Equity (Balance Sheet #3) (12 page)

Dublin was an amazing city. It was full of life and full of people who loved life. The pubs were the place to be and the places I avoided. Last thing I needed was to drink my sorrows. Turner hadn’t contacted Lizzy. Kalen hadn’t come looking for me. A couple of times, while sightseeing during my free time, I thought someone was following me. But I saw neither man I loved watching me from the shadows.

“Hey,” a pleasant male voice said from behind me.

I turned from the espresso machine to the deep blue eyes of one of the café’s regulars. “What will it be today?” I asked while handing the espresso to the woman off to the side waiting. She smiled and gave me a nod before walking away.

With the cash register a buffer between us, I tried to avoid his penetrating gaze. At the moment, he was the only patron at the counter as the morning rush had just breezed through. The guy was everything I didn’t need at the moment. First of all, he was a man. Plus, he was intelligent and quite handsome with a short crop of dark blonde hair and chiseled features.

When he didn’t order, I finally met his eyes. They were on me like glue. I knew what was coming next. He’d asked me out regularly since I’d started helping out here.

“I know this is a fool’s game, but I have to ask...”

Here it comes, I thought.

“I’m headed back state side tomorrow. I thought maybe you would join me for dinner for my last night in town.”

He held up his hand, stopping me from giving my usual refusal. “Don’t look at it as a date. Just two people needing a meal. I promise, I’ll keep my hands to myself and act like a gentleman the entire time.”

I smiled. It was hard not to.

 “And just in case you forgot, I’m Brian.”

I laughed. It was a rolling joke between us. He’d introduce himself each time he tried to ask me out. And every time after, I’d refused to call him by his name. I didn’t want to encourage him. Apparently, doing so had the opposite effect.

“I know your name,” I said with a slight laugh.

 “Well then, don’t make me beg.” My brow rose, and in acknowledgement he threw in a “Please.”

It had been a while since I enjoyed anyone’s company. Occasionally, I had a conversation with Ruth, the owner of the café and my benefactor. And I Skyped with Lizzy and Violet regularly. None of it was the same. I missed causal conversation, especially the kind between a man and a woman. Kalen had made me hunger for it. Turner had spoiled me with it.

Dangerously, I answered, “Sure.”

He let out a deep sigh as if the world had left his shoulders. “Where can I pick you up?”

“In front of here would be fine.”

He gave me a smile again. “Great, I’ll see you at around eight.”

I nodded. He spun on his heels and left without placing an order. I half giggled. Ruth came around the corner. “It’s about time you let that young man have a go.” Her grin was wicked. She totally approved of him and had sung his praises.

