He’d never had a one-night stand in his life. Of course, maybe that was because he’d married April right out of high school. But regardless, he wasn’t a sex-with-a-stranger kind of guy. He liked to know a woman, liked to learn how to please her, share an intimacy in bed and out, before and after.
“I said you can’t have any more beer,” came the persistent voice.
Caleb shifted on his stool and took another gander at the bossy broad next to him. Who the hell did she think she was?
If he wanted a beer, he’d have a beer, and some woman with nice shoulders and a scowl couldn’t stop him. No one could stop him, especially not when he was determined to drink enough beer to forget how annoyed he was, and he wasn’t nearly there yet. It was going to take a lot of beer to get over his confusion that his ex-wife was marrying a guy old enough to be her grandfather. And was so happy she was beaming. Glowing. She’d never glowed with Caleb, and it bothered him.
“Get me another beer,” he told Joe.
“No,” the woman next to him said quite clearly.
Was this the morality committee? Annoyed, he turned to her. “I don’t mean to be rude, but would you mind your own damn business?”
He blinked hard, trying to focus a little better. Damn room was dark and the cigarette smoke hanging like a factory cloud always made his eyes water.
She switched tactics. Her hand rested on his arm. Her tone became conciliatory. “Just take a break,” she said. “I hate to be the only one not drinking.”
But Caleb wasn’t fooled. She looked and sounded too wily and calculating to be genuine. Women with short hair were like that. They existed in a world of hair products, where everything could be sculpted and molded and tamed to their liking, and he thought she probably viewed him as an unruly cowlick.
Unsure what to say, and wanting to ask why she was in a bar if she didn’t want to be around drinkers, he gave a grunt that could be interpreted any way she liked and turned back to the TV.
“Can you pass me a nut?”
She smiled at him, her hand held out expectantly. Caleb felt prickly annoyance as he passed the bowl of peanuts to her. Was she bored or was she flirting with him?
His brain was a little addled from the beer, so he decided if he were uninteresting, she’d move on to someone else. Because she really wasn’t what he had in mind.
Oh, she was pretty enough if you were into perfection. Long cheekbones, artful makeup, stylish dark-brown hair with lighter highlights. Great shoulders, tanned and toned, making him wonder just briefly if the rest of her would be the same before he stopped himself. Only the message didn’t quite reach his bottom half in time and he felt a hard-on rising in his jeans.
Thanks, pal, he told his unruly appendage.
Despite his body’s reaction, he knew he wouldn’t know quite what to do with a woman like this. Self-assured, bossy, clipped and manicured, wearing a sleeveless dress that screamed classy businesswoman, she was from a different world. One of cappuccinos, Audis, and business trips to New York—nothing like his life managing his small construction business, and living in a dingy little duplex.
“You know, I’ve never met a huge man who grunts before,” she said, popping a nut into her mouth and pouching it in her cheek. “I mean, I’ve seen guys like you on TV and checking purses at the airport, but I’ve never actually talked to anyone like you. Are you a cop, a welder, or a mechanic?”
He gave her a hard stare, hoping to scare her into leaving. He did not want to be her blue-collar novelty of the night.
Instead she shivered and gave him a smile. “Oh, do that again. And growl this time.”
She was making fun of him. Caleb frowned deeper.
“Here.” She took a peanut and shoved it between his lips. “I think the alcohol is dulling your reflexes. You’re just staring at me.”
With good reason. The woman was friggin’ crazy. But he couldn’t protest, not when her warm finger was still resting on his lips, the salty, fleshy taste of the tip still lingering on his tongue. If he sucked, he could draw her into his mouth.
It was nothing, a little gesture that meant nothing, but his long-neglected body stood up and took notice.Hey , it said.I remember this. This is foreplay.
It could be, but it wasn’t.
He hated to disappoint his gonads, but this woman was only amusing herself. At his expense.
“Chew the nut,” she said. “Food will help absorb the alcohol before it hits your bloodstream.”
“One peanut?” he asked.
