“Yes. Thanks. Congratulations on getting the drink right.”
He turned, planted a forearm on the bar, showing off that beautiful hand, kicked a heel up on the rail, and leaned back to survey the crowd. “Seemed like the least a man could do. Plus, he was wearing cuff links. Poser.”
This time, she laughed. “Ten bucks says he has an arrow tattoo of some kind.”
“Eight inches of it along his forearm. Not that he’s asking you to measure.” His eyes lit up some more. She could see that, because she was swiveled the other way. Towards him. When had that happened? “Signifying courage and direction and toughness, except not. You know what would be a real good line of work? Tattoo removal. A man could make a killing around about ten years from now.”
A killin’, he’d said. If his voice was honey, it was the amber variety. Dark, rich, and pouring out slow. Some honeycomb in there, too, a few rough edges to go with all the smooth.
“On the other hand,” she said, “there shouldn’t be anything wrong with people presenting themselves in a way that makes them feel confident, should there? That’s what I keep circling back around to, even though being snarky is more fun.”
Whoa. She’d only had one drink, and here she was being all honest. She definitely wasn’t used to going out anymore.
“Pretty people shouldn’t judge, you think?” he asked. “Unfair, maybe?”
He didn’t ask it in an arrogant way, or a flirtatious way, either. More of a thoughtful way, like he looked reality in the face. “Yes,” she said, “I think so. We all put on our armor, don’t we? Even deciding you aren’t going to try to look your best is making a statement. Armor of a different kind, maybe.”
“Hmm,” he said, the golden-brown eyes intense under the dark brows. “Sounds like you’re thinking of somebody in particular. It can’t be you, because you did try, even though you make it look easy.”
“I was,” she said. “Thinking of somebody in particular, I mean. My sister. She thinks that paying too much attention to grooming is giving men power over her. I think it could be the opposite. I dress for myself, and if the way I look gives me more confidence? That’s not a bad thing, at least I can’t see how. Confidence gives you power, including the power to say no. But then, fashion is my job. I’m required to think it’s important, you could say.”
He didn’t look predatory, not exactly. If he had, she’d have sent him on his way. The bartender had already checked him out, she could tell from the way he was looking over here. He wasn’t moving closer, so the guy had passed muster there as well. What he was…it was focused. But casual, like his ego wasn’t in this, and it wasn’t a game. Like he was actually interested. “Somehow,” he said, “that doesn’t surprise me. About the fashion. What, exactly? You make decisions. That’s obvious.”
“I have a shop,” she said. She didn’t say lingerie. She liked him, yes, but moving this thing much further would be a bad idea. You didn’t go for the hundred-meter-freestyle medal the first time you jumped into the pool. But…You make decisions. That’s obvious. That was breath-stealing all by itself.
“A shop, huh,” he said, clearly rolling the idea over in his mind. “I could see that.” He looked at the drink she hadn’t made a move to take, and then at her face again. When he spoke, his voice was…gentle. It took her by surprise. “We could have the guy take that drink away,” he said, “and bring you another one. One that you could watch him make. Won’t hurt my feelings.”
She looked at him, startled. He smiled, purely rueful, and something happened that took her a moment to recognize.
Something she hadn’t felt for a long, long time. A flutter in her belly, and something, if possible, even less familiar.
A flutter in her heart.
Her eyes weren’t blue, Rafe found. They were deep brown, liquid and soulful. Which would make the hair not natural, except that if that was the work of a colorist, it was a bloody good one.
She had style, too, to go with the confusing shirt. Her earrings were made of blue feathers, their ends dipped in silver and dropping halfway to her shoulders. Three silver hoop bracelets fell down her forearm when she raised a hand to touch her hair, and she was wearing absolutely no rings. A statement, maybe. If so, it was one he was all good with.
There wasn’t room to sit. There was barely room to stand, and he didn’t care. She was swiveled around to face him, sipping at that second drink he’d had the bartender mix for her, her face moving from smiling to serious like clouds across the sun. Or across the moon, maybe, because despite the golden hair, she was more mysterious than sunny, more serene than shining. And her perfume was so delicate and floral, it was barely there.
