“Want to stay for a drink while I clean up?”
She should obviously say no, but how could she turn him down?
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
SASHA DIDN’T SAY NO, and part of her wanted to celebrate her good luck at Patrick playing into her fantasy. “Sure. I’d love to keep you company.”
Patrick started turning over chairs and putting them on top of the empty tables. Without words, Sasha joined him. They worked in silence until they were done, and Patrick returned behind the bar and started making her a whiskey sour.
Burning, sweet, and tart. Just like she felt around Patrick Dooley.
“Your family is a trip.”
Sasha didn’t stifle her laugh. It was a relief to not suppress her emotions after spending hours with her mother. It was so automatic that she didn’t even realize she was doing it half the time. “That’s an understatement.”
“How’d you—”
“Not end up being a total bitch?”
“That’s not what I was going to say.”
“But that’s what you meant.” She leaned toward him and the danger of being too close to him.
Patrick shrugged, respectful enough not to deny it.
“I guess it’s because I try to do the right thing even though I want to do the wrong thing. I pretend to be the good girl they want me to be.” He put down her drink in front of her and she took a sip, meeting his gaze. “Even though I want to be my own person and live by my own rules.”
“Is that what this . . .” he said, motioning between them, “. . . is?”
The fact that he’d noticed there was something between them was a cataclysm. His words made her want to throw everything she’d just said to the wayside and jump over the bar to kiss him. She wanted to forget all about trying to be good and just allow herself to be fully bad.
But she stopped herself. If only to dig in to what he’d said before humiliating herself. “What do you mean?”
Patrick rolled his eyes, and she got a picture of what he must have been like as a wayward adolescent. It was another un-priestlike thing that she needed to file away for when they both came to their senses. They would both come to their senses, right?
“I might be a priest, but I haven’t forgotten what this is like.” He made the same motion.
Still, Sasha shook her head. “You’re going to have to elucidate. I’m still not clear.”
“Chemistry. Heat. The whole thing.”
Each word hit her right in the abdomen, turning it liquid and hot. “Are you trying to seduce me?”
“No.” The word was like a bucket of cold water, leaving her whole system confused. “I can’t seduce you.”
“If you could?”
Patrick raised his brow and poured himself two fingers of scotch. He leaned down against the bar so that his right forearm was close to her left forearm. “If I could, I would have ages ago.”
It was as though the bucket of cold water had never happened. “How?”
He canted his head toward her and said, “I don’t think it would be all that difficult.”
“So you think I’m easy?” God, she loved teasing him. When had she ever had this much fun around a man? Definitely not with Nathan. Maybe not since college, when the stakes were a monthlong fling rather than a lifelong commitment.
“No, I don’t think you’re easy. I think this would be easy.”
This. She loved how he said it and wanted him to lay out what this was.
“How are things going with Chet?”
Sasha was confused for a moment, and then she realized that he meant Nathan. “Nathan and I have seen each other a few more times. I like him,” she said, more to convince herself than Patrick. “He’s a good guy.”
“You talk about him like he’s a long stint downstate,” Patrick scoffed. “Or lima beans.”
That made Sasha’s spine stiffen. He didn’t have the right to flirt with her. They couldn’t touch. They could certainly never kiss or fuck or make babies. Why did he think he could judge her trying to ease herself into a lovely relationship with someone who could give her all of those things?
She leaned her head so that she met his gaze. So close that he could kiss her with the most minor tilt of his head. “What’s it to you?”
“I hate it that you don’t have this,” was all he said before he kissed her cheek. It was the most intense kiss she’d ever had, and it wasn’t even on her mouth. The feel of his soft lips against her skin was incredibly sensual. She was already warm all over from being near him, but this was far too much.
And when it was over, in what could have been a month or a minute, she turned her head so that she could meet his gaze. It was molten and intense. She was drawn to it like a flame.
“What was that?”
“I’m sorry.” He might be, but she wasn’t. “I didn’t mean—I couldn’t help—”
“I couldn’t help it either.”
“So you and that other guy don’t have this.”
Sasha shook her head and Patrick closed his eyes as though the disturbance in the airflow caused by her movements was a caress. “No.”
“What do you want from me, Sasha?”
How could she answer that when the answer was absolutely everything? She wanted him to lay her out on top of the bar and strip off all of her clothes. She wanted him to lick and suck and bite at her skin until it was bruised and aching for any other reason than needing him to touch her. She wanted him to completely lose control and empty himself inside her body.
But she couldn’t have those things because there was guilt marring his perfect features from just a kiss on the cheek. It seemed that he didn’t expect her to give him an answer either because he said, “I thought about you the other night in the shower.”
“Did you touch yourself?” She might not be able to tell him all of her thoughts on what they should do with this, but that certainly wasn’t going to stop her from a follow-up now.
He nodded. “I hadn’t done that in—a long time.”
That admission filled her with a level of pleasure she hadn’t previously known. It filled her with electricity and sensual power, and she wanted more of it. “How did it feel?”
“Amazing.” More sparks across her skin. “And terrible.” Even more.
“I haven’t let myself do the same.” She didn’t know why she admitted that. It had the potential to give him the wrong idea—that she didn’t want him at least three times as much as he wanted her. “I don’t think I could stop.”