“Good point.” She grabbed a whole handful and started toward him.
Caleb clamped his mouth shut and shook his head.
She grinned. “No? Well, Joe can get a sandwich for you. They make club sandwiches and really greasy fries here.”
“I’ll have one if you do. I don’t like to eat alone.” He smiled smugly, throwing her words back at her.
A snort of laughter flew out of her mouth, and she covered it with a soft, golden hand, her short, rounded fingernails painted white at the ends.
Diamonds flashed in her ears, and dark, intelligent eyes gave him another once-over. “I might as well, I guess, since I missed out on dinner when my date stood me up.”
Caleb figured his brain was firing a little slow, but he couldn’t believe this woman had been stood up. Personally, he would have been scared to. She was intimidating as hell.
“Some idiot stood you up?”
“Sad, but true.” She popped a nut into her own mouth, then offered him another one by hovering her hand over his.
He opened his fist and let her drop the peanut into his palm. “So you came here instead?”
She nodded. “Even more sad, isn’t it? That when lonely and pissed off, I came to a bar.”
If it was sad, then he was doubly so. “I can understand that.” More than he even wanted to admit to himself.
Gesturing for Joe to come back over, he chewed the nut. And looked down at the woman beside him, all straight-backed and confident, one leg crossed over the other, a hint of cleavage popping out of her little black dress. “What’s your name?”
“Trish,” she said, and stuck her hand out like they were in a business meeting. “Trish Jones.”
He took her hand, small and soft in his, but possessing a firm, bold grip. “I’m Caleb Vancouver.”
She pumped his hand up and down twice, then let go, a mischievous smile on her perfectly painted, caramel-brown-lipstick lips.
Those lips were very distracting. Very luscious, very arousing. Caleb had a sudden image of what exactly she could do with those perfectly pretty lips on what part of him. He shifted on the stool.
And when Joe came over to see what he wanted, Caleb completely forgot to order another beer.
Two
Trish watched Caleb pack away his second club sandwich in awe. The guy was huge, granted, and probably needed a lot of fuel to drive that big old muscled body of his, but Jesus. Come up for air once in a while.
“Don’t you feel better now?” Trish asked, not sure how she felt. He was really damn cute, in a pathetic, kissable, lumberjack sort of way.
He nodded. “I didn’t realize I was so hungry. You’re a smart woman, Trish, but I bet you hear that all the time.”
Damn good at her job. Dedicated. A bitch.She’d heard all of those lately, but notsmart . Sometimes it seemed like a woman was only allowed to be intellectual, academic, with her intelligence—not sharp, driven.
The compliment meant more to her than it should. “I’m a prosecuting attorney. I handle all the sex-crime cases.”
Caleb licked mayo off his lip, and carefully set his sandwich down. “No kidding? Are you sure you’re in the right joint? Me, I’m a construction worker, and not your usual type, I would guess.”
Of course he was a construction worker, and of course she had to have an arousing vision of him shirtless in the summer heat pop into her head. Carrying a two-by-two, or whatever those pieces of wood were called, jeans sinking down low. Sun l
ightening that short brown hair until it was the color of milk-doused coffee. Tan. Hard.
And of course she was wearing a dress that revealed that her nipples had suddenly gone leaping out toward the bar like they wanted to join that sandwich being palmed by his fingers.
Waving her hand, Trish gave a scoff, striving for cool and sarcastic. No need for him to see that she was tilted a little off her axis. “My type for what? Besides, I’ve adopted you for the night.”
Snatching one of the bottled waters off the bar, he glared at her. “Adopted me? I don’t need you to baby-sit me, Miss Prosecuting Attorney.”
“You were drunk when I sat down.”
“So? And not nearly enough, in my opinion.”
Trish nibbled on a French fry, then tossed it down as her stomach recoiled. It was like licking bacon grease. “But you feel better now that you’ve stopped drinking, don’t you?”
He didn’t answer.