“I’m Clay, by the way,” he told her. “Clay Austin.” He’d thought about telling her the truth, but how long had it been since he’d met a woman who had no clue who he was? She liked him. Plain brown eyes, blue jeans, and all. He wanted to keep things right here.
“Li—Lindsay,” she said, a faint touch of pink appearing in her cheeks. She added hastily, “You’re not from here, though. Or not originally.”
“West Virginia. Just visiting.” It didn’t escape him that she hadn’t told him her last name. “And Lindsay’s a pretty name, but I’m surprised.”
“Oh?” Her blush went a tiny bit deeper, but there was no indentation or any tan line on that ring finger, so that couldn’t be it. “Why?”
“Seems like a Lindsay would be sporty,” he said. “A rock climber. But maybe that is you.”
She smiled, soft and sweet, and bloody hell, but she had dimples in both cheeks. She said, “I ride a bicycle in the summer. I garden, too. Does that count?”
“Mm,” he said, then lost the plot a little.
“What are you thinking?” she asked him, then shook her head, making the feathers brush against her skin, and said, “Whoa. Wait. That’s one of those questions women should never ask. It’s been a while.”
Ah. “Now that,” he said, “doesn’t surprise me. Or it does, but…not. I keep thinking, ‘What is she doing here alone?’ And then forgetting to think it. I’m wondering where your shop is, and where you’re from, and…” He laughed and took a final sip of beer. “And when I can see you again,” he confessed. “Dumb, since, if I don’t make a better effort, I won’t see you any more right now. Let me try this again. We could get something to eat. I’m sure there’s a restaurant around here somewhere. After that, maybe you’d like to take that independence of yours out for a spin. Wherever you like.”
She looked at him from under her lashes. “What if I choose bowling? Maybe I’m a champion bowler. Could be embarrassing.”
He was grinning like a fool. He couldn’t help it. “Then I’ll attempt,” he said, “to lose with grace.”
By the time Lily had finished that second Flirtini, she’d decided, with the kind of reckless abandon that wasn’t one bit like her, that the lady’s pleasure was karaoke. Just because she’d never done it, and she’d imagined sitting across a restaurant table from Clay, wondering how she was coming across and feeling the anxiety creeping in, and she couldn’t stand it. She wanted to be spontaneous. She wanted to have fun. She wanted to be carefree Lindsay, who rock-climbed and…and sang karaoke if she wanted to.
When she suggested it, Clay said, “Now, that sounds like a real good idea,” signed a credit-card slip without making a big deal of it, helped her on with her coat, led the way out of the bar and through the lobby, and told to the doorman standing under the awning, out of the rain, “Taxi, please. To wherever the karaoke and the food are both decent.”
The doorman nodded, blew hard on an eardrum-piercingly loud whistle, and waved an arm, and a yellow cab pulled to the curb almost instantly. Lily told Clay, “You realize that an Uber would be half the cost.”
He said, “But then you’d have to wait, and I wouldn’t be doing my job,” stepped back so the doorman could hold the umbrella over her on the way to the cab, and slipped him a bill with enough discretion that Lily couldn’t se
e how much it was. The sight of it had the doorman paying attention, though, so it wasn’t any five. And the whole thing may have had her knees going a little wobbly.
She knew that letting a man spoil you, believing he could protect you, was the road to perdition, or at least to dependence. But just for tonight, maybe she could allow herself to slip into it, like spending a night on the couch in your PJ’s, eating chocolate ice cream and watching weepy movies. Every once in a while, you needed a treat, right? And she’d never had a treat quite as good as him. So she leaned back in the seat, emboldened by the darkness, the spatter of water on the cab windows, and the shine of streetlights on wet pavement, and told him, “You may live to regret going along with this idea. I’ve never done much singing in public.”
“Nah,” he said, sitting over on his side and not making any moves at all. “We’re having fun. You don’t need to be good to have fun.”
