She’d been to this park before.
Many times.
Of course she had. It was within walking distance of the karate studio, and there wasn’t a lot of green space in the city, though this neighborhood, with houses that actually had backyards and several other parks dotting the area, perhaps had more green space than many places in San Francisco.
“Yes,” he said, tugging her hand, leading her up the curved incline that led to the top of the hill. “Why can’t we be here?”
She yanked her hand from his, used it to point to the green sign directly behind him. “That!” she snapped. “That says right there why.”
He turned, read aloud the second rule. “No adults unless accompanied by children.” A beat. “Hmm.” Then he shrugged, moved toward the top of the slide that this park was known for. Well, technically it was a pair of steep concrete slides.
“We don’t have kids.”
Another shrug. “But you work with kids,” he said. “That has to count for something.”
“Liam—” She didn’t know what to say to that.
His eyes flicked back to the sign.
“And it’s Tuesday.” He tsked, pointing to the part of the sign she’d missed—the fact that it was only open Wednesday through Sunday from ten in the morning until five at night. “And”—a glance down at his watch—“it’s not even ten o’clock.” Humor filled those gray eyes. “We’re breaking all the rules today.”
“I—” She took a step back. “Liam—” Mia waved a hand at the slide itself, where a metal gate was installed at the top and wouldn’t be opened until ten the next day. “Look, we can’t even do this anyway. Everything is locked up, and we don’t have any cardboard.”
He frowned. “Why would we need cardboard?”
“You slide down on it, and it makes you go faster.”
That earned her a grin. “I like faster.”
“I know,” she said, adding when she read the question in his gaze, “I saw you move on the ice.”
His eyes sparked with humor. “I had figure skating classes when I was young.”
She gasped. “No, you didn’t.” That just did not fit in with her tough, hockey player mental picture.
“I did,” he said, wandering over to the side of the slide and glancing down. “It’s actually not unheard of. Figure skaters tend to be much more graceful than us big brutes.”
“Yeah, I was wondering about that.”
“Wondering about what?” he asked, straightening then moving over to glance behind several pots that were grouped together, the community surrounding the park having come together to grow a small, shared garden.
“Aren’t you a little short for a hockey player?”
“But not for a stormtrooper.” She was frowning, confused at the statement when he bent with an “Ah-ha!” Then stood with several pieces of cardboard in his hand. He turned. “Now, don’t tell me that a woman who can nearly kick the ceiling can’t climb over one teensy gate.”
“That’s not the point.”
He shoved a piece of cardboard in her direction and when she wouldn’t take it, set it at her feet, leaning it against her knee. “What is the point?”
“It’s against the rules.”
“And you don’t break the rules?”
“No.”
“Not ever?”
She shook her head. “No, Liam. The rules are there for a reason.”
He tucked the cardboard under his arm, moved toward the top of the slide. “And if the rules said to throw yourself off a bridge . . .”
Plunking her hands on her hips, Mia snapped, “You’re not seriously comparing the opening hours for a park with an order to do self-harm, are you?”
“And if I was?”
He chuckled at her outraged noise, then climbed over the little gate, put the cardboard down, sat on top of it, and . . . disappeared.
His whoop of pleasure warmed something inside her, and she found herself running forward, leaning over the edge in order to watch him fly down the concrete slide. Moments later, he was at the bottom, gathering up the cardboard and loping back up to her side.
“You know you want to,” he said, hopping up onto the platform and coming toward her. His energy was infectious, making her yearn for . . .
More.
She bit her bottom lip.
He groaned softly.
“What?” she whispered.
“Promise you won’t flip me onto my ass again?”
“I don’t make promises I can’t keep.”
Liam laughed, and the sound of his slightly rasping chuckle, the warmth in his eyes, the way his body bent slightly, coming close enough to hers that she could smell the spicy, masculine scent of him made Mia’s head spin.
“I guess I’ll have to take my chances.” He brushed his knuckles on the outside of her arm. “When you bite your lip like that, I want it to be my teeth doing the biting.”
Her breath shuddered out. “Why?”
His thumb traced lightly over the corner of her mouth. “I think you already know the answer to that question.” Hot breath coated her lips when he shifted closer. “You have the most kissable mouth I’ve ever seen, did you know that?”
Pulse pounding, she managed to say, “How could I possibly know that?”
He smiled at the tart rejoinder. “Come on and break the rules with me,” he said, stepping back and holding out his hand. “Just this once.”
Mia hesitated, studying the face of this man who’d wreaked so much havoc in so little time. “Once,” she said and returned to where she’d knocked the piece of cardboard he’d given her to the concrete, bent to snag it. His smile widened, and again it hit her in the solar plexus with all the force of a punch. “Th-that’s it,” she added, straightening her spine and breathing through the impact. “Just one time.”
She’d only ever used the technique in sparring—the breathing through impact, pushing air through her lungs.
But . . . she supposed this was a type of sparring as well.
Which probably shouldn’t have made her feel better, even though it did anyway. Grinning, she tucked the cardboard under her arm, bypassed Liam’s hand, and slithered her way between the metal horseshoe that topped the slides and the gate that was in place because the park was technically closed.
“Like the way you move, J.B.,” came the husky male voice.
“You going to talk?” she asked, even though the compliment secretly pleased her. “Or are you going to actually come over here and slide?”
“Big words for a woman who wasn’t going to break the rules a minute ago,” he teased.
“Less talk and more action from the man who’s apparently ready to break all of them,” she countered, and got a flash of his sexy grin again . . . then a nice ass—ha—view of a very nice ass. Which made her remember something she’d overhead Brayden’s stepmom, Angie, say. Unfortunately for Mia, she also murmured those remembered words out loud, “Hockey players have the best asses.”
“What was that?” Liam was halfway through the horseshoe and gate, and her words made him tilt forward dangerously, almost lose his grip.