“I guess so,” I said.

~~~

My wardrobe was limited. I still only had the one bag. I hadn’t bought much. Unable to use my cards, I only had the little cash that Lizzy insisted on Western Unioning me the first week I was here. I’d made it stretch. I didn’t want to ask for more even though I was more than able to pay her back. It just felt wrong. She was already doing so much by taking my sister in.

The pencil skirt and silk top were finds from Macy’s back in Virginia that I’d bought just in case I had to go to a meeting with a lawyer or someone else more important. It wasn’t quite a date outfit, but it would do.

There was a weariness in my eyes. I considered cancelling, but I didn’t have Brian’s phone number. I still hadn’t been sleeping well as the nightmare of my ordeal plagued me on a regular basis. I knew if this continued, I would need to see somebody because I couldn’t imagine living like that the rest of my life.

In the mirror, my black hair did nothing for the light blue top and navy bottom. That gave me another reason to cancel this date. The ordinary color of my hair when I tried it on had given the outfit something extra the unnatural black did not.

“Stop it, Bailey,” I muttered to myself as I continued playing with my hair up or down. “This isn’t a date. And he’s leaving. The last thing you need is another relationship.”

Fine, I thought. I pulled my hair back in a ponytail. Without glasses, I hoped the effect of sexy accountant didn’t come across. That was the last thing I was hoping for.

At eight o’clock, I left my room. I headed down the stairs knowing it would only take me a couple of minutes to make it to the front. I didn’t walk through the café. There was another door that led directly to the street. I hoped Brian would be waiting on me. I didn’t want to appear anxious. I would have waited five more minutes and been fashionably late, however I didn’t really want to play too many games. This was a friend hang out. Well, we weren’t friends, but that was the closest analogy I could give and what I’d told Lizzy earlier.

When I stepped out, his back was to me. His focus was on a pub across the street that had a large TV screen that could be seen through the front window. A football game was on. Or rather what we Americans called soccer. I couldn’t keep up. It was a popular debate some of the regulars liked to have when making conversation with me. I could have cared less what they called it.

“Hi,” I said tentatively. I had enjoyed the view of his tall slender frame a bit too much. He wore dark slacks and a shirt with sleeves rolled up. His jacket was slung over his shoulder. The air was unusually warm. It was a nice night all in all.

It was like slow motion when his body turned to face mine. His eyes lit up like diamonds when he stared at me. I couldn’t deny how nice it felt to be appreciated.

“You look beautiful.”

There were a few times when I’d felt beautiful. This wasn’t one of those days. But his appraisal of my form made me feel it nevertheless.

“Thanks.”

“I thought we’d eat at my favorite little Italian restaurant a few blocks from here. You don’t mind if we walk?”

“No, it’s… sounds great.”

I wasn’t sure what to do. I didn’t know him well enough to hold hands. So I gripped my purse and put one foot in front of the other, hoping it wouldn’t feel as uncomfortable to him as it did to me.

Breaking the silence, I said, “It’s probably weird of me, but it feels a bit odd to be eating Italian in Ireland.”

He laughed. “No, I felt the same way my first time out of the states and on the streets of Dublin when a colleague took me for Chinese food.”

We laughed and he talked more about his first experiences outside of America. When we arrived at our destination, the place turned out to be quite cozy like most of the places I’d been to thus far. I liked it. The lighting was soft but not so much that you needed a flashlight to find your seat. We sat at a corner table in wooden chairs across from each other near the window.

“So tell me about yourself,” he asked.

“Not much to tell,” I answered, quickly giving him a smirk. It was easy to flirt with him like you would do a friend. I hadn’t yet felt sparks, but certainly I wasn’t repulsed by him either.

“How about where you are from?”

Thus far, I hadn’t been recognized. The headlines that hit the U.S. weren’t big enough to make international news and I’d been pleased by that. I’d been watching the news via the Internet. Although I’d been named, they hadn’t yet done an exposé on my community. Part of that had been the ice storm that plagued the east coast and an earthquake that wasn’t quite a destructive one on the west coast. I hated to be thankful of natural disasters, but I was glad the focus wasn’t on me.

I decided on the truth. “Pennsylvania,” I finally answered. “How about you?” I quickly diverted the question so that he wouldn’t ask a follow-up.

“San Francisco,” he replied.

My eyes lit up. On the inside I’d cringed before he answered, thinking if he was involved in big business, he would most likely say New York. I’d hoped he’d say the next obvious answer, Chicago, which would have been fine and far enough away from me that I’d most likely not cross his path in the future. However, I hadn’t at all guessed San Francisco.

“I’ve always wanted to go there.” The winding streets, hills and trolley cars were all intriguing to me.

“You’ll have to look me up whenever you decide to visit.”

I nodded and was grateful when the waiter came to take our order. Brian helped my indecision. I selected something I’d never tried before, at least at any American Italian restaurant, but one I thought I would enjoy.

Once the waiter was gone, I quickly asked him a question before he could ask me. “So what do you do that brings you all the way to Ireland?”

“My family owns a bunch of businesses. One of them produces ale.”

My eyes widened. He kept surprising me. “Any that I may be familiar with?”

“Possibly,” he said cryptically. Part of me wanted to press on. Yet, I didn’t want him prying into my life either.

“What about you? Something tells me that you aren’t just a barista.”

“No, this is kind of like a mini vacation. I’m actually an accountant.” Why had I gone and told him that? It was the way he disarmed me with just a smile, I concluded.

It was his turn to be surprised. His eyebrows arched perfectly. “An accountant.”

I shrugged. “I love numbers.”

“Are you on vacation from work?”

This is where things got complicated with my answers. Still I found myself saying, “Actually, once I go back, I’ll be in search of a new job.”

“See there is a reason why you said yes to my offer of dinner tonight.” He waved off my speculative gaze. “I have a friend I went to college with who majored in accounting. He owns a small boutique accounting firm. I don’t know if he’s hiring, but he may know of someone who is. His firm is based out of DC, which isn’t far from Pennsylvania.”

It was far from New York and that might be a good thing. He reached in his pocket for something. The next thing I knew, he pulled out a business card. He wrote something on the back after consulting his cell.

“This is my card. My friend’s name and contact information is on the back. Be sure to tell him I passed his information on to you.”

“Thanks, I think,” I said.

“Don’t worry. I won’t stalk you. As much as I’ve been begging you to go out with me, it usually doesn’t take that much effort for me to get a date.”

“Vain much?”

He laughed and shook his head. “Sorry, that came out all wrong. I just didn’t want you to think I would be harassing you. You are a beautiful woman, but there are other beautiful women in the world.” Something must have showed in my face and he blushed, actually turning red. “I’m a bumbling idiot. I can’t seem to think straight when I’m around you.”

It was kind of cute and I caught myself looking at his mouth and wondering what it would be like to kiss him.

“It’s okay. I think I understood what you were trying to say.”

We laughed and just like that things were back to easy. Our conversation changed and he talked about what it was like to grow up in San Francisco. I glossed over my life in Pennsylvania, using words like
simple
and
easy
, and saying that my parents liked to grow their own food, but leaving out that we had an actual farm.

By the time we made it back, the café was closed. Somehow, Brian ended up walking me all the way to my door. All three doors on each floor inside this section of the building were locked by deadbolt. Furthermore, I trusted Brian. I just didn’t peg him as a killer.

“Thanks for the nice evening,” I said, facing him with my back to the door.

“Yeah, I’m sorry it took so long for us to do this. It’s kind of nice to hang out with a fellow American.”

I liked that he didn’t say something cheesy and compliment me in some way. A tension grew. It wasn’t the kind that made me want to say goodnight. The way his look darkened, like he wanted to devour me, had my insides tighten.

Okay, so it had been almost a month since I’d been kissed or touched by a man. Was I that much of a slut that I was ready to give it up to a complete stranger? That thought made me think of Kalen, and I quickly pushed him back to the recess of my mind. Clearly my sexual choices had caused all my problems of late. Hadn’t I learned my lesson?

Still, when his head bent down and his eyes questioned me, I leaned up to meet his lips. They were warm and softly probed mine. It wasn’t all bad. In fact, it was really nice. When I closed my eyes and gave him entrance, I felt his arms snake around my waist. I reached up as he deepened our kiss and cupped the back of his neck, needing some kind of control.

His hand slightly lowered on my waist and I lifted on my tiptoes. It must have been some sort of approval. Next thing I knew, I was pushed back into the door. One of his hands slid over my hip and down to the hem of my skirt. The air began to touch higher and higher on my thigh. Things were moving at light speed.

When I started analyzing what he was doing and not enjoying the moment, I knew I wasn’t ready. I let my feet fall back and let my hands fall to my sides. He quickly stepped back.