“Life’s not a competition? That’s not an opinion most men share.”
He didn’t tell her that he wasn’t “most men,” like just about every man she’d ever known would have. Instead, he said, “That so? They’re missing out, then. I’ll tell you what. We’ll make a pact. We’ll both make a little bit of a fool of ourselves, and we won’t care.” He held out his right hand. “Deal?”
She slipped her hand into his, got a tingle like she’d been shocked, and saw him go still. His hand was big and warm, and his palm was harder than she’d expected. She swallowed, did her best to control her voice, and said, “Deal.”
Any other man would have kept holding her hand, too, or would have done something else, one of their little tricks that were supposed to make you tremble. Running their thumb over your palm or whatever cheesy move they’d read in a magazine.
Clay, though? Clay let her go.
She didn’t expect nearly enough, Rafe thought. However much confidence he’d seen in those first minutes—a confidence that he could swear wasn’t faked—he heard the lack of expectation in what she said, and in what she didn’t. And in the split second of surprise when he did anything halfway decent. Wary and wild as a bird, making you want to hold still just to see if you could bring her around, because that bird was so pretty, and all you wanted to do was stroke it.
Gently, though. If you were rough, if you moved too fast, she’d fly away, and you wouldn’t get her back.
When they’d climbed the steps to the Japanese karaoke bar and restaurant and were threading their way through the dim lighting behind the waitress, he saw her shoulders relax. The woman on stage wasn’t doing the song any favors at all, but she was laughing right along with the group of girlfriends who were sitting around three tables shoved together and whooping it up. They were all wearing wreaths on their heads, for some bizarre reason, that seemed to be made of tissue, and the whole thing was pretty amateur and not one bit intimidating.
Perfect.
“Bachelorette party, I’ll bet,” Lindsay said, seating herself as gracefully and composedly as she’d done everything else. The woman on stage, whose tissue wreath was white, was doing a bump and grind now. And singing, oddly, Tom Jones’s “She’s a Lady.”
“You got it,” the waitress said. “Wild night. That’s the bride up there. What can I bring you?”
Lindsay glanced at him, and he asked her, “What would you think about champagne?”
She laughed, sounding a little giddy, and there were those dimples again. “I’d love it. And I’d think that I’ve had two pretty strong drinks already, and that I still have to drive home.”
The waitress said, “I’ll give you a few minutes,” and vanished, but Rafe didn’t pay much attention. He focused one hundred percent on Lindsay and asked, “How about if I sent you home in a taxi? Where’s your car?”
She hesitated. “Hotel garage, back at the Clift. And that would be a steep fare. I’m not staying in the City. Plus—there my car would be, stuck overnight.”
Staying. She didn’t live here, then. But neither did he. “I tell you what,” he said. “I’ll promise to take care of all that, I’ll let you pour your own champagne, and we’ll burn down the house.”
She glanced at him sidelong, half-flirting and half-serious. “I know I should ask you what you do for a living and all of that,” she said, “and I definitely ought to tell you that this isn’t going to be worth your while, but I’m floating in a bubble right now, and it feels so good.”
He’d had exactly one beer, and he couldn’t feel his feet. She was in a bubble? He was all the way up at the ceiling. “Then,” he said, “let’s keep doing it. It’s already worth my while.” And when the waitress came back, he did order that champagne. The best they had, which wasn’t anything very choice, but that was all right. After that, he let Lindsay pour her own, applauded at some more drunken and fairly mediocre singing, and studied the song list with her.
“I want to try,” she eventually said, setting the list down with a sigh. “I’m just not sure I can pull it off.”
“Want to do it along with me first, then?” he asked. “Ease into it?”
“I should have gone for the bowling,” she said, but she was laughing again, her eyes teasing him from over her champagne glass. “At least I know how to bowl. Vaguely. My dad bowled. Except that you probably have a secret bowling championship in your past. Is there anything that fazes you?”