Irritation rose in her, and she wasn’t even sure why. “And what were you getting drunk for, anyway? To talk yourself into dragging some woman home with you tonight?”
Caleb shifted on his stool, pinning her with another one of those hard stares. “What does it matter? Why do you care?”
She rolled her eyes. “I don’t!” Stupid lug. Here she was, being friendly, reaching out, something she didnot normally do. Let him wallow. “Order yourself another beer, for all I care. Get blitzed and pick up some giggling, brain-dead bimbo who might be impressed by all that muscle you’re hauling around.”
“Maybe I will.”
“And maybe I’ll just leave you here to do that.”
“Fine.”
“Fine.” Yet Trish didn’t move. She just switched legs and wondered why she wasn’t walking away.
Because she didn’t want to. Caleb was drunk, totally not her type, and he drank domestic beer. Yet she just didn’t want to go home alone. Again. So she’d stay with Caleb for a little while longer, another minute or two, before she headed back to her empty apartment. He needed the company.
She needed the company.
Caleb picked his sandwich back up. “Aren’t you leaving?”
“No.” She shrugged. Let him think what he wanted.
But he shot her a quick glance out the side of his eye. “Good.”
Trish laughed. “You are drunk, aren’t you?” And she nudged his brawny arm with her side.
He grinned. “Maybe just a little.” And his finger reached out and moved past her face to touch her earring. “These are pretty.”
“Thanks.” She reflexively ran her own finger over the spot where his had been. “They were a present from my parents when I graduated from law school.”
“Are you a good lawyer?”
“The best,” she said, never doubting it for a minute. She’d been born to argue, and she was good at it.
“I believe you. You look like you could run circles around those guys downtown. I bet you won every staring contest when you were a kid.”
“Of course.” Trish pushed the plate of fries away from her and went back to the nuts. It had been too much to expect that Joe could produce a salad for her. But instead of leaving and finding a grocery store or deli, or just scrounging something up in her fridge at home, she was still sitting there on a stool so hard her backside had gone numb.
It was stupid.
Caleb took another swallow of water and some of it sloshed down the front of him. “Damn. Got a hole in my lip.”
Trish reached for a napkin. The guy clearly needed a keeper. He couldn’t even drink water without slobbering all over himself. There would be no telling how he’d find his way home if she didn’t stick around.
“Here.” With less-than-gentle fingers, she swiped at his chest. His solid, football stadium-wide chest.
His hand grabbed hers, stilled it. A big, scratchy hand that swallowed hers whole like a shark with a tuna. He was strong, holding her immobile even when she tugged a little, and she was annoyed, yet simultaneously fascinated.
“Trish?”
“What?” Damn if she wasn’t actually leaning toward him, gazing up into his murky green eyes like some soulful Juliet wannabe.
Only she didn’t have a romantic bone in her practical body. The dating game and her job had only confirmed that romance was dead in the twenty-first century, if it had ever existed.
“I think you’re a lot nicer than you pretend to be.”
Giving up on retrieving her trapped hand, she let him cup it like a baby bird, while she sat back and snorted. “Don’t bet your tool belt on it, buddy.”
But she was secretly pleased.
Caleb had figured out that his beer buzz was still racing, and that the room was pulsing in bright, fuzzy, undulating waves. Which had to be why Trish looked so deliciously tanned and perfect, perching on her stool with posture that would make a chiropractor proud, and why he suddenly wanted to taste her. Every polished and smooth inch of her attorney ass, from that tidy hair down to her rounded breasts. Past her firm belly, skimming over her dark, wispy curls, down her toned and tan thighs to satin toes, capped off with a dash of red toenail polish.
Two years was a long time to go without sex.
At the moment he couldn’t even remember why he’d been celibate. It had something to do with his ex-wife, and how he’d vowed not to make the same mistake twice. April had been about the neediest woman he’d ever met, lacking in confidence and unwilling to give him any independence. He had loved April in the beginning, loved that she was a generous, caring woman, but in the end he’d realized he wanted to be friends with her, not married to her.
