Her eyes searched his. ‘And the piercing? Did you have that done at the same time?’
‘Yeah. The guy in the shop persuaded me it would make me some kind of bad-ass, irresistible to women.’ He laughed harshly. ‘It sounds so immature, so stupid now, but I wanted to prove to Freya that other women wanted me, even if she didn’t. After a while the flirting, the going back with a woman at the end of a shift, it became a way of life.’ He stared into Mia’s eyes, hoping she could see beyond the surface of him. ‘It isn’t who I am, only who I became. And I don’t want to be that person anymore.’ Mia’s expression softened and she did something unexpected. She kissed him. ‘Not complaining, not one little bit, but what was that for? Just, you know, so I can maybe get another one.’
Her eyes smiled back at him. ‘It was for the eighteen-year-old boy who had his heart broken, but still manned up and brought up his child with the woman who turned him down.’
Shit, he could feel the back of his eyes prick. ‘Thank you.’
‘Tell me about that time.’ She turned so she was facing him, and his heart gave a bump of delight when she entwined her legs with his, keeping the body contact. ‘You said you worked in a bar while Freya was at uni, and that Freya lived with her parents. Did you live with yours?’
‘Yeah, that would have been useful, but they chucked me out.’
She stared at him, clearly shocked. ‘Why?’
‘I got a girl pregnant. I was irresponsible.’ He shrugged, trying to ignore the pain that twisted through him whenever he remembered that time. ‘They never approved of me much anyway. Phil was the one who worked hard at school, didn’t get into trouble. I was the one they always thought wouldn’t amount to much, and I proved them right.’
‘Bollocks.’ He couldn’t resist a smile at the disgust in her voice. ‘You own a bar, Luke. You raised a daughter.’
Now wasn’t the time to remind her the bar was slipping out of his hands. ‘Grace is so smart, she practically raised herself.’ He smiled as he remembered back to when she was small. ‘I rented a room in this bloke’s flat, and he was into weights, so that’s how I got into them. I remember I used to strap her in this bouncer chair when she was a baby and she’d watch me, wriggling away like she was trying to copy. As she got bigger I bought her some pretend dumb-bells and she’d do the lifts along with me. God, she was adorable. Still is, though she’s more likely to give me backchat now and tell me I’m being dumb. Back then, she looked at me like I was some sort of hero.’
‘You’re the dad who looked after her. The one who took her to the park, who entertained her, made her laugh, who worked at night to make sure she had whatever she needed.’ Mia smiled into his eyes. ‘You are kind of a hero.’
He wasn’t. He’d done so many things wrong, especially in those early days when he didn’t have a clue how to take care of a kid. Still, in that moment, Mia’s words spinning through his head, he felt better about himself than he could ever remember feeling. ‘So where does this leave us?’ he asked quietly. Then held his breath.
If she wanted to go back to her place, to cool things for a while, he could work with that. If she’d changed her mind and wanted out, though… The loss of Freya had been brutal, but she’d been a teenage sweetheart, his first love. Could he bounce back if he lost Mia? Because he was terrified the guy who’d spent a large part of his adult life going from woman to woman, had finally found one he never wanted to leave.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Mia’s mind was in a whirl. All her life she’d been getting men wrong. It was entirely possible she’d got Luke wrong, too. The tattoo, the piercing, the reason he’d got into doing weights. All things she’d thought were part of his playboy image, actually had deeper meanings. The tattoo to keep his daughter close, the piercing to help his self-esteem, the weights because it had been a way of keeping fit while looking after Grace. The women because he’d been hurting, and that was the way he’d tried to cope.
‘Mia?’
His voice brought her back to his question. So where does this leave us?
The expression on his face – the longing he wasn’t afraid to show her, overlaid with anxiety he was trying to mask – helped make her answer easy.
‘I can’t promise I won’t sometimes worry when I see you chatting to a women at the bar, or when Chloe or another of your exes wraps an arm around you.’
He huffed out a breath. ‘I was never with Chloe.’
‘Would you have been though, if I hadn’t turned up?’
He gave her a mild look. ‘Aside from the fact that I didn’t fancy her, Chloe only ever wanted me as a tool to help her forget her ex. Women go off with the barman at the end of the night because he listens and makes them feel good. Not necessarily because they like him.’
Her heart crumpled. Beneath the cocky smile, the blarney, this gorgeous, strapping hunk of a man really had very little sense of self-worth. ‘I’m here because you listen, even when it’s not what you want to hear. Because you make me feel better than good. You make me feel like I’m attractive, special.’ She reached for his hand and held it in hers. ‘And because I like you. A lot.’
Like a burst of sunshine, a smile shot across his face. ‘A lot, huh?’
‘A lot,’ she confirmed, her heart starting to beat faster now. She was taking a risk, trusting he was the man she thought she was discovering and not the one she’d believed him to be when they first met.
‘Enough to continue where we left off? Not that I’ll mind if we don’t,’ he added hastily, then shook his head. ‘That’s not true, I don’t know why I said that. I desperately want you to stay but I’m trying to be a good guy here, trying not to rush you.’ He laughed softly. ‘And I’m also freaking out right now because this has never meant so much, never felt so important.’
Her heart swelled, feeling too big for her chest. ‘It feels important to me, too.’
He reached to cup her face, eyes glittering. ‘Maybe we could freak out together?’
‘I’m not freaking.’ Feeling oddly powerful now she knew he was nervous, she rested back against the headboard. ‘In fact I’m going to sit here and enjoy watching you strip for me.’ At her words, she started to laugh. ‘Oh God, now I’m remembering what Stan calls you.’
Luke winced as he slid off the bed. ‘Do I want to know?’
‘Probably not.’ But the temptation was too much. ‘Chipmunk.’ His eyes snapped to hers, his expression so horrified it cracked Mia up. ‘It’s a long story, one we’ll save for when I’m not looking forward to seeing you take your clothes off.’
‘Okay.’ He seemed to mentally shake himself before lifting at the hem of his T-shirt. ‘Do you need some moves with this strip show?’
The brief flash of tan skin and rock-hard abs drained the saliva from her mouth. ‘No moves needed. Just…’ She swallowed.
His smile was teasing. ‘Slow?’
She nodded, eyes fixed on him as he removed his shirt again. This time she was able to savour the slide of muscle over muscle, the smooth expanse of golden skin, the dusting of dark hair that trailed from his belly button into the waistband of his jeans.