“I guess I do,” he admitted.“Here’s me worrying someone will want to date me for my money, and then you come along.”
She bit her lip.“I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“No, you should have,” he immediately countered.Leaning forward, he reached for the hand she’d placed on the table after she’d sipped at her glass for fortification.When their fingers connected, breath whooshed from her lungs.“And that’s why you had to.”
She frowned a little.“I don’t understand what’s happening here.”This felt strange.
So beyond odd that she wasn’t really sure what was happening.She’d never felt like this before, and though El knew that countless women said that on countless first dates, something truly different was happening between them.
He made to speak but Diana popped up.She had a glass of what looked like a Bloody Mary on her tray.
She popped it on the table, and asked, “Would you like to see the menu yet?”
“It’s early,” Ryan pointed out, glancing around the still empty restaurant save for a few early birds.“I knew it was when I set the time.We don’t have to eat yet.We can go to my office?”
She bit her lip, then looked up at Diana who was studying them with curiosity.When Ryan saw where her attention was, he murmured, “Give us a second, Di, please?”
“Sure,” came the bright response and she bounced off, all blond and beautiful, her waves trouncing with each step.
Jeez, she probably had the jocks in her college weeping over the fact she was gay.
“My security will want to check out your office,” she said softly, ducking her gaze with embarrassment.
“Let them,” he replied, not sounding put out by that.
“Really?It’s your confidential business space.We can just stay here.”
“No, I’d like to talk to you in private.”
“You would?”She blinked at him.“What’s going on, Ryan?”
“That’s what I’d like to discuss.”His smile was warm, genuine.“I can’t really do that out here in public.”
“Why not?”What was he going to tell her?That he turned into a wolf when the moon was full?
Inwardly snorting at the thought, she murmured, “Just answer me something.Do you feel this way too?”
‘This way’ boiled down to a simmering need that was slowly overtaking everything.
In fact, it was so pervasive she felt certain she looked like she had permanent sunburn.
Every minute they spent together, the feeling spread through her veins.Unfurling and curling, blossoming in ways she’d never known before.
This kind of response to a man should have terrified her.She’d never felt like this before.Had never thought something like this was possible outside of romance novels, and yet, here she was.About to spontaneously self-combust because she was sharing the same breathing space with a walking, talking Adonis.
A shudder whispered through her when he said, “What do you think?”
“I think I might be making a fool out of myself here,” she whispered, pulling her fingers away from his gentle clasp.
“Never that,” he said, equally as softly, his bright blue eyes dimming a little as his gaze glanced over her.“I feel the pull, El.I feel it probably more than you.”He hesitated, then sotto voce, asked, “If I show you something, do you promise not to freak out?Or, at least, if you freak out, to do so quietly?”
Her brow puckered.“What?”
“Just answer, El.Can you keep calm if I show you something a little weird?”
What the hell was he talking about?Was he about to flash or something?
Heck, this would be the first time ever any woman would willingly be flashed, she thought, her lips twitching in amusement.
