by Tate James
I laughed this time, running my fingers through my hot pink hair. “Pretty much. Thanks for the ride, Hunter.”
“Anytime, Cleo,” he replied, and there was a heated undertone to his voice that made me look back as I opened my door. Had he intended that to sound like a proposition? Maybe it was the accent messing with my head. “There’s a bar about two blocks down from here; you can’t miss it. They serve pretty decent food, if you’re hungry later.”
“Was that an invitation?” I blurted out before my mental filter could clamp down on that thought. Could anyone really blame me, though? Hunter was like something straight out of a dirty dream.
A broad grin spread over his face, and I had to pinch my own leg to prevent myself from drooling. “It was a recommendation. But if I happen to be there for a drink around eight, then I’d be offended if you didn’t at least say hello.”
“Noted.” I grinned back and tried to ignore the girlish flutters in my belly. “Thanks again, Crocodile Hunter.”
I quickly hopped out of the low car—praying I hadn’t just flashed my lace thong to Hunter—then closed the door behind me. Giving him a wave through the window, I turned and made my way into the little reception office.
Somehow, this day had managed to turn itself around in the most unexpected way. Hunter’s “recommendation” that I check out the local bar for dinner had me all kinds of excited, so much that I barely even flinched at the dirty room the clerk gave me a key for.
Chapter Two
Considering I had only grabbed my purse out of Jack and hadn’t thought about a change of clothes, I didn’t have much getting ready to do before heading out. The short nap I’d taken after watching trashy TV for a couple of hours had left me groggy, so I splashed my face with cold water to try and wake up more.
“Holy fucking cats, you look like a bag of shit, Cleo,” I muttered to my reflection in the grimy mirror. Running my fingers through my hot-pink hair, I briefly toyed with the idea of just going back to bed. My mind was made up for me, though, when my stomach rumbled loudly.
Besides, I was only lying to myself if I tried to ignore the flutters of anticipation about seeing Hunter again. Damn sexy man and his adorable dimples...
Rifling through my hippie, fringed handbag, I located the necessary makeup items to look less like a vagrant stranded in the middle of nowhere and more like a sexy, put-together woman.
“Good enough,” I told myself when I was finished and used the edge of my pinkie to smear some gloss across my lips. I’d used shimmering gold shadows and inky black liner to highlight what I deemed to be my best feature—my eyes. They were an unusual shade, even for my heritage. Almost cat-like, they were a tawny shade of yellow under some lights. Even more so when I used gold shadows.
Tucking my room key into my bag, I slung the long strap across my body before stuffing my feet back into my beat-up, old combat boots. I was too frugal to take a taxi such a short distance, so I chose to brave the freezing temperatures and power walk my butt down the street. If I was lucky, I’d make it before the impending storm hit.
True to Hunter’s directions, the bar was impossible to miss. Two blocks down from the motel, it was possibly the only bar in the entire town. It had flashing neon signs in the window indicating it was open, just in case the loud music and people holding drinks weren’t clear enough.
Stepping inside just as the rain started falling, I discovered why the music was so loud. A live rock band was on a small, raised stage, thrashing away on their instruments like they were playing to a stadium. Admittedly, they were damn good, which made me wonder what the hell they were doing in a random, blink-and-you-miss-it town like this.
I made my way across to the bar but couldn’t seem to tear my eyes from the band. Or, if I was more specific, from the guitar player. He was, in a word, mesmerizing.
Midnight-black hair fell loose, brushing his broad, strong shoulders, which were covered by a form fitting black top. His skin was bronze, similar to my own, and from where I stood, his eyes seemed almost totally black. He was so tall he would easily dwarf me if I tried to kiss him, considering I was all of five foot four
Why the hell I was picturing myself kissing this total stranger I had no freaking idea. Maybe hunger was making me delirious or something.
“He’s pretty good, huh?” A man spoke into my ear, and I jumped, squeaking with fright as I spun around. Hunter stood there, watching me with an amused smirk that made me second guess whether maybe he could read minds.
