"Good." Archie nodded. "That's good. I was afraid you'd hang around here forever, thinking you could bring the ML and P into the new millennium."
"I tried."
"God knows you tried. Those old fossils in charge have shit for brains."
Privately, Charlie thought so too but he'd never say so out loud. No point in creating bad feelings. "Ah, you can't blame them. They still think of me as Rose and Henry's nerdy little kid, the one who flooded the cafeteria with his science experiment. Nobody's a hero in his own hometown."
"Like I said, shit for brains. Anyway, their loss." "I might not get the job."
"You'll get it." Archie flipped the towel back over his shoulder. "So who's the lucky lady who's causing you to delay your Sam Adams purchase?"
Charlie glanced at his watch. Three minutes to go. "This isn't exactly a date."
"She's meeting you here, right?"
"Right."
"Then voila, it's a date. Two people happen to run into each other somewhere, that's not a date. Two people agree to run into each other somewhere at a stated time, then it's a date. And from the way you keep looking at your watch, you absolutely have a stated time."
"Archie, that's faulty logic. Two people could have a business meeting at a stated time. That's not a date."
"Is this a business meeting?"
"Not exactly." Charlie had already decided not to tell anybody about the explosion, provided Eve showed up and he didn't have to call 911.
Archie smiled. "Then it's a date."
"Not exactly."
Archie blew out a breath. "You sound like a rental car commercial. Are you going to tell me who it is or what?" "Eve Dupree."
"Eve Dupree." Archie squinted as if trying to place the name. "Isn't she the New York model who moved here last fall?"
"Yeah. So now you can see why it's not exactly a date." "Why can I see that?"
"Hey, I'm an engineering geek. You don't catch successful New York models going out with—"
"That's what you say. She just walked in the door."
Adrenaline shot through Charlie's system, but he turned the bar stool seat slowly because he wanted to play this cool. He was aware of Archie watching the proceedings with great delight. Naturally, the seat creaked like the hinges in a horror flick.
"I'm here," she said. "Right on time."
"That's—" He had to stop and clear his throat. "That's good." He'd prepared himself to be knocked out by her glamorous beauty. He'd figured on makeup and some designer outfit.
Instead she stood there in a bulky green jacket and fuzzy white earmuffs. Her mop of brown wavy hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and she had on a pair of large-framed glasses. If she had on makeup, he couldn't see any evidence of it. She might be wearing a little bit of lipstick.
She'd obviously taken no pains with her appearance, so why couldn't he stop looking at her? Critically speaking, her nose was a little too prominent and her forehead a tad bit high. But something kept his attention riveted on her face.
It was her mouth, he decided at last. Her mouth was wide and her lips full in a way that made him think of kissing and . . . yeah, to be completely honest, oral sex.
But surely other women had great mouths and he hadn't been this fixated. Maybe it was her eyes. Even partly obscured by the lenses of her glasses, they were very blue. And besides being beautiful, they shone with a kind of creative intelligence that he found extremely seductive. No telling what was going on in her head, and he loved that. Predictable women drove him nuts. Give him a creative woman anytime.
Apparently the combination of her eyes and her mouth fit his idea of perfection. Or maybe the big draw was the secret she had refused to tell him. He'd always loved puzzles, and she'd presented him with one by having a mysterious explosion in her garage. No matter what the reason, he wanted her. He wanted her bad.
And what an idiot he was! As he'd taken great care to assure Archie, this wasn't a date. She'd come because he'd threatened to call 911 and expose her garage accident. She wasn't here because she thought he was wonderful, so the fact that he found her wildly attractive made no difference. Besides, he was leaving town.
He swallowed and attempted to curb his lust. "Want a beer?"
"Sure." She took off her coat and hat. "What kind?"
"Sam Adams would be great."
Charlie almost groaned out loud. She was sexy, she was smart, and she drank his brand of beer. Just his luck, he was not in the market.
