Austentatious

by Alyssa Goodnight

Conscious of the need to get some work done today, I swung into my lab coat, selected the pertinent binder from a tidily organized row, and carefully collected the tray of parts I needed to get tested that afternoon.

  I ran into Brett on my way out—literally ran into him. He was lounging in the doorway of my cube, his hands deep in his pockets. He had an uncertain little-boy look on his face as he eyed the daisies peeping their mischievous little faces up over the edge of my travel mug.

  “Flowers, huh?” His eyes swiveled back to me, and his smile seemed a little off.

  I glanced over my shoulder and then back at him. “Um, yeah. A friend sent them.”

  “Nice. Well, I just came by ...” He breathed out, his shoulders drooping slightly with the effort, and started over with, “The guy in the cubicle across from me told me you’d been by a few times.”

  Hell. Who knew Brett had spies?

  “Yeah.” Think fast, think fast. How can I possibly justify swinging by at all hours of the workday?

  “Thought I’d better come pin you down after Saturday night,” he continued before I could muster anything useful.

  “Saturday night?” I was seriously confused.

  “At the wedding? I thought you were going to come upstairs and hang out.”

  Oh crap. Saturday night had been an out-of-body experience. But that probably wasn’t the best response here. “Yeah,” I answered, nodding, “I thought so too.” I shook my head a little, trying to convey my inadvertent mishandling of the situation. “I ended up leaving early,” I confessed, hoping this little fraction of the truth would satisfy him, hoping he’d never seen me with Sean.

  “I figured. I didn’t see you again after the one dance.”

  Shit! He saw me!

  Frantically fidgeting with my pocketful of engineering tools, I forced myself not to react, to try to stay mysterious.

  “Right. I left right after that. I should never have worn those shoes.” I was cringing inside, waiting for him to call me on this ridiculous skirting of the truth.

  I smiled up at him and saw his gaze flick over the daisies again. As if he was making the connection I desperately didn’t want him to make. Yes, I’m having dinner with that stranger tonight and planning to see him again Thursday night. But it’s just a fling, brought on by a little spot of blackmail!

  “I gotta admit I was disappointed.”

  This had me whipping my head up and stilling the hand in my pocket.

  He was watching my reaction with interest and surprised me with the admission, “I was kinda hoping to talk to you beyond the realm of cubicles and the whole Whac-A-Mole dynamic.”

  Recognizing the appeal of a padded mallet in my current work environment, I nevertheless tried to stay focused on the words coming from Brett’s mouth.

  “You free for lunch any day this week?”

  “Yep. Pretty much any day. Take your pick,” I offered, shooting him a much-relieved smile. Sean was no longer the elephant in the cubicle. Or if he was, Brett was content to ignore him.

  “How about tomorrow?”

  “That works.” I’d have to push back my trip to New Braunfels a few hours. Maybe I could swing an early-evening visit, steering clear of the Jeopardy! time slot.

  “Okay, well, see you then—unless I catch you skulking around my cube sometime before that.” He was clearly teasing, but it was hitting a little close to the mark. I plastered on a grin.

  His eyes tipped down, taking in my white engineer’s smock, schoolgirl binder, and clunky heel straps, and a slow smile slid across his face.

  “I know—it’s all very sexy,” I said, rolling my eyes.

  “And here I thought it was my own personal fetish,” he admitted with a parting wink before shrugging off the doorjamb to head off down the hall.

  Oh my God, he was serious! I stared down at myself, a shapeless figure in white with a pocket protector. Who knew?

  Feeling the warmth of a full-on flush creeping up my neck and spreading into my cheeks, I hurried into the maze with my head down, making a beeline for the test floor. Looked like I’d be spending the remainder of the afternoon worrying alternately over my bumbling flirtations with both Sean and Brett. Not to mention trouble.

  By six I’d shucked the smock and sped home to change. My thinking was to dress sensible and act the part. But gazing at myself in a tailored skirt and sweater set and remembering Sean’s tousled hair and effortless style, I figured it’d be nice to look like his date instead of his personal assistant. Even though this was not a date-date.