And if he ever got involved with a woman again, he wanted passion this time. Not just friendship. Not just companionship. But passion, and deep, lasting love.
He’d been holding out on the sex. Waiting for the right moment, the right woman, when he was so turned on, so intrigued by a woman that the thought of waiting was downright painful.
He was thinking he was just about there.
Enough so that his jeans were straining at the crotch and he was shocked at himself. He’d just met Trish—what the hell?
He let go of her hand. “I was married for eight years.” Flicking the crusty rye bread on his sandwich, he stared at the bare spot on his left hand where his wedding ring had been. He had felt a tremendous relief when he’d taken that ring off. He’d been more than ready to move on, to a new life, to a new woman. Yet it was April getting a second chance, not him.
“Was married?”
“Yep. I’m divorced. Been two years, and my ex is getting remarried tomorrow.”
“Yeah? So I guess you’re heartbroken? Jealous of the new hubby?”
That startled him. Jealous? Definitely not in the way Trish meant. “Nah, I actually feel kind of sorry for the guy. Everybody loves April, but not everybody’s had to live with her.” It had been exhausting to always ease April’s insecurities.
“So it was a mutual breakup?”
“Nope. I left her. She dragged out the divorce as long as she could.”
“So you’re here getting drunk…why?” Trish wrinkled her nose. “I’d think you’d be happy to get her out of your hair.”
“I’m celebrating, that’s why I’m getting drunk.” Caleb frowned. “Was getting drunk.”
“Yeah, you look like a barrel of laughs to me. Party on, Caleb.” She made a funny face and stuck her fingers out in some frat-boy gesture.
It made him want to laugh. “Okay, so it’s kind of hard to celebrate by myself.”
Trish played with a French fry on her plate. “Why’d you leave her?”
“I left her because I wanted something more, you know what I’m saying? And here she’s moved on, getting married.”
Trish leaned over the bar counter, propping her arm up as she watched him. Caleb wasn’t sure how the conversation had turned to his life story or why he was telling her anything about his ex-wife. He’d have to blame it on the beer, because he was not the kind of guy wh
o talked about his friggin’ feelings on a regular basis.
After studying him for a second, Trish nodded. “Aah. I get it. You’re feeling bad because she’s over you. Found someone else. She’s got a lot of nerve picking up the pieces of her life after you broke them.”
Wait a minute. “What’s that supposed to mean?” It didn’t sound flattering.
“That you’re just such a typical guy. You don’t want her, but you don’t want anyone else to have her.” Trish made a face at him. “What was she supposed to do? Sit around crying for the rest of her life because you decided the marriage wasn’t working? You should be happy for her.”
Trish had it all completely wrong. “I am happy. Very happy. Happy that Harry fell on my grenade. If you don’t press down April’s pin at all times, she’ll explode.”
“I have no idea what that means except that it sounds vaguely sexual. If it is, donot explain any further. If it’s not, enlighten those of us who can’t follow military metaphors.”
Caleb grinned at the look on Trish’s face. He hadn’t meant to sound sexual, but now that she mentioned it…he wondered where Trish’s pin would be. What would set her off? Before he could stop himself, he glanced at her cleavage again. Trish had a fabulous body that he’d love to see more of.
“I mean April’s really insecure. She can’t make any decisions on her own, and she gets whacked-out upset if you don’t do everything exactly the way she thinks it’s supposed to be. For eight years I walked on eggshells, until I got tired of it.”
“But everybody loves April?”
“Yes. Because she’s so damn generous and sweet and unselfish.”
“Tricky bitch.” Trish’s mouth quirked up.
“Exactly.” Caleb fingered the lettuce on his plate, feeling a little better about the whole thing. “Harry’s sixty years old,” he added.
That was a little embarrassing, though he wasn’t sure why. Maybe it made his masculinity feel a little threatened, if he wanted to get all talk-show about it.
Trish’s lip twitched again. “Now we’re getting to the bottom of it. How old is April?”
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