The Promise of Lace (5 page)

I covered my mouth, trying to keep myself from laughing, but
he was chuckling too.

“At least it didn’t smash anyone else’s car. It dropped
right into an empty section of the road. A better parallel park than I ever
managed.”

I couldn’t stifle my laugh that time, but he echoed me.

“Well,” he said, once we’d calmed down a little. “This was a
lovely evening.”

He took a step toward me and I licked my lips in anticipation.
He lifted my hand, which was still sitting loosely in his, up to his lips and
pressed them to the sensitive skin at the back of my hand.

My stomach graduated from butterflies to full-on somersaults.

“I’m so glad that I ran into you, tonight, Roxanne.”

“You too,” I managed. He turned and went off to his own car.
I collapsed, shivering, into my driver’s seat. I told myself the shivers were
because I was underdressed for a cool spring night, but part of it was
definitely Dieter.

It was silly, girly, and immature and I was totally okay
with that. I hadn’t had this type of feeling after a first encounter with a guy
in such a long time that I had forgotten how exciting it could be.

Chapter Five

I was stone cold asleep when Dieter texted me in the
morning, inquiring which foods I would ban if I had the power. I answered
“mushrooms” before I was even fully awake. I hated the idea of eating actual
rot, but people kept putting sauce on it and putting it in with real food, like
pasta or stir-fry. We exchanged a couple more questions back and forth, before
he asked me if he could take me out that night. We set up a time and a
restaurant and then he had to get back to work.

I finally went through my enormous backlist of texts from
Hailey, which, true to form were almost a stream of consciousness report on
what she and Noah had been doing while I was talking to Dieter. Like finishing
my fries and talking about his ass.

I had been planning to sleep in, work for a few hours,
then
convince myself that I deserved an afternoon off. The
dark side of working from home is that there is always something you should be
doing and you have to really force yourself to believe that you can have some
time off.

I had only been planning to take half the day off, but with
the promise of a nice evening ahead of me I decided that I deserved an entire
day off. I hadn’t taken one in weeks.

I grabbed my neglected yoga mat out of my closet and went to
an easy class at the studio down the street.
Had a salad.
Spent an absolutely asinine amount of time picking out
clothes with my music turned up a little too loud.
Had another light
lunch because a salad is not, strictly speaking, an actual meal.

Dieter and I were meeting at a vintage themed place down the
street. Not exactly full on
Happy Days
diner
style, just cute and retro. Classic Rock, but no jukebox, which pretty much
summed up the atmosphere as well. It was close enough that, despite the light
rain, I didn’t mind walking in heels, and I could tell it had paid off when I
noticed the way I caught Dieter’s eye as I walked toward him in my three inch
heels, knee length sea foam green dress, and little jean jacket.

His jaw slackened, just a touch, and his gaze started at my
feet and traveled upward. His smile widened as he went.

No wonder he was good at his job. He sure as Hell knew how
to make a woman feel beautiful.

He hugged me when I finally reached him, letting his
fingertips trail down my arm in a way that gave me the chills and taking my
hand gently in his own.

“You are absolutely stunning,” he said quietly. I bit my lip
and smoothed my dress down a little bit.

“Thank you. You’re looking pretty sharp yourself.”

It was charming how much he’d dressed up to take me out to
dinner at a relatively casual place. He was wearing a crisp white dress shirt
with an open collar, a light gray vest, very tight jeans and red sneakers. It
was a little Justin-Timberlake-meets-Ellen-Degeneres, but he had the body to
make it work.

He tugged me into the restaurant. The hostess sat us near
the window and lit the candle between us. She shot me a wink that I took to be
congratulatory. I was having a nice dinner with a freaking gorgeous guy. He
dressed well and had a nice smile and pretty eyes. I was clearly doing
something right.

I sipped my water out of the deep glasses that had been
sitting at the table when we sat down. I felt a little self-conscious because
Dieter was still smiling at me and a little nervous because I could not think
of a topic of conversation.

I grabbed my menu as a cover, but it turned out there was no
reason to worry.

“So, what’s your favorite book?” he asked. I laughed a
delivered a much practiced speech about why
Les
Miserables
is the best book ever written. He responded with his own speech
about
Fahrenheit 451
.

The longer we talked the easier it got. Our drinks came and
we chatted about our siblings. When our food came he set his foot against mine
and we talked about all the places we’d like to visit while I traced the tip of
my toe from his ankle to his calf.

He started clearing his throat a lot as I touched him under
the table. I couldn’t stop smiling. He smirked at me when I suggested splitting
a desert and I slid the point of my toe over the arch of his foot until he
squirmed and ordered us a slice of cherry pie and coconut ice-cream. Rain
splashed against the windows and the topic turned to current events.

It turned out that he was smart and passionate on top of his
nice body and handsome face.

 
A few hours ago,
dancing around my place to some band I hadn’t actually listened to since
college, I’d been vaguely hoping that he’d kiss me, and now I was hoping it
would be a little more than that.

I excused myself after I’d finished my half of the ice
cream. I “went to powder my nose” and popped a piece of wintermint gum in my
mouth as soon as I was out of sight. Then I used the facilities, spit out the
gum and returned, minty fresh, to the table, just as Dieter tucked his card
into the little leather folder and handed it off to our waitress.

I faltered a little. I had intended to pay. I knew what
minimum wage was and hadn’t expected him to just take the check.

Oh, well. I’d pay next time.

And then I noticed that it wasn’t raining anymore so much as
deluging.