  Fully aware that I was going to be late—when did this start?—I yanked off the sensible and scrambled to replace it with something sexy. I did a quick touch-up on my makeup and tamed a few flyaways with a squirt of hair spray. Feeling only marginally overdressed for Tex-Mex, I grabbed my purse and dashed for the door. I absolutely refused to check the calendar and psych myself out any further.

  I made the drive in record time, wobbled across the potholed parking lot, and scanned for motorcycles. I didn’t see one—maybe he wasn’t here yet. I spared a moment to gather my nerve and remind myself that there was no need for me to be suffering all these first-date symptoms when this wasn’t a date. The last second before I pulled open the door was spent in calling myself a delusional idiot.

  All was momentarily forgotten as I stepped into sensory overload. Mariachi music mingled with the sizzle of fajitas, and punched tin lanterns glinted off neon Mexican beer signs to create a quaint but jaunty ambiance. I approached the hostess with her scary-enthusiastic smile. She greeted me brightly. “Table for one this evening?”

  “I’m actually meeting someone,” I informed her, trailing off, glancing around.

  “There’s a man waiting in the bar,” she said, shifting her eyes that way, willing mine to follow, and letting hers linger. We shared a smile before I thanked her and headed off in Sean’s direction. I couldn’t help but wonder where his motorcycle was hiding.

  He was staring up at a muted television screen, mesmerized by a frenzy of soccer players. Shaking his head, presumably in exasperation, he suddenly, almost guiltily, shifted his eyes in my direction. And I, just as guiltily, tried to pull mine up and away from his ass, hoping he hadn’t noticed. We shared a smile, and he nodded his thanks to the bartender, lifted a booted foot off the brass bar rail, and headed toward me.

  He’d switched his jeans for chinos and covered that afternoon’s T-shirt with a charcoal gray crewneck sweater that looked suspiciously like cashmere. I had an almost overpowering urge to smooth my palms over his chest and snuggle into him. Not the best of sensible, restrained beginnings.

  His lips quirked with some secret knowledge and he pointedly checked his watch. I tried not to squirm. “You’re late,” he informed me. “I would never have imagined that possible, Ms. James. But good for you.”

  I had absolutely no response to this—an apology seemed out of place, and he didn’t seem to be expecting one. Palming my hand in his and raising an eyebrow that dared me to remove it, Sean led the way back toward the hostess station. We were seated immediately in a red vinyl corner booth.

  As the hostess stood waiting with our menus, I lowered myself onto the right edge of the booth, swung my legs under the table, and tentatively started scooting. First test of the evening: Where should I stop in my scoot-around? Before I could decide, Sean dropped down onto the seat opposite and began his own scoot, rapidly closing the space between us.

  I forced myself to focus on the hostess as she ran down the day’s specials, but a slight dip in the seat cushion had me glancing to my right, only to discover that Sean had, in one fell scoot, repositioned himself almost flush up against me. Our knees bumped, followed closely by our thighs. It was only when they’d finally settled against each other that the little zips and snaps of electricity settled down to a low-level buzz. Glancing up at Sean, I caught the look in his eye and once again felt as if he was daring me to shift away. I smiled warmly, keeping all sharp edges of my personality in check
, and glanced again at the hostess, who finished with, “Your server will be right with you.”

  This wasn’t going to work. My body went haywire whenever he so much as brushed against me, and here he was, pressing, lingering, driving me crazy. I casually shifted over a couple of inches, pretending to get comfortable.

  Sean looked me in the eye, quirked his lips, and in a low voice murmured, “I’ll follow you all the way around.”

  My smile fell away a little, chipped off by the shock of it all, and I didn’t move again.

  At that moment, it occurred to me that if I didn’t drag my nerve out of hiding, he was going to play everything to his advantage and probably end up scoring (in one way or another). At this rate it was only a matter of time before my willpower tanked and my plan to stay detached and project incompatibility crashed and burned.

  The busboy appeared, bearing tumblers of ice water, little bowls of chunky red salsa, and a heaping basket of golden tortilla chips. Depositing these, he dodged away without a word.

