My eyes snapped shut.
Did I just say that?
And this was why you should think before you speak, especially when you knew you weren’t at your full brain capacity.
Mortification began to set in, but then I made the mistake of looking up at him. I saw the smirk on his face and knew his mind had gone to the same dirty place as mine.
“Shut up.”
“I didn’t say anything,” he replied with a crooked grin.
“Your face did. And it said plenty,” I shot back.
“Tammy, if you’re more comfortable on your hands and knees in front of me, by all means…”
“Zip it,” I snapped, pointing my finger in his face.
Even before that exchange, the air was exceptionally thick with sexual tension tonight. I was pretty sure he could feel it, too.
But now…now I’d ramped it up.
He said nothing more. Instead, he leaned back in his chair, one arm crossed over his chest, his hand holding the opposite elbow, while his other hand stroked his chin with his fingers thoughtfully.
Not wanting to poke the bear any more than I already had, I turned to the other customers and checked in with everyone, making some more drinks.
Just then, one of my favorite songs came through the speakers. We had a new system where patrons could scan a QR code at their table and choose from a list of a thousand songs that would play in the restaurant. As a kid who grew up in the eighties, I couldn’t help but get excited whenever a good throwback song came on.
Huey Lewis and the News filled the space around me, and I began to sway my hips to the beat.
I began singing along to the song in a low voice just as I walked over to Ray to hand him a new drink since his was low.“I am happy to be to be you.”
Grabbing his old empty glass, I heard him chuckle, and I lifted my eyebrow in question.
He reached over and stroked his thumb over the back of my hand, which was resting on the bar top.
It was so subtle, but I felt an electric current sprint through my veins.
“Tammy, you know that’s not the lyrics, right?” he said, a smile still on his face.
He was probably right—I had a terrible habit of butchering songs—but I also didn’t care.
“Bold of you to assume I care,” I shot back. “I prefer my version.”
He just smiled, his shoulders shaking as he tried to hide his laughter, while I ignored him and kept right on singing in my low voice while I handed out more refills.
Over the next few hours, Ray’s low-key flirting was driving me crazy.
The way his breath felt on my neck when he leaned in to whisper things to me. The delicate, soft touches on my skin—my hand, my elbow, my shoulder. It felt like every touch was a calculated move on his part to keep me thinking of him.
I’d squeezed my thighs together tonight more times than I cared to admit. I thought I’d been doing a good job of hiding it, but after another touch to my hand when I set a new drink in front of him, the look in his eyes and the smile he gave me told me I hadn’t been as surreptitious as I’d thought.
The smile wasn’t one of the casual, carefree ones. It was indulgent—one that made promises of what could happen if I let myself give in to temptation with him, just one more time.
My already quickly fading resolve was now barely clinging to life.
This man was good for my ego, but that also made him dangerous because he was also becoming my weakness.
It also hadn’t helped that he was wearing a short-sleeved shirt tonight that allowed me to see the tattoos on his arms peeking out from under those tight sleeves. I’d never gotten the chance to really explore them like I’d wanted to. I knew his right arm had mostly military insignias, but the other arm and his chest were filled with mysterious designs.
