“Dinner atPelligrini’s.”
“No sex,right?”
“Absolutelyno sex! I don’t run abrothel.”
I could do dinner. Dinner was safe. “Why would someone pay three grand fordinner?”
“Can’t give you any details until you agree to it. So, what’ll itbe?”
If Evelyn found out… I couldn’t even finish that thought without shuddering. I wasn’t a prostitute—this was just about being arm candy to men who didn’t want to spend time getting to know a person—but most people wouldn’t see thedistinction.
Ihadn’t, until Everest explained it to me. He’d met Becca through the agency. Too shy to ask a girl out on a date, he’d paid someone else to do it forhim.
“Okay. But, Sandra… Don’t keep me on the roster after this,okay?”
“You got it,Candy.”
She finally proceeded to give me the details of my date, which I jotted down on the small pad of paper next to the bed, and told me to wear somethingfancy.
I had two nice dresses: one was the black sequin number I’d worn for my “date” with Heath Kolane; the other was a cherry-red silk slip with spaghetti straps that used to beMom’s.
Even though donning something of hers sent a chill straight through my breastbone, I went with thered.
I didn’t want to be reminded of Heathtonight.
* * *
Iwas ready early.I’d applied foundation to my fading bruises. Most had already vanished anyway. And I’d swiped mascara over my lashes and lipstick as red as my dress to my healedlips.
Instead of lingering inside the inn and incurring more of Lucy’s inquisition: “Where was I going dressed up like a…like a…” She hadn’t finished the sentence, but I’d heard the end loud and clear. I told her I had a blind date and not to wait up. Not that she would have waited up. She told me not to get knocked up. I thanked her for her unsolicitedadvice.
I waited in the inn’s driveway, eyes closed, face raised toward the dying sun. The weather was unusually warm for early July, which suited the L.A. girl in me. Winter in Boulder—if I stayed that long—would be especially brutal now that I was used to mildtemperatures.
“Someone’s looking mightyfancy.”
I snapped my lids open and found Lucas hopping out of the passenger side of a dark Mercedes SUV decked out with oversized off-roading tires. And then Liam was there, too, in a short-sleeved, black V-neck, his hair artfully tousled, as though he’d finger-combed it back with styling wax but missed a couplelocks.
How I wished he was covered in warts; it would’ve made disliking him wayeasier.
“Where you going, Clark?” Lucas drawled, coming to a stop in front ofme.
I was glad I’d worn heels, glad for the extra inches. “I’m going to dinner with afriend.”
“You have friends?” heasked.
Jerk.
Liam jabbed his companion. “You look nice,Ness.”
I frowned, unsure what to do with the compliment. I tightened the black leather jacket I’d added to my dress. “Thanks?” Why, oh why, did it have to come out as a question? “What are you guys doinghere?”
“We just came to have a couple beers at our favorite inn,” Lucas said. “Did you think we were coming to hang out withyou?”
I balked. “Why would you ever think I’d want to hang out,Lucas?”
He disregarded my comment. “Ready for trial numberone?”
“Absolutely.” I wasn’t ready. I still hadn’t changed into my wolf form—I hadn’t even tried. I’d been too busy licking my wounds from paintballing to worry about much else. I’d worry about it tomorrow, and if by Saturday I couldn’t change, I’d fake an illness. They wouldn’t force me to competesick.