Chapter Two
Twenty minutes, which had to include the walk to the tavern, hadn't given Eve time for more than washing her hands, putting her hair in a ponytail, and swiping on her favorite mocha lipstick. Just as well, she'd thought. From now on, any guy she took a shine to would start out with the real Eve Dupree, not the airbrushed version. That way she'd never be worried that they were attracted to glitz. In spite of her career, glitz was so not her.
Charlie might have expected some glitz, though, because he was staring at her as if he'd never seen a woman without makeup before. Or even one wearing glasses. Oh, well. Great tush or not, he might not work out.
Too bad, too. She certainly admired what she saw— sexy brown eyes, nicely squared-off jaw. She also liked the thin-framed, black-rimmed glasses. The guys she'd dated in the city were into contacts. Personally she didn't care for them and only used them when she had to on the job. There was something honest and refreshing about just wearing the glasses.
His black leather jacket was gone, revealing a white dress shirt with no tie and the sleeves rolled back. When paired with the jeans, it gave him a casual, almost wholesome look. But she'd seen how the black leather chaps outlined his butt and his package. She didn't think Charlie was all that wholesome.
As she approached the bar, Charlie stood and introduced her to the tavern owner, Archie Shepherd. As if Eve needed another reason to be attracted, she discovered that Charlie was a good five inches taller than she was. Although she would have loved to be evolved enough to date shorter guys, she wasn't there yet.
She exchanged niceties with Archie, but all the while she was aware of Charlie's intensity of focus. There was definitely energy pulsing between them. Whether it was sexual energy or not, she wasn't sure.
Maybe his stare had been complimentary. He might like his women nerdy. If so, that boded well for the future, because she was and always had been a nerd in a model's body. No one ever believed that of her, but here was a guy who might.
Finally she picked up her beer, which she'd asked Archie to leave in the bottle, and turned to Charlie. "Ready for that game of pool you promised me?"
"Sure am."
"Whoa, there, Nellie," Archie said. "Did this guy give you a handicap?"
Eve looked Charlie in the eye. Oh, yeah. Sparks. Maybe there was sexual chemistry. "Do I need a handicap?" she asked.
He met her gaze, and his was starting to smolder. "I don't know. Do you?"
No doubt about it, now. This connection had potential. "That depends." She paused for emphasis. "How good are you?"
"Nobody in town can beat him," Archie said.
Eve lifted her eyebrows. "Is that true, Charlie?"
"Mostly."
"Well, then." She brought the bottle to her lips and tipped it slightly to take a sip. "Let's see if it's still true, shall we?" Then she winked and walked over to the cue rack. She used her runway walk on purpose.
"Let's make it interesting," Charlie called after her.
She already thought it was plenty interesting, but she glanced over her shoulder as she reached the rack. "By doing what?"
Instead of answering right away, he walked up beside her and lowered his voice. "If I win, you'll tell me what happened in your garage today."
His manner indicated that he hadn't told Archie about the incident. She appreciated that. "And if I win?"
He smiled, which had quite an effect on her already supercharged libido. "You can tell me whatever you feel is appropriate, given my efforts to make sure
you came through it safe and sound."
Standing almost near enough to touch him while they had their own private conversation felt delicious. Now she was certain he didn't have a girlfriend. Either that, or he was a louse, and she didn't want to believe that.
"Fair enough." She studied the cue sticks and reached for one that was quite obviously better quality than the rest. The shaft looked straight and the handle was inlaid with onyx and mother-of-pearl in an intricate diamond pattern.
"That's mine."
She paused, her hand on the smooth shaft. Unconsciously she stroked it. The wood was incredible. She glanced over at him. "Yours? Really?"
"Yeah. I keep it here instead of carting it back and forth on my bike." He paused. "But you can use it."
"I'd be honored." She really should buy herself a pool cue. She'd considered it, but she'd never owned a table, and walking into a pool hall with your own stick advertised either your ability, your arrogance, or both. During her years of playing in the city, she hadn't wanted to broadcast anything. But this cue of Charlie's was a pleasure to hold and inspired all varieties of lust, including the sexual kind.
