at all, the bridge
dissolved.
And
her face closed up. The sparkle in her bright eyes faded, and her energy pulled
back inside her, leaving me cold again. A mixture of fear and surprise replaced
the glow on her face, and I felt both guilty and monstrous as I watched what it
did to her. She let other words fall between us. Nonsense, really. I’d made her
uncomfortable, unhappy. And I already knew she was a girl I never wanted to see
unhappy.
Finally,
she turned around and went back to her table, pulled the other girl toward the
door, and disappeared into the night beyond. And the strange light that had
filled the club was extinguished.
About Delancey Stewart
Delancey Stewart has lived on both coasts, in big cities and small towns. She's been a pharmaceutical rep, a personal trainer and a wine seller. Despite lots of other interests, she has always been a writer.
A military spouse and the mother of two small boys, her current job titles include pirate captain, monster hunter, Lego assembler, story reader, and tech writer. She tackles all these efforts from her current home outside Washington DC.
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