35
NINE
In the kitchen, Emmy fought with the coffee machine while Black leaned against the counter, watching her with a vague look of amusement. They were dressed identically now, in boxer shorts and supersized T-shirts. Emmy’s came to her knees while Black’s was a little tight across the chest. Suddenly, I felt self-conscious in my day clothes. Everyone else had gone to bed, and it was evident that Alex and I had stayed up together. Still, it could have been worse—if things had escalated between us, if that heat had kept building, Alex’s shirt would have been missing its buttons in another ten minutes. Would my borrowed sweater have survived? He didn’t strike me as the clothes-shredding type. Oh, he sure knew how to fight—I’d learned that in our training session—but off duty, he was a g
