“I might have watched you walk away,” he flirts, showing off a faint dimple in his cheek.
I smirk back, enjoying the feeling of his obvious appreciation. As I turn to head into the restaurant, I catch a whiff of his incredible scent. It’s very subtle, but once I realize it’s coming from him, my legs nearly buckle.
No Old Spice for Peter. He smells like hand soap and black tea, and somehow… that crisp, faintly bitter edge like ozone from too many electronics in a small space. It’s strange and energetic and clean… and somehow warm and cold at the same time. It’s not just a scent, it’s a memory and a feeling—of being surrounded by computers, of feeling at peace, and knowing I’m about to make some lines of code my bitch.
Might as well call it Mad-nip. I’d be the only customer, but bottle that, and I’d buy 1,000. Goddamn, that shit isfresh.
“Careful, Peter,” I say, my voice coming out a little huskier now. “You’re giving away all your secrets.”
“Am I?” His grin is curious now.
I toss him a look over my shoulder. “Well, now I know offering to let me go ahead of you wasn’t about being polite—it was about the view.”
With a deep chuckle that I feel in my core, he shakes his head and reaches in front of me to get the door for me. It brings him so close that I can feel the warmth of his body through our clothes. “I’m fairly certain that’s always been the point of that particular polite gesture. But with a view like this, can you blame a bloke?”
I’m glad my back is to him and he can’t see my face as I react to that—I’m trying to play it cool, here, and my dopey grin would totally give me away. But that was one of the smoothest things I’ve ever heard. And in that accent, no less?
Somebody sedate me.
They seat us in a cozy back corner at a four-person table so we can sit on adjacent sides with the corner between us. He pulls out my chair for me, then shucks off his leather jacket and drapes it on the back of his. Damn. I wish those long sleeves didn’t cover so much.
Like he can sense my disappointment, he starts rolling them up—my own personal forearm burlesque show—and my mouth goes dry, watching more and more colorful, inked flesh being exposed. I’m still staring when he takes his seat, and he gives me a cheeky wink.
Busted.
Wishing I’d remembered to ask for a booth, I shift in my chair. When my legs don’t touch the floor, I prefer to sit crisscross, and there’s usually only enoughroom for it in a booth. Noticing my discomfort, Peter offers to ask for a different table. With a sheepish smile, I let him ask our waiter to move us.
Is this what it feels like to swoon?
Settled at a new table, we chat about the decor of the restaurant until our waiter shows up to take our order, saving the deeper topics for when we won’t be interrupted. Once we’ve got our drinks—a beer for Peter, a marg for me—we jump into it.
“So, tell me about yourself. What do you do?” he asks.
“Little of this, little of that,” I say dismissively, spinning my drink against the table—a fidget to release some anxiety. “What do you do?”
“Erm,” he says, an odd smile on his lips at my refusal to answer. “I work for a cable company—installations, repairs, maintenance.”
That sort of explains the physique. I’ve watched those guys carry spools of wire over their shoulders that I know weigh close to 100 lbs. “Sounds like you’re good with your hands,” I flirt.
“Very,” he flirts back.
“And you like it?”
“It’s a decent job—leaves me plenty of time for hobbies.”
“Hiking? Baking? Candlestick making?”
He chuckles and sits back in his seat. “Tinkering with electronics, mostly. I’ve always been curious about how things work. When I was a boy, my father encouraged me to take things apart so I could teach myself and understand. Didn’t tell my mother, though—she pitched a fit when she came home and her washing machine was in pieces on the laundry room floor.”
A laugh bubbles up in my throat. “Did you put it back together at least?”
His grimace is conspiratorial, making me feel like I’m in on the joke. “In my defense, there were way more parts than I remembered taking out. I’m convinced my father slipped a few extra bolts in there when I wasn’t looking, just to fuck with me.”
I release the chuckle, relishing in the feeling of unexpectedly sharing a sense of humor with someone new. “So you were a bit of a troublemaker.”
“Incorrigibly. Still am,” he winks. Okay,thisis what it feels like to swoon. “What about you?”
“Oh, I’m definitely a troublemaker. Some of my friends would call me more of a menace, though.”