My gaze flickered back to the band, to the guitar player, before I cleared my throat and gave Hunter my full attention. “Yeah, they’re great. How come they’re not making it big in LA or somewhere?”
Hunter shrugged, a gesture that was not at all meant to be sexy but managed to draw my attention to his own broad shoulders anyway. What was up with this freaking town? Had I actually died somewhere on my journey and this was heaven?
“They only play for enjoyment; none of them have any interest in making money off it. Besides, they only formed their band a few weeks back.” He tipped his head towards the bar. “Have you eaten yet? I was just about to order a burger, if you’d like me to get you one too?”
My belly rumbled its acceptance, which was thankfully drowned out by the loud music. “Sounds great.” I nodded.
While Hunter made his way to the bar to order, I snagged a tall table with two bar stools as a middle-aged couple left.
“Good score,” Hunter commented as he joined me, carrying a table number and two frosty bottles of beer.
“Beer, huh?” I remarked, taking the offered drink and peering at the label.
Hunter paused with his own drink halfway to his mouth and gave me an uncertain look. “Shit, that was presumptive. Do you even drink?”
As tempted as I was to mess with him and say no, I was genuinely thirsty and not fussy in the least. “It’s fine,” I assured him with a grin, then took a long sip. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, Cleo,” he smiled back, and once again I got the impression he was purring my name. It was the strangest thing, but maybe I’d been spending too much time with cats rather than people.
“Tell me a bit about yourself, Hunter,” I prompted after a pause. His gaze on me was just that little bit too intense, like he was reading my mind again, and I needed to break the tension.
“What would you want to know?” he asked, cocking his head to the side and not taking his eyes off me.
Shifting slightly on my stool, I ran my fingers through my neon hair and averted my gaze back to the band. “I don’t know; that’s why I’m asking. What is a guy like you doing in a middle-of-nowhere town like this? You’re Australian, right?”
I glanced back to him, and he nodded. “Sure am. Sydney boy, born and raised.”
“So, how did you end up here?”
Hunter finally took his eyes from me and tipped his head to the stage where the gorgeous, bronzed god was still jamming out on his guitar.
“Came over to visit Raze—that devastatingly handsome bastard on guitar—and just never quite made it home again.” There was something off in the way he said this, like the humor had suddenly dropped out of his voice. “Maybe one day I’ll make it back.”
I raised my eyebrows at him. “Well, that sounds like a story.”
He gave me another devastatingly sexy smile and took a long—seriously seductive—sip of his beer. “Story for another day. Why don’t you tell me about you, Cleo? You’re clearly an animal lover.”
“Because I’m on my way to rescue kittens?”
He nodded. “That and all of your tattoos have got animals incorporated somewhere. Or the ones I can see so far do.”
I choked a little on the sip of beer I’d just taken, my mind fixating on his suggestion that he might see more of my ink later… with considerably less clothing. Damn, this dude was doing a number on my libido.
“Good call,” I replied when I trusted my voice not to sound too sexed up. With my free hand,
I rubbed a finger across the foxes on my chest and tried not to think about the big cats woven into the design under my clothes. All that would do was make me picture Hunter taking my shirt off and—
“My best friend, Meg,” I explained, “she owns her own tattoo parlor and uses me as a living canvas.” I didn’t bother explaining that I had been letting her tattoo me in increasingly more obvious places, like my neck or the backs of my hands, because of my intense need to piss off my straight-laced, pearl-clutching mother.
Hunter smiled, his gaze following my finger across my chest ink. “Well, she’s a talented artist.” He paused then as a waitress arrived and dropped two identical burgers on our table. “Crap, I didn’t even ask if you were a meat eater.”
With the tip of my finger, I tilted the top bun up on my burger and inspected the heavy meat patty and strips of bacon.
“Quit second-guessing yourself, Hunter,” I told him, picking up the whole thing to take a bite. “Love beer and meat. Just ‘cause I look like a Portland hipster doesn’t mean I’m a vegan.”
Hunter snorted a laugh and took a bite of his own burger. For a while, we ate in comfortable silence, listening to the band play and sipping our drinks.
