Her eyes popped open. “You’re fucking with me, right?”
Cole shook his head. No, no yet. Hopefully soon, though.
She wanted sex and no involvement whatsoever beyond the physical, and she was ready to hire an escort for that. That was fine by him. Hell, more than fine. That was exactly up his alley. And as long as he was the one being hired for the job, he was all for it.
He pressed on. “So tell me why I don’t qualify. I don’t have any right now—I honestly never thought I’d need them—but I can provide references if you insist.”
Christy laughed, or choked, he wasn’t sure. “No thanks, no need, I’d take your word for it.”
“So, do I make the cut?”
She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She looked…flabbergasted. And she was getting nervous. He could tell by the way she nibbled at her lower lip and how she tried repeatedly to tuck her just-too-short bangs behind her ears.
She shook her head.
“Why not?” he inquired.
“Because,” she replied mutinously and lifted those big eyes to his.
“What do you mean ‘because’? You should be an equal opportunity employer. Disqualifying me without reasons is unfair.”
She blushed and several times opened her mouth as if to say something else, but closed it again.
“I don’t believe I’m discussing this with you. This is too surreal,” she finally said.
Tell me about it, Cole thought. He was in a poorly lit basement in the middle of the night, surrounded by crates and dust, trying to convince a very reluctant woman into hiring him as a gigolo. And apparently failing. He wasn’t sure which one of those realities was more disturbing. He should really get his head examined because, even though at some basic level he resented the situation, this uncontrollable desire burning in his gut wouldn’t let him leave without securing some kind of bargain with her. Hell if he knew why.
She cleared her throat. “Assuming I believe you aren’t jerking me around, and that’s a big if, and assuming I’d go ahead with the gigolo idea, which is, by the way, none of your business, why would you even want to qualify? What do you get out of it?”
He gave her a sideways look. Was she for real?
Her face caught on fire. So pretty. “Besides
that
.” Then she narrowed her eyes at him. “Are you hurting for money?”
He laughed. “Nope. No money in exchange for my…man-whore services.”
“So how do you intend to get paid? Or is this a pro bono case? Because, frankly, that’d be a bit insulting.”
Was she kidding? “I get to fuck you. From where I’m standing, that’s reward enough.”
Her expression was full of suspicion. She didn’t believe him. “What’s the catch?”
She seemed so hung up on the whole quid pro quo thing. Fine, he could work with that too. As they said, “Once a soldier, always a soldier.” The whole “we adapt, we overcome, and we find the advantage in every situation” was ingrained in him, even when it was his cock leading the show.
“I’ll get you properly laid, and in exchange you’ll pretend to be going out with me.”
“What?” Again she had that stupefied look on her face.
“Sex for fake dates.”
She stared at him, then at her soda can. “Did you tamper with this? Because I’m having auditory hallucinations. I heard you say ‘sex for fake dates.’”
He chuckled. “You opened the can yourself, remember?”
She conceded and then pointed at his can. “Then you’ve been tampering with yours, because you’re talking nonsense.”
No, he wasn’t.
He’d systematically avoided thinking about Alden’s 200th anniversary, but whether he was ready to face it or not, he had a month full of celebrations ahead. Potlucks, picnics, dances, auctions, festivals, fund-raising dinners. You name it, it was happening in town, and in one way or another, his company was involved in it. Having a steady date would help him survive all those events without going insane.
“Since my brother James got engaged, women in this town have begun aggressively pursuing me and my younger brother. Max loves all this attention. He’s in heaven, but me…it bugs the fuck out of me. They’re too damn pushy. They knock at my door with excuses you wouldn’t believe, stop me on the street, bother me at work…”
Being his polite but distant self had kept them at bay before but not now. He’d tried looking unapproachable, but it hadn’t worked. He’d tried bored, put out, indifferent. He’d tried looking friendly and letting them down gently; he’d even tried ignoring them. Nada, nothing worked. They were relentless. They didn’t take no or a rebuff for an answer.
“You want clearly agreed upon, no-strings-attached sex, and I need a decoy date for the festivities, one who won’t give me any shit and would clearly know what I have to offer. Perfect economical exchange.” Any other woman wouldn’t do. Two dates in a row and they began getting ideas, looking at him with sparkles in their eyes, and going all mushy.
