“I’m here to meet G.B.” Wow, didn’t that sound like a protest.
He dropped his unshaken hand. “What’s that got to do with me?”
“Wait, I thought he asked you to get me and take me backstage?”
“When I said I came for you, I can assure you, it was not on anybody else’s behalf.”
Cait’s mouth nearly fell open, but she caught it in time. Although come on, it wasn’t like she was sporting any swagger over here, what with the blushing routine and the self-talk about her very non-Girls existence.
“Three thirty,” he repeated.
“I’m sorry, I already have … plans.”
“I work at the Iron Mask. Use the staff entrance in from the back parking lot. Ask for me.”
Cait frowned. “Quick question here. Does this approach actually work for you?”
“I’ve never used it before. So you tell me.”
“I don’t like cavemen. And I do not sleep with strangers.”
“I gave you my name. I’m the one at the disadvantage on that.”
Bullshit he had any disadvantage. But at least he didn’t deny that this was just about sex.
He leaned in. “Don’t tell me you didn’t think about me last night.”
“Are you always this arrogant?”
“I don’t worry about what other people think.”