Setting her beer on a nearby table, she wiped her hand on her overalls so she wouldn't get any moisture from the bottle on Charlie's stick. Then she sighted down the shaft. Perfectly straight. She didn't want to read too much into a guy's choice of pool cue, but so far, she was impressed with everything related to Charlie Shepherd.
If he played a clean game of pool and didn't throw a tantrum when he missed a shot or happened to lose, then she thought she should tell him about her invention. Fate seemed to have thrown him in her path. He could be just the guy she needed, in more ways than one.
Charlie had never let anyone use his thousand-dollar pool cue. The locals knew it was his and avoided it. During tourist season Archie put it in the back. But this wasn't tourist season, so Archie had left it on the rack, easily accessible when Charlie came in to practice.
When Eve had wrapped her fingers around it, he'd felt a sexual charge as if she'd taken hold of his dick. Then, to compound matters, she'd started stroking the shaft. Charlie had never seen pool as a sexual game, but he was seeing it now. And Eve could hold his cue stick for as long as she wanted.
Meanwhile his brain, what few cells he still had working, kept repeating a message like a blinking traffic sign: You're leaving. Don't get started. But he was already started and didn't know how to stop. She hadn't even told him what the explosion was all about, but he had a gut feeling that would only enslave him more.
He studied the remaining cues, reaching for and rejecting three before he finally settled on one. Sheesh. It was just a game, for chrissake, not the national billiards championship. But he didn't want to look like an idiot in front of her and he would love to win and have her tell him about the explosion.
Finally he settled for the best of Archie's house cues and turned to discover Eve had picked up a tray of balls and was racking them. She knew how to handle balls, too, cupping them gently in each hand as she positioned them in the wooden triangle.
Charlie broke out in a fine sweat. He'd played tired, he'd played sick, and he'd played drunk, and he'd still been able to make the shots. But he'd never played aroused, and he had a feeling that could destroy his game.
She positioned the balls precisely, sliding her fingers between the bottom row of balls and the rack to keep the triangle tight. She had the sexiest fingers he'd ever seen in his life. He wanted to suck on them.
Lifting the rack, she glanced at him. "Got a quarter?"
"Yeah, but there's no jukebox here. Archie decided that—"
"We need a quarter to toss so we can see who breaks."
"Oh." He was losing it fast. He'd been worried that she'd been affected by the explosion, but obviously she was functioning just fine. He was the one acting as if he'd taken a blow to the head. At this rate he'd be lucky to remember which end of the cue stick to use.
"Yeah, I have a quarter," he said. Digging in his pocket, he produced one and held it over the table as he bounced it in his palm. With the way his reflexes felt, he didn't trust himself to catch it, so he'd let it land on the table. "Your call."
"Tails."
The quarter dropped tail side up on the green felt. "Tails. Your break."
"Okey-doke." She leaned his stick carefully against the cue rack and pulled out a house cue for the break.
Could this woman be any more perfect? On top of her X-rated mouth, intelligent eyes, and sexy fingers, she understood that you didn't use a custom cue for the break. He had to hope that she wasn't interested in him, because if she had even a smidgen of attraction going on, his plan to move to Nevada was in serious jeopardy.
As she lined up for the break, he stood at the opposite end of the table staring like a love-struck fool. She handled that stick like a pro, but it was the wiggle in her butt as she concentrated on the cue ball that made his equipment twitch. The break came fast and furious, scattering balls to every corner of the table and dropping two solids.
"Nice break," he said. He would call it a spectacular break, but she might think he was patronizing her.
"Thanks." She retrieved his cue, adjusted her glasses, and lined up for another shot.
It was a fairly easy one, so he wasn't too worried when she made it. But when she executed a complicated combination, he began to wonder if he'd fall without firing a shot. She could run the table.
