“I don’t like the way he looks at you,” Tommy muttered, glaring stonily at Kasey’s back.
“He’s just a pompous asshole,” Shaun said and shrugged, setting down her champagne flute on the black linen tablecloth. Looping her arms around Tommy’s neck, she leaned in for a kiss. “Besides, you’re the one that gets to kiss me at midnight.”
Tommy grumbled something unintelligible over the loud music and planted his hands on either side of her waist.
After finishing her glass of champagne, Shaun wandered over to the bar and stood to Jodi’s other side, as far away from Kasey as possible. Tommy headed outside and Shaun’s face fell in annoyance. He had taken up smoking cigarettes again but was hiding it from her. She didn’t care either way, but the sneaking and lying bothered her. If he couldn’t be honest about smoking, what else could he keep from her?
The bartender came over and caught her attention, pointing to her empty glass, and she shook her head, leaning forward on her forearms on the smooth bar top. “Can I get a Paloma?”
The bartender nodded and turned away to mix it. Jodi leaned over and said, “Oooh, that sounds delicious. Maybe I’ll get one of those next.”
Shaun laughed when Free leaned over and murmured, “Do you remember the last time we had tequila? I ended up in jail.”
Jodi laughed and said something about “Guess it’s a good thing Josh isn’t going to show up and provoke you into a fistfight this time” but Shaun wasn’t paying attention. Her eyesmet Kasey’s over Jodi and Free’s shoulders, and he raised his glass, which was filled with a dark amber liquor and took a sip. Her belly did that annoying little flutter when she watched his lips on the rim of the glass, his eyes never leaving hers.
The bartender came back with her tequila and grapefruit cocktail and Shaun thanked him, adding it to their tab. “I need to use the restroom, I’ll be right back,” she whispered to Jodi and then headed across the room.
Staring at herself in the mirror in the blessedly empty women’s powder room, she pressed her palm to her stomach, between her ribs and belly button, the knot of anxiety and annoyance that she always felt around Kasey making her wish she’d either eaten more at dinner, or not consumed as much alcohol.
Washing her hands, she left the ladies room and made her way down a short, dimly lit hallway back toward the door that led to the main room. She stifled a startled yelp when a hand clamped on her wrist at the same time she heard a low, husky drawl from behind her, saying, “Shaun—"
She swung around, colling with his impossibly hard chest.
“Kasey!” she exclaimed, hating the breathlessness in her voice at the feel of his strong, warm fingers clasped securely around her wrist and the way his body was angled against hers from thigh to chest. “Let go.”
But he shook his head, his fingers tightening on her wrist. “Since when are you engaged?”
“What?” Shaun gasped, stunned by the hard edge in his voice.
“Since when are you engaged to that buffoon?” he asked, his words coming out low and laced with animosity.
“Tommyand I have been engaged since Labor Day weekend,” she snapped, tugging at her wrist to no avail. Hisfingers were like a vice around her wrist. “Not that it’s any of your business, Kasey!”
“I don’t like him,” he muttered, his eyes narrowing.
A shocked, ugly snort of laughter escaped her, and then she hissed, “I don’t care if you don’t like him! I don’t likeyou!”
Lowering his mouth to the shell of her ear, he whispered, “Your body tells a different story, darlin’.”
Shaun couldn’t stop the shiver that ran along her entire body when his breath fanned over her ear. But she steeled herself and hissed, “Fuck you. Believe it or not, but not every woman you meet is going to drop to their knees at your feet, you conceited jackass.”
“Don’t be makin’ promises you can’t keep, darlin’,” he murmured, making her shiver again. Damn him. “I’d love to see you on your knees in front of me—”
White hot fury washed over her, and before she could even think of the consequences, her palm had cracked across the side of his face.
She’d never struck someone in her life! What was it about this man that brought out the absolute worst in her?!
She panted in the dim hallway and yanked her wrist out of his grasp. His jaw tightened and fear skittered over her as his eyes narrowed, but then his lips curved into a dangerously dark smirk, and he took a small step toward her so that his mouth was close to her own.
“I can’t wait to unleash all that fire, Shaun. You’re going to burn me alive, baby,” he drawled, his voice a husky murmur. “You’re fucking exquisite. And he can’t handle you.”
“And you think you can?” she sneered, but desire had curled low in her belly. Fucking traitorous libido.
“Wouldn’t you like to find out?” he asked, his lips moving against the skin of her cheek.
“No,” she whispered.
“Liar.”