“You have no idea,” he said. “At this moment? Yeah. There sure is. I’m kinda knocked off my feet, in fact.” And having a hard time staying in character, too. “But I’m going ahead anyway. We’re having an adventure, remember? I’m willing to make a fool of myself if you are. That was our deal. I’ll go sign us up for this one. You can sing backup, or you can take a turn. Your choice.”
He went over to the karaoke jockey, handed him a twenty, and put his name on the list. The bloke took the tip, but said, “I keep a strict rotation, man. Can’t get you in there any quicker.”
“That’s fine,” Rafe said, remembering not to say “No worries” at the last minute. “We’ll wait.”
The bloke peered at him more closely. “Do I know you?”
“Nope,” Rafe said. “I’m new in town.”
“Uh-huh,” the bloke said, but then, there was that twenty, and more where that came from. So Rafe went back to the table and drank some more champagne along with whisper-light tempura vegetables and prawns that were heaps better than the alcohol, and later on, tender bites of chicken on skewers, and they didn’t talk about what the fictitious Clay did for a fictitious living, or where Lindsay was visiting from. And when the DJ called his name, he stood up, took Lindsay by the hand, took her over to the table to pick up their microphones, and told her, “Remember. We got this. Loud and proud. If you’re going to go—go big.”
If he had anything to say about it, that bird was going to fly.
Clay took her up the steps to the stage fast, and when they got there, he grinned.
How did he do that? Do nothing but smile at you, and make that bubble float even higher? The champagne fizzed all the way to her feet, or maybe that was his hand around hers and the warmth in his eyes.
The big monitor in the back of the room lit up, but he didn’t look at it. He looked at her. And as soon as the first insistent note sounded over the speakers, it was like you’d flipped a switch.
He wasn’t Pharrell Williams. His voice was too deep, and he was too tall, too muscular, and much too obviously masculine to be any kind of teenage heartthrob. But he sang that song with absolute assurance, and from the first word, he owned the room. He sang that he was happy, and he made you feel it, too. It could be the way his feet were moving. Clay could sing and dance.
Somehow, she was clapping along, adding her voice as much as she dared, and getting her own body going. She couldn’t sing, not all by herself, but there was one thing she could do just fine. She could dance.
He saw her and grinned some more, but he didn’t miss a beat. He was smiling, he was singing, and he had the room rocking. It was for her
, but it was for all of them, too, like he had so much life inside, it had to spill over. The DJ had gone to town with the light show, and the yellow spot, then the pink one, were lighting them up, pulsing like they were on Broadway. The bachelorettes, meanwhile, were on their feet, clapping and singing background along with Lily. They were all in that bubble together, with Clay pulling them higher with his voice and his body and his energy, to where gravity let go. To where you were weightless.
Tomorrow, they’d pick up their troubles again. But right here and now, they were happy. And every one of them, probably including the bride, would have traded places with Lily in a heartbeat.
More and more, higher and higher, and nearly everyone was on their feet now, letting it all go, like Clay had them on strings. Like it was the Fourth of July, and they were the fireworks.
She wasn’t just floating anymore. She was singing, she was dancing, and she was soaring. She was flying free.
An hour later, the bottle was upside down in a bucket of melting ice, the noise level had risen another twenty decibels, every seat in the place was full, and the energy was pulsing like nobody here had realized before what living was, but now they knew. And Lily was up on the stage again and singing her heart out. The best part was—Clay was letting her do it.
“I’m still standing,” she announced to the room, flinging her arm wide and belting the song out like a woman who believed it, not to mention like a woman who could sing. Loud and proud, Clay had said, and that was how she felt. The man himself did a spin and a complicated series of moves that had her tossing the song to him with an extravagant gesture and doing some dancing of her own. By the time they’d finished and the applause had started, her hair had long since come out of its knot, she was sweating more than a lady probably should, and she was laughing out loud and letting Clay twirl her, his hands around her waist, her arms around his neck and her feet off the floor, like she weighed nothing at all. Or like he was just that strong.
Tempting as Sin Page 3