If he'd thought he'd beat her and get the answer to his explosion question, he had another think coming. He was more likely to get his ass whipped. Reaching for his beer, he took a couple of fortifying swallows. In the process he happened to glance over at the bar and noticed Archie leaning on it watching with a big smile on his face.
Suddenly Charlie had a horrible thought. Archie was old enough to be Eve's father, but he'd never let little details like that stop him. As much as Charlie loved Archie, he didn't love the idea of Archie putting the moves on Eve. Charlie had seen her first, dammit. But Charlie was going to Nevada. Wasn't he?
He became so absorbed in thinking about leaving town right when he'd discovered the perfect woman that he didn't notice that Eve had stopped shooting. And wonder of wonders, she still had one ball on the table. It wasn't all over.
"Your turn," she said, walking over to retrieve her beer.
Brushing away the unwelcome thought that she might have missed on purpose to make him feel better, he put down his beer and evaluated the situation to see if he could still save himself. He might have a chance if he planned his shots carefully and didn't look at her while she sipped from that Sam Adams bottle.
Her mouth should come with a warning label. One glance and several suggestive thoughts popped into his head. Worse yet, those knowing eyes of hers seemed to be reading his mind. No doubt she could easily spot the lust in his expression after years of having men drool over her.
But because he was interested in her brain, not to mention her ability to play pool, he liked to think his interest was different, more intellectual, more discerning. Yeah, right. That's why he was gazing at her mouth and dreaming about blow jobs. He was the soul of subtle.
With great effort he focused on the balls on the table and told the ones in his pants to cool down so he could concentrate. Nothing good could come from muffing his first shot. A guy with his own pool cue and a habit of practicing every afternoon after work had better come up with the goods.
Fortunately he managed to knock something in, and the technique wasn't half-bad, either. He'd put a satisfying amount of backspin on the cue ball so that it lined up perfectly for his next move.
"Nice screw shot," she said.
"Thanks." He should have guessed she'd know what to call it. Now if only that particular word coming out of her mouth hadn't given him a boner, everything would be ducky.
"You're good," she said. "You have a nice steady rhythm."
Oh, man. Since when had everything turned into a sexual reference? "Thanks," he said again, and
swallowed a groan of frustration.
"I can see why Archie thought I should get a handicap."
"I'm the one who needs the handicap." And he had a doozy pressing against the fly of his jeans.
"Nah. You're doing great."
"I will be if I don't give you any more shots." He pictured how deflated he'd feel if he lost, and that helped his buddy deflate some, too. He knocked in one ball, then managed to sink another. Finally he had a groove going, until he hit a ball too hard because he was showing off. Instead of sliding into the pocket, the ball bounced off the rail. Well, at least he'd blocked her shot.
She put down her beer and wiped her hands on her overalls before she picked up his cue stick. He really liked that she was so careful with it. Then she did the stroking thing, caressing the shaft of his stick, and he was in trouble again.
"I really love your stick," she said.
He almost choked. He managed to say thanks, although he sounded like the Godfather.
"However, I'm not going to use your stick for this one." She walked over to the wall rack and leaned his pool cue carefully against one of the prongs.
Her walk was getting to him too, he realized. Made sense. She walked for a living, prowling down runways while wearing the latest fashion. She was paid to look sexy doing it, and by now her walk was probably ingrained and unconscious. But he was extremely conscious ... of every sway of her hips, every nonchalant shrug of her shoulders.
She wasn't particularly chesty, or at least she didn't seem to be. Hard to tell in the bulky pink sweater and overalls. But chances were she wasn't hugely endowed because most models weren't. That should mean Archie wasn't interested, yet he was still leaning on the bar looking quite interested.
As for Charlie, he didn't care whether a woman was stacked or not. He was intrigued with how they moved, which might have something to do with his engineering background. Eve moved with smooth precision, all parts synchronized. That worked for Charlie.
"I'll try this one." Eve took down the jump cue.
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