It wasn’t until the band took a break that I hopped off my stool and went to grab us more drinks. I’d been nursing an empty bottle for most of the last song but hadn’t really wanted to take my eyes off Hunter’s friend—Raze.
I paid the bartender for two more beers, then almost dropped the damn things when I arrived back to our table and found the object of my attention casually chatting with the sexy Australian who I was equally as attracted to.
Fucking hell, who knew small towns were the place to meet hot men?
“Cleo, this is Raze,” Hunter introduced us. “I was just telling him how I rescued you from the side of the road today.”
I dipped my head in a nod, avoiding the stunning man’s intense gaze. Up close, his eyes were green but seemed almost backlit, like a wild cat at night.
“Uh, yeah,” I mumbled. “I was having a pretty shitty day, so it was a good thing Hunter found me when he did.”
There was a bit of an awkward pause, and I could feel Raze staring at me. Or was he glaring? It was really hard to tell without staring back, and for some reason I was too scared to meet his gaze, instead choosing to focus on the ink curling over the back of his hand and up his strong forearm.
“If your day was so shit, why are you drinking this piss water?” he asked me finally, and shock made me glance up. His face was serious, and I couldn’t work out if he was joking or not. On closer inspection, I decided he was probably Native American rather than Middle Eastern or North African like me.
“Are you... accusing me of lying?” I spluttered, frowning at the handsome asshole. “I wouldn’t make up a day as shitty as I was having. No one could make that crap up.”
He shrugged one of those broad, muscular shoulders and quirked a brow. Not once had he blinked that I’d seen. “I’m just saying, you might want something a bit stronger.”
Without waiting for my response, he sauntered towards the bar with a sexy swagger, and I caught myself staring at his denim-clad ass the whole way, until Hunter let out a long sigh.
“What?” I feigned innocence, turning back to my new friend.
He rolled his eyes and took a sip of his beer. “You,” he replied, “drooling over Raze. Here I was thinking that I might have been in with a chance seeing as I met you first.”
This made me choke a little on my own drink again, and I did a bit of a double take to check that he wasn’t joking. He was grinning, sure, but did that mean he was kidding? Why was it so damn hard to tell?
“You’re kidding, right?” I decided it was easier to just ask rather than assume.
He arched a brow at me. “No, why would I be kidding? That wanker constantly gets the girls. Here I was thinking my accent would work for me, but he has to swoop in all brooding and angry with that gorgeous hair and strong jawline. Ugh. I hate him.”
I squinted at Hunter for a moment, feeling like I’d just stepped into an alternate universe or something. Seriously, Allison and her Underland had freaking nothing on the craziness that was Hunter questioning his own attractiveness.
“Okay, now I know you’re fucking with me. You look like the sort of guy who would be a jeans model or an actor or something. Aren’t all you Australian men related to the Hemsworths, anyway?” I gave a nervous laugh, grasping at my necklace and rubbing my thumb over the pendant.
Hunter barked a short laugh. “Not quite, but are you saying I’m still in the game here, Cleo?”
“I don’t know what game you’re talking about, but if you’re trying to make me say I’m attracted to you, then yeah, I am. You’re stupid hot; you both are. Happy?” I tucked my necklace back inside my shirt and picked at the label on my bottle while I desperately searched for a change of subject.
Thankfully, Raze returned then carrying a full bottle of whiskey and four shot glasses, saving me from what was sure to turn into a super awkward conversation. Not that it wasn’t already.
“Who’s the fourth for?” I asked, curious.
“Boden,” Raze replied, then didn’t elaborate. He really did have the brooding thing down as he poured out three of the glasses and handed one to me without another word.
Hunter took his and clinked it against mine before downing it in one gulp. “He lives with us,” Hunter explained as I drank my own whiskey a little slower. “But I thought he wasn’t getting back to town until later tonight?” This question was aimed at Raze who just shrugged.
“So, you three live together?” I asked when it became clear Raze wasn’t replying to Hunter about their third friend’s whereabouts. It was a dumb question, given Hunter had just said as much, but sitting opposite these two was making my brain malfunction.
Again, without really meaning to, my fingers found my necklace and fiddled with the pendant.
