“Who hurt you?”
She snorted, and her face contorted into as close as it could get to ugly. Still pretty. “Who hasn’t?”
He reached out his hand to her, waited for her to take it. “I haven’t hurt you, and I promise I won’t.”
“You won’t.” She shrugged, still not reaching for him. “We’re just getting tacos.”
“Shake on it?” He threw in a smile, which softened her up like it had inside the bar.
She grabbed his hand, and he liked how her soft skin felt against his palm.
He didn’t let her go but tucked her hand under his arm and escorted her to the taco truck.
He didn’t laugh out loud when they both ordered the same thing—carnitas. Once they found a seat at a picnic table under a streetlamp, he started on the questions. “So, where’d you grow up, Hannah?” He couldn’t stop saying her name. “Where were people such assholes?”
“Outside of Minneapolis.”
“Aren’t people from Minneapolis supposed to be nice?”
“I was born in LA.”
“Figures.” Hannah narrowed her gaze at him, and God help him. “I just meant—LA face.”
The side of her mouth quirked up. “But I don’t have the Oakland booty to go with it. And that doesn’t save it.” Damn, she wasn’t going to let him get away with anything. “You’re from Chicago?”
“That obvious?”
She smiled again, for real this time, and he savored it as though it was something crazy-precious. And frightening. “The accent gives it away.” She took a deep breath, as though she was thinking hard about whether to continue talking. He couldn’t breathe until she opened her mouth again. “You also walk like you have a big dick. I’ve noticed that a lot of guys in Chicago do that, regardless of what they’re packing.”
So, she was calling him a cocky bastard, and he wouldn’t disabuse her of that. Not if the decent-but-cocky-guy thing would get him laid—not tonight, but eventually.
“I’m not walking like that because I’m putting on airs, Duchess.” He winked at her. She’d opened the door to this conversation when she’d mentioned his cock.
She rolled her eyes again, and it was even more of a turn-on because he didn’t think she wasted the energy to roll her eyes at guys she didn’t like just a little. “I’m not angling to find out.”
She’d demolished her taco in a fashion that was kind of scary but mostly impressive. His instincts told him that she was going to bolt, and he didn’t want that. He wasn’t about to throw her over his shoulder caveman style—that wasn’t him—but he didn’t meet a girl he sparked with like this every day. Or even every six months. Though he wasn’t looking for anything serious, he couldn’t help hoping for more than a taco.
“Can I have your number?”
She shook her head and leveled him with a look that would make a lesser man run in the other direction. When she wiped an errant drop of crema off the side of her wide, lush mouth, he quaked a little in his boots. Instead of showing weakness, he pushed the remains of his food aside so he could lean over the table. To get closer.
“Why would I give you my number?” There was an unmistakable breathy hitch in her voice.
“So I can use it.”
She leaned back, and that’s when he knew he was going to get it. She was just as affected by being close to him as he was by her. “How good’s your memory?”
“Damned good.” Had to be when deadlines were tight and news stories came fast.
She rattled off ten numbers, and he fumbled with his phone to enter them. Just as he got the last one in the phone app, she stood up. “Thanks for the drink. And the food.”
The few seconds of hesitation before she grabbed her phone, something expectant about it, gave him the chance to stand up and get next to her. He glanced at her screen, where it looked like she was booking a car. They were close—close enough to kiss. But he wouldn’t kiss her without permission. So he just waited.
Her breaths were little gasps as she looked up at him. “I told you that I don’t date.”
“Then why’d you give me your number?”
She shrugged, but it was more trying to be cool than actually being cool. “You amuse me.”
“Bullshit.” That made her break eye contact with him. He was losing her, and he had to get her back. Although he’d been benched for a minute, he was still a world-champion suitor. That had to be why watching her leave right now would physically hurt him. “You feel this thing between us too. Just admit it, and I won’t pester you for a date.”
“I just have to admit it?”
He nodded and gave her his most winning grin. Even though she looked as though she wanted to slap him, he could feel something about the invisible ten-foot concrete barrier she had around her crumble a little bit. He wanted to pump his fist in the air. But he was about to have something infinitely better to do with his hands. “Admit you like me. And then you’re off the hook for a date.”
“Okay.” And then she had the audacity to look bored.
Because of the blasé look on her face, he didn’t expect it when she pressed her mouth to his. Everything in him froze with the feel of her mouth against his. The press of her hands against his chest. His hands hovered over her shoulders, as though repelled by the electromagnetic field of holy hell sweet baby Jesus yes surrounding this kiss.
He didn’t react, couldn’t. He was so surprised that it took him a beat to really make the most of this opportunity before she ripped it away. But when he remembered himself, he pulled her close and took her mouth with his.
And she let him get away with it, softened under his kiss. It was perfect. She was perfect. In a split second, he knew he would crave the feeling of this woman dissolving into a puddle under his lips forevermore.
He almost broke away from her then; it was simply more than either of them had bargained for. She’d seemed to freeze up, too. Knowing he’d have to give up on the feeling of her soft mouth under his pained him.
Just as he was about to pull out of the death spiral, she grabbed ahold of him. And the way she wound her arms around his neck and pulled him close told him that—even if kissing had been impulsive—she definitely wanted more. Flames of need worked their way through his whole body, no chance of banking them as she pressed her body close. Her curves molded to every inch of him.
Damn, she might not date or be down for a one-night stand, but she could kiss. His arms around her waist, she let a breathy moan loose into his mouth. When he put his hand on the back of her neck and took the kiss deeper, she bit his bottom lip. It was as though a crack of thunder went off in his body. The way they kissed, he knew that everything with her would be a battle of wills, a fight that made his cock hard. Little whimpers into his mouth sounded like victory. He ran his fingers through her hair and gathered the strands at the back of her neck to pull her closer, to angle her head so that he had all the access to her witchy mouth.