  Sean leaned into me as I reached for a chip.

  “Did you notice? I’m dressed as ‘Investment Banker on Casual Date.’ ”

  “Very nice.” I shot him an amused smile. “But not necessary.”

  “If it helps you relax, then I’m all in. And next time, you can return the favor by dressing like a rock star. Wild hair, a little leather, lots of skin ...”

  This was a bit of a shocker. “Is that how your band dresses?”

  “No, but if we had a female band member, we’d absolutely make her dress like that.” His grin was quick and sure, and I was getting a little addicted to it. I decided not to mention that there wouldn’t be a next time.

  He was quiet for a bit, staring at me. Initially I filled the silence crunching chips, but eventually self-consciousness won the day, spurring me to stop eating and ask, “What are you doing?”

  “Picturing you in leather.”

  My stomach lurched. It appeared the evening would have me floundering in ways I’d never predicted.

  Reaching for another chip, I tried to get the conversation back onto manageable ground. “What’d you do today, other than ambush a geek at work?”

  He eyed me for a moment before answering, as if gauging whether it was a serious question or merely polite conversation. So I turned to look him square in the eyes, seemingly riveted with curiosity.

  “Fiddled about in Whole Foods,” he said, in that patient way of his, with humor creeping in at the edges. “Snitching samples until I was no longer hungry for lunch. Ended up with a bloody puncture wound, courtesy of a prickly little star fruit. The beast.”

  I nodded in sympathy. “Produce can get pretty rowdy. Are you talking seriously bloody or just painful enough for cursing?”

  “Both,” he admitted. “I worked some too,” he informed me as I reached for another chip. At the rate I was going, I’d be wedged into this booth indefinitely. In an effort to slow the pace, I broke the chip into crispy little shards and ate them slowly one at a time.

  “What are you working on now?”

  “We’re prepping for the show now, mostly practicing our current stuff. But my mum’s started hinting around for some new songs, so I’m searching for inspiration in hopes of some brilliant new music and lyrics.”

  “Is she your biggest fan?” He could no doubt hear the amusement in my voice, but he couldn’t know that I thought the reality was just adorable.

  “Are you kidding? She’s a mother. She probably would have preferred male model to pub singer-made-good.”

  I bit my lip and tried not to snigger. The real difficulty, however, came in not getting distracted by imagined skin shots. “But you’ve won her over?”

  “Not exactly. I bought her an iPod and downloaded all the band’s songs and nothing else. She takes it walking with her.”

  “So you’re taking advantage of the fact that she’s not tech savvy?”

  “Don’t tell me you’re taking her side?”

  He was obviously teasing, but I couldn’t help but tense in reaction. In my defense, I was confident I’d be just as likely to resist the advances of a calendar pin-up as an up-and-coming rock star. Seriously! Is something wrong with me? Taking a deep breath, I tried to steer clear of a doozy of a conversational pothole, hiding behind a little friendly banter.

  “Sorry. All I had to hear was ‘male model.’ ”

  Suddenly, like flashbulbs going off in my head, images of a scantily clad Sean were making me dizzy.

  After an excruciating silence, he finally spoke up. “Sorry—are you flirting with me? I’d got the feeling I was strictly off-limits.”

  Now he was definitely mocking me, but the wicked flash of his grin easily defused the awkwardness, and I laughed. I couldn’t help myself. And I had the urge to ask, “Does your nerve ever get you into trouble?”

  “I prefer the term ‘Machiavellian charm,’ ” he informed me with a wink.

  So the end justified the means. I knew a fairy godmother with the very same perspective. Nerves pounced on my empty stomach as my smile faltered slightly. If I were braver, I’d ask for the evening’s agenda right now, because I was certain there was one. I might have been winging it, but Sean, I could tell, had a plan. A man with a plan ... be still my heart. Too bad it didn’t mesh with mine.

  “Is that what’s got you so nervy, then—the what-ifs?” he asked.

  “You could say that.” Or you could say I was suffering a tragic crush on the completely wrong man and no one—best friend, mentee, fairy godmother, nary a lesbian neighbor—seemed willing to take my side. I unhooked the wedge of lime from my glass and squeezed it into my water, suddenly desperate for a distraction.

