“More like private.”
He arched one of his glorious eyebrows. “Same diff.”
“So tell me, then. When was the last time you had sex before me?”
His eyes blinked like a defibrillator. “Wow.”
“What’s wrong? Is that a secret?” I tilted my head to the side and cocked a brow. “Or do you just prefer to keep it private?” My voice came out raspier than I’d intended.
He pressed his lips together, then snorted a laugh. “Touché.” His gorgeous mouth curved into a frown. “So you really didn’t see me in the coffee shop?”
“It’s possible,” I conceded. “We were pretty busy, but there might have been someone who looked like you.”
“I’ve probably been in that coffee shop a hundred times thisyear alone. How have we never met?”
“And I’ve been in your market nearly every day.” I moaned, thinking of the food there.
Mistake. Bas stared at my mouth, and I realized suddenly how close we stood. How the shelves pressed in on us, encouraging us. I swallowed back a memory of his cabinets rattling below me as I clung to him and begged him to fuck me harder.
“What do you typically buy at the market?” His voice came out thick, and he might as well have been coaxing me to come for him again. My heart skipped a beat, and heat pooled between my thighs.
“That Kahlua-soaked tiramisu for starters. Oh my God.” Were we seriously going to talk about food while his dark eyes sought mine, while he had me backed into the corner of this store—alone?
“Yeah?” He licked those fucking irresistible lips, a smile creeping its way out. “I created that. It’s not exactlyorganic, but—”
“But it’s orgasmic.” Had I just said that out loud? “I’ve drawn up legislation to make it legal to marry it.”
He coughed a laugh. “What else?”
“The baklava. Don’t tell me you make that, too.”
“You have a sweet tooth?”
“Yeah, but I also get the mushroom raviolis. The pasta there is to die for.”
I loved how his eyes shone, how his neck flushed whenever I praised his cooking. Or maybe the proximity was killing him, too.
“I’d love to cook something for you sometime.”
Oh. Not where I saw this going. “Thanks, but—”
“But you’re not in the market for a boyfriend.” He pressed those succulent lips together. “No strings. Just dinner.”
I considered it. And it would check another item off my list:Let someone cook you dinner.But it sounded too domestic. Too much like a real date, which was why Elizabeth had added it to the list in the first place. She knew what it would mean for me to let someone get that close. I shook my head.
“Are you trying to lure me back to your place?”
He ran his thumb over his chin, and I objectified the scruff that once scratched against my inner thighs. “You’ve already been to my place.”
True.
I pictured us there. The way he looked at me when he’d stripped me bare, both figuratively and literally. “You know I can buy your food any time I want it.”
And there it was. That disappointment on his face at last. The realization his persistence wouldn’t pay off this time, and I wasn’t worth the effort. He reached out like he was going to caress my hair. Holding my breath, I braced for the spark of urgent need his touch would ignite.
Instead, he pulled out a bottle of Ca’ Bea del Maniero from the rack behind me.
“Good choice,” I said, my lips flattening.