She studied him with those devilish eyes that never failed to make him hard, and suddenly broke into a laugh.
“Are you saying demolitions expert here can make a skyscraper fall down to the millimeter without breaking a sweat but can’t handle a bunch of women on the make?”
Basically.
“Demolition operations are clear-cut, laws of physics really, no great mystery, but dealing with these women…they’re vicious. Nothing is ever what it seems.” He was fast running out of options for rejecting them in a civilized manner. Which was his only speed when dealing with women. Besides, he was responsible for a big company, one that his father had worked his ass off building. His own feelings aside, he needed diplomacy, and leaving a trail of scorned women in his wake wasn’t a sound policy.
“Some women are more subtle than others, but I’m sick of it. They’ve decided on their own that I’m ready to settle down and all I need is a wife.”
“And they’re wrong?” she asked.
He looked at her pointedly. “Yes. One hundred percent. I don’t want to be seriously involved with anyone. I like my life the way it is now, simple and uncomplicated. I’m not interested in commitment or marriage. Casual dating I can do, as long as there are no illusions about a future…or a ring.”
Those were out of his comfort zone—way out.
Cole liked his women hot, hard, and once. Maybe not just once, but close. He liked them independent enough to know the score and not get hung up on him. A wife, a picket fence? No, thank you. Straightest path to hell if he ever saw one. Giving a woman power over you was a sure way to fuck up your life. Besides, attaching strings to sex just spoiled the sex.
“Anyway,” he continued, “if they think I’m going out with someone, they may lighten up, and I’ll get them off my back.”
He waited for her to say something, but she didn’t.
“I’m very attracted to you, so it won’t be a burden to fuck you. Not by a long shot.”
She snorted in derision. “Jeez, thanks…I think.”
“You get your stud, and in return you just have to pretend to date me. We both win.” Although as far as he was concerned, he won double. Getting to fuck her out of his system was the star of the deal; getting the other girls to back off was just a nice extra bonus.
“Pretty sure of your…abilities, aren’t you?”
“Yes.” No need to beat around the bush. In bed he knew what he was doing. He was good at fucking, always had been. The rest? Gibberish to him. “You can give me a test run if you want.”
This time she choked. Her eyes were frantic. “But…but…I thought you didn’t like me. You’ve been growling at me for the past month.” She was so cute when she babbled.
“Oh, I like you, all right. A lot.”
Too much, probably.
And as far as the scowling went, well, that had been plain self-preservation.
She let out a snort. “You could have fooled me.”
“And you like me too. Unless, of course, you’re in the habit of trying to lick men you dislike when you think they aren’t looking.”
Her face flared as red as a traffic light.
Yes, she liked him. He’d felt her eyes on him many times, sizing him up. What he didn’t understand was why she was being so difficult about the whole proposition.
“Still…” She fidgeted, and her gaze lowered. “I can’t jump into bed with you. I don’t know the first thing about you.”
“Honey, what did you expect to know about the half-assed gigolo you’d get through an escort service?”
She shrugged. “Not that I’ve thought about it, but I don’t know. I guess they’d give me a brochure about him or something.”
He laughed at her. Not with her, at her. She puckered her lips, and for some reason, his stomach somersaulted, which was a fucking first for him. “So come to dinner. You can ask me anything you want.”
She shook her head vigorously. “I don’t date.”
“Okay, then let’s meet tomorrow in the Red Chicken. You go there every Friday, right? We can talk there, and it wouldn’t be a date. I may be a morally rotten man whore, but I pick up my dates—fake or otherwise—from their places.”
She was freaking out, chewing her lower lip vigorously. And then the dead giveaway; she went for one of the lollipops on the crate, unwrapped it, and put it in her mouth.
He groaned inwardly. Man, that sweet, soft mouth on those suckers was a torture he’d been enduring for longer than he cared to count.
“There it goes, your oral fixation again,” he said, taking the lollipop from her. “I can help with that too.”
She was already shaking her head, but he cupped her neck and brought her to him, covering her lips with his in a flash, digging his hand into her silky-smooth hair, holding her firmly against him.