  The waiter came to take our orders and left us to our deceptively casual silence. I couldn’t speak for Sean, but I for one was in a bit of a tizzy. I tried to relax and focus on the sombrero-topped mariachi trio as they wound their way through the tables, alternating between rousing instrumentals and sigh-invoking serenades. I barely even noticed my fingers fidgeting with a slit in the vinyl seat cover until I realized I needed to relocate my purse to cover the new tangerine-sized hole beside my hip.

  “So what if ... you enjoy yourself tonight?” Sean prompted, sliding his finger slowly along the cold, wet condensation coating his water glass.

  “No biggie,” I countered blithely. “Mexican food is a pretty sure thing for me.” I swirled my straw and watched the ice spin in circles.

  “Fair enough. What if ... the Mexican food isn’t the best part of the evening?”

  I stopped swirling, just for a second, before starting up again. He had me there—it had taken him two measly questions to size me up and get me squeamish.

  “Then that means you’re a good date.” That seemed a relatively safe response. I smiled, not quite meeting his eyes.

  “What if I turn out to be the best date you’ve ever had?” He smiled back, his gaze clinging to mine. My tortilla chip turned to dust in my mouth, and I reached for my water glass, relieved to have a distraction, no matter how fleeting.

  I took a long drink, probably too long, but I was racking my brain for the safest response.

  “Then you’ll get a full-page write-up in my journal,” I promised, figuring a version of the truth was probably best.

  “Not precisely what I was hoping for,” he admitted, his head tipped to the side.

  “And,” I hurried on before he could elaborate, “you will have raised the bar for all my future dates.” I was teasing now but urgently hoping he’d drop this line of questioning—I wasn’t about to agree to anything beyond this one date.

  He smiled then, a cagey smile that had my pulse zipping with nerves.

  “I’m a sucker for a good cause,” he said, twirling his tortilla chip through the salsa.

  Sean and I had been steadily working our way through the chips and salsa during the “what-if?” repartee, and now it barely registered that his chip had been around the bowl before. And then it was like firework
s in my head. I had little doubt that tonight would remain uncontested as Best Date Ever, but it eased my mind just a little to discover that, as amazing—not to mention cocky—as he was, the man wasn’t perfect. I’d found a flaw: Sean was a double-dipper.

  While I was against this on principle, it didn’t particularly bother me: If I was going to get Sean’s germs, I was likely getting them right now sharing a communal basket of chips, rubbing elbows (and thighs), and breathing the same spicily scented air. And if he should happen to kiss me tonight (please, God!), I’d be well and truly breached. Still, I wasn’t about to let this pass without comment.

  “You’re a double-dipper!” I blurted.

  Sean took the accusation in stride. “I hate to disappoint you, but no. Just good with my hands, luv.”

  Temporarily thrown by the casual endearment, I quickly recovered, turning to argue. But he was faster. Slipping his hand around to cup the back of my neck and tipping his head sideways to speak directly into my ear, Sean made everything else fall away. His voice skittered over my skin and was the cause of widespread goose bumps.

  “And I hope it’s not my germs you’re worried over, because I have plans for you. And clearly I have my work cut out for me.” He was dropping a kiss along the curved line of my neck as the waiter approached. As he presented our food on oversized stoneware, warning us of “hot plates,” Sean let his hand slide down, skimming over my shoulder, arm, and finally my thigh as he pulled away.

  Every nerve ending was on full alert, so when I stuffed that first oven-hot bite of enchilada into my mouth, my tongue got scalded. I was frantically gulping down ice water when the mariachis materialized at our booth garbed in the traditional black and silver charro suits.

  Sean set down his fork and asked, “Are you familiar with the Elvis ballad ‘It’s Now or Never’?”

  “The King?” The guitarist looked a tad affronted by the question. “But of course. We play for you?”

  “Just the instrumentals, if you don’t mind.” Apparently Sean was not too impressed with the vocal stylings of these men. And here I’d thought they were pretty good.