“That’s an interesting necklace, Cleo,” Raze remarked, his voice somewhat sharper than a casual observation required. Hunter must have thought so, too, because the table jerked as he kicked his friend in the leg.
Glancing down at the pendant between my fingers, I nodded. “Thanks. I got it in a junk store when I was a kid. I’d just gotten to the age where I actually understood that I was adopted, and my friend Meg and I went a bit nuts researching my Egyptian heritage. So, when I saw this in a shop, I just... had to have it.” I traced the little hieroglyphics carved into the metal disk with my fingertip. “It’s probably a bit stupid that I’m still wearing it after all these years, given it was just a cheap knock-off.”
“Not stupid at all,” Hunter corrected me with a small frown. “It clearly speaks to you, and that’s all that matters.”
“Do you know what it says?” Raze asked, still in that sharp tone that made me feel a bit on edge.
I shook my head and responded with sarcasm. “No. In case you weren’t aware, ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics aren’t commonly taught at school in Oregon.” His tone had been that perfect blend of snarky and condescending that made my blood boil. Pretty soon we would come to verbal blows. Or I’d just kick him in the balls, one or the other.
He must have come to the same realization because he gave me a tight, insincere smile and poured us all another shot. “Of course. Just wondered if you’d looked it up. No need to get catty about it, Cleo.”
My eyes narrowed, and I opened my mouth to bite back at him, but Hunter’s hand on my wrist stopped me. He turned my hand over and pushed my sleeve up a bit to reveal my freshest ink—a cute cartoon voodoo doll with a pink bow. Meg and I got them on a trip to New Orleans recently, and it was the only one I had that wasn’t done by Meg herself.
“This is cute,” Hunter commented, stroking the doll with his fingers.
I wasn’t even going to pretend that I didn’t shiver at his touch. It felt like he’d just zapped me with electricity or something... except the jolt went all the way to my
sex drive. Weird. Not that I was complaining; it had been a long-ass time since any guy had lit me up like that.
“Souvenir,” I explained, feeling my heart thundering in my chest and desperately hoping I was pulling off casual-cool and not needy–turned on. “Do you have any tattoos, Hunter?”
His lush lips curved up, and his chocolate-brown gaze captured mine in a way-too-heated moment. “You’ll have to wait and see, Cleo.”
Ugh, there he goes again, purring my name. So freaking hot.
“Tone it down,” Raze snapped, and I jerked out of Hunter’s grip. For a moment I’d forgotten we weren’t alone and had somehow ended up leaning intimately close to the Australian Adonis.
Clearing my throat uncomfortably, I took a huge gulp of my whiskey and almost missed the irritated glare Hunter shot his friend.
“Don’t you have another set to play or something?” he prompted, jerking his head back to the small stage where Raze’s bandmates stood chatting but clearly waiting for him to return. “Go on, mate. I’m perfectly capable of entertaining Cleo alone.”
The bigger man scowled at his friend, his inky-black lashes framing those glowing green eyes in a way that made my breath catch—in arousal or fear, I couldn’t be totally sure.
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Raze muttered but placed his glass back on the table and returned to his band anyway.
Alone with Hunter once more, I shifted on my stool and poured another shot of whiskey. The strange feeling of intimacy when he’d touched my skin was making me uncomfortable in retrospect. What the hell had just happened? It was like the whole room had disappeared from around us and all I had been able to focus on was him. Hunter.
“Okay, spill it,” I ordered him, sick of asking myself questions I had no answers for.
“Spill what?” he replied, arching a brow at me but not losing the amused tilt to his lips. Did he know how badly his innocent touch had affected me?
I narrowed my eyes at him. “There’s something weird going on here. It’s not normal to break down in the middle of nowhere, only to be rescued by the sexiest import since Hugh Jackman and his drool-worthy bad-boy best friend. So what gives? Why are you two here in this blink-and-you-miss-it town, why do you seem so interested in me, and what the hell just happened when you touched me? This isn’t normal, Hunter.” Alcohol was loosening my tongue, but really I wasn’t all that reserved normally.