“Uh-oh,” I chuckled, slipping back into my seat.
“Looks like we’ve got a little more time to kill.”
I grinned
widely and slid my feet forward, ready to go back to teasing him. The way it
made him flush and squirm was a turn on. But my feet didn’t meet anything.
 
He’d tucked his feet under his chair, out of
my reach.

He chuckled.
 
“Mhmnn, my turn.”
He held his hand out to me palm facing
upwards and flexed his fingers. “Give me your hand.”

I grinned and obliged.

He gently placed my hand on the tabletop, knuckles down. He
traced his fingertip lightly over the fleshy part of my palm, the part just
underneath my fingers.

I tried very, very hard to stay as still as I could. It
tickled, but it was more than just a sensation across my hand. He was looking
in my eyes while he did it, a half-smile hanging expectantly. He knew he could
turn me on like this as much as I’d known exactly why the soft graze of my toe
across his skin made him gulp his water. It was a soft touch that promised
more, but it was small and ostensibly innocent enough to be executed while
surrounded by people in a packed restaurant.

He swept his finger suddenly across the sensitive middle of
my palm. I gasped and clenched my hand tightly around his finger.

“Maybe we should get another drink and wait out the rain,”
he suggested. His voice was quiet, but intense.

It made me gulp before I replied, “It’s starting to slack
off. Give it another couple minutes to wind down and we could walk back to my
place for that drink.”

I slid my fist off his finger, more suggestively than
necessary, but I wanted the message to be clear. It had been a while for me,
and I liked this guy, and I still probably wouldn’t sleep with him on the first
date, but
wow
did I want to fool
around. I set my hand back down on the table and Dieter went back to tracing
the lines of my palm while I sipped my ice water until the downpour weakened
back to a drizzle.

“Alright, better hurry before it kicks up again.”

I slipped my hand into Dieter’s. He spun around when we were
outside the door so his back was toward me. He crouched down.

“Come on,” he said.
“Too many puddles for
those shoes.”

I laughed and climbed onto his back. He tucked his broad
warm hands under my bare thighs and stood up.

“Point me in a direction,” he said.

“Forward,” I replied.

He hurried to the end of the block and stopped at the red
light. He brushed his index fingers across my inner thighs and I rocked against
him before I could stop myself.

He laughed.

“You’re a filthy cheater,” I hissed as he kept grazing my
thighs with his thumbs, stroking back and forth over the sensitive skin.

“I don’t think there are set rules for this,” he opined.

“Take a left,” I told him, fighting a crazy urge to rub my
hips against his back the whole way there. “And hurry.”

“What if I don’t?” He laughed and slowed his steps down to a
comically slow pace.

I pressed my mouth to his ear and, feeling bold, look the
lobe between my teeth. “Then you’ll pay for it later.”

He staggered, but sped up.

By the time we reached my block we were both laughing like
idiots.

He was running, purposefully bouncing me so that I couldn’t
tease my tongue against his ear, which also meant that he had to hold my thighs
tighter and couldn’t tickle me anymore.

I yelled, “Stop,” when we reached my building. I probably
didn’t pull away from his ear in time before I did. He jumped as my voice cut
out into the air and I kissed the side of his face apologetically.

He crouched down again and I slid off his back, wobbling a
little bit as I hit the sidewalk. I jammed the key in the door and spun it
hard. I grabbed his hand and pulled him into the big atrium that my building
always boasted about on their website. I skidded to a less-than-graceful stop
in front of the elevator, punched the up button too hard and slid on the tile.
Dieter caught me just as the elevator opened.

I ducked in, and tugged him toward me. Trusted that he’d
follow my lead because I couldn’t physically move him if he didn’t want to be
moved. I swept my hands up his damp shirt, across the back of his neck and
pulled him down to kiss me.

A thrill ran through me when he opened the kiss immediately.
I congratulated myself on my mint gum maneuver. I slid my hands up into his
rain-damp hair and cried out when he hauled me up against the elevator wall.

I linked my ankles behind his back and tightened my grip
around his shoulders. I shouldn’t have been thinking about having sex with him.
Not on a first date, but I was already wet and thinking about stripping him out
of his clothes, throwing him on my bed and climbing on top of him. I rocked
down against his body just as the bell sounded and the doors opened.

Mrs. Huber, who lived across the hall from me and was always
forgetting her keys, was standing in the doorway. I could easily see the lobby
behind her. We hadn’t actually pushed the button for my floor. We had gotten into
the elevator and been too distracted by making out to actually do anything
about it.

“Apologies,” Dieter managed. With me braced against his hip
he leaned over and punched ‘door close’.

“Which floor?” he asked.

“Four,” I answered.

He hit the button to my floor and set his forehead to mine.
We both laughed hysterically for a moment, but by the time the elevator opened
again, we were back to making out and I could feel his erection through his
jeans.

I was impressed.

He set me back down on my feet and I pulled him down the
hallway toward my place.

I practically kicked the door inward. In my eagerness I did
slam it shut behind Dieter, but he didn’t say anything. I quickly flipped the
locks behind him.

“This is a really nice place,” he said. It was charming how
out of breath he was for such an expected polite remark.

“Thanks, I can save you the tour, it’s a studio, this is all
of it,” I told him. I was very happy with myself for leaving the futon down in
bed-mode this morning. Now I didn’t have to stop and unfold it. It was an
expensive futon, and I slept like a goddamn rock on it, but people saw it and
expected it to be shitty dorm furniture instead of comfortable loft furniture.

I stepped out of my shoes and set them by the door.