“You find that hard to believe?”
“Can’t say I’ve met many matchmakers at hotel bars.”
He lifts a light-colored brow. “Does that mean you frequent hotel bars?”
I shake my head, enjoying our easy back and forth that’s starting to feel a lot like flirting. “No, can’t say that I do, actually.”
“What about bars in general?”
His eyes penetrate mine, and I can’t look away. I find myself wishing it was brighter in here so I could see the different layers of blue within the depths of his irises. I lean forward in my seat, as if a string is pulling us closer, a building zing of attraction sparking between us.
“No,” I say.
“Wineries?” He asks.
I smile and look down at my glass of red. “I wish.”
“Why just wish?”
I look back up from my glass. “You’re not from here, are you?”
E leans back in the booth and shakes his head. “That obvious?”
“I mean, you are in a hotel bar. But as I mentioned, Grove City isn’t known for its wineries. Our closest one is an hour away. It’s also winter.”
“Right,” he says. I pause before I ask, “Where are you from? And what brings you here—a Valentine’s Matchmaker Convention?”
E laughs, the sound like a sinful melody. “Something like that.”
“Shit, really?”
He leans forward so we can see each other better. Only amplifying the crackling energy between us that I couldn’t ignore if I tried.
“I was in town to make matches.”
“Looking to set up lonely souls at a hotel bar, or get business from heartbroken ones?”
E slides his wine glass to the side so he can place his arms on the table. With his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, the candlelight flickers over his thick forearms. With the light, I can also see there’s a bit of stubble on his curved jaw and different shades of blond in his curls.
“If you were to ask me that thirty minutes ago, I would have said yes.”
My fingers tighten around the stem of the wine glass. “That’s changed now?” My voice comes out quieter than I expected it to, and I almost look away from E’s simmering stare.
“It has.”
I debate asking my next question, because there is only one thing that could have changed in the last thirty minutes, and that’s him meeting me. But I need to know.
“And what are you here for now?”
E maintains our eye contact as he takes his arms from the table and slides toward me in the booth, moving our coats to theopposite side of him. When I don’t protest his actions, he gets closer until we’re side-by-side. The heat of his body radiates into my very being, lighting my core, and quickening the wings of the butterflies that have refused to settle in my stomach since I met him.
He places one of his hands on my knee under the table and dips his head till his lips are near my ear. “To find someone for myself.”
I shiver at E’s declaration, my nipples tightening beneath my black V-neck sweater. Between his touch and his words, every thought of Ricky and my ruined relationship have vanished. I’ve barely thought about what brought me here since the moment I stepped into this bar.
I should be more upset about my breakup, a normal person would be, but I haven’t shed a single tear. I didn’t scream, or even get angry, not even during the hour I spent aimlessly driving before ending up here. Maybe I should be concerned about that.
Instead, all I can think about is this mysterious man, whose full name I don’t even know, making a move on me in a very public hotel bar. A matchmaker, no less, who doesn’t even live here.