He’d half expected a fight, but it didn’t happen. She went very still, her breath labored, and when he flicked his tongue over the seam of her lips, she opened for him, letting out a compliant moan he greedily swallowed. And he lost his frigging mind. Tasting her was a million times better than he’d imagined, and he’d imagined plenty. What he hadn’t envisioned was this roaring need blasting through him, obliterating any rational thought in his head.
He gripped the corner of the crate hard, doing his best to keep his other hand away from her—from that soft skin, from that tempting body. If he reached for her, he was going to fuck her on the spot.
“You taste good,” he said as he managed to move away from her. “Like vanilla and cherries.”
“Why did you kiss me?” she asked, still looking half-dazzled.
“Besides because I fucking felt like it?” he said, popping the lollipop in his mouth, trying not to sound half as desperate as he felt. “You needed an incentive. Be in the Red Chicken tomorrow. I’ll be waiting. We have business to discuss.”
* * * *
“Cole asked you out, and you turned him down?” Holly asked Christy the next day on their way to the Red Chicken. “Why on earth did you do that?”
Christy glared at Holly. How did she know about that? Was there no privacy in this town? She hadn’t said a word to anyone, not a frigging word.
Holly just lifted her shoulders unapologetically. “I saw Penny this morning. Shame on you for not telling us right away. Now answer me.”
Christy exhaled. “He didn’t ask me out, technically. He wants to sleep with me.”
Holly threw her an incredulous look. “And the problem is…?”
She grimaced. “He got the wrong idea about me.” Although who could blame the guy? She’d been the one up on that flowerpot claiming she was done with relationships and wanted to get thoroughly fucked.
“Why? Does he think you’re a lesbian?”
“No,” she said, horrified. Why would he think that?
“Then he didn’t get the wrong idea. Besides, who cares what he thinks as long as it gets you laid?”
She cared. She didn’t want to care, but she did.
After their first conversation, she’d been pissed. And humiliated and embarrassed and hurt, but mostly pissed. At herself for getting into that mess, and at him for being such a jerk and jumping the gun. The nerve of the guy! Continue this conversation at work? With all his men around? She’d have rather gotten hit by a freight train, thank you very much; it’d have been less damaging to her self-esteem.
But then he’d blindsided her with that sex-for-dates proposition, and now she was as confused as hell, which in her book was much worse than pissed. Pissed had a focus, a direction. Confused was just plain stagnant.
The thing was, no matter how infuriated she’d been at him for jumping to conclusions about her, it was easier for her to believe he was an asshole making fun of her than the possibility that he’d seriously consider having anything to do with her. That was just baffling. Mind-boggling. Out of an
X-Files
episode. Guys like him didn’t go hiring themselves out for girls like her. That was a fact of life.
“What’s the problem? You don’t find the man attractive?” Holly interrupted her thoughts.
Duh
. The mere sight of him made her wet. He talked, and she broke into goose bumps, for crying out loud.
“It’s just complicated,” she answered.
“Complicated how?” Holly turned her inquisitive eyes on her. “What aren’t you telling me?”
Christy considered the virtues of taking the Fifth for a second but decided against it and relayed to Holly all about the weird, impromptu man-whore job interview.
Holly’s jaw dropped open. “Wow! What are you waiting for, girl? Here’s your chance to get properly laid.”
“Yes. No. Crap, I don’t know.”
Regardless of her bold claims under the influence, she wasn’t that liberated. Hell, she’d seen sixty-year-old grannies more at ease with their bodies and sexuality than she was. Recreational sex? Sure, in which alternate reality?
She couldn’t have no-holds-barred sex with an alpha male like Cole. No way. No day. She wasn’t confident enough to take on a man like him. Not only was the guy’s attitude frigging intimidating, but he was physically perfect. And Christy…well, some days it was difficult for her to look at herself naked in the mirror without flinching. She knew she looked nothing like she had five years—and a gazillion pounds—ago, but still. There was no way in hell she could knock boots with Cole and still be able to look him in the eye afterward.
What she should be doing was concentrating on how to straighten out her messed-up life. She had important decisions to make, a job to return to, an apartment to tend to. Explanations to give, phone calls to return. The list was endless. But instead, here she was, a dozen states away from home, playing librarian. And getting drunk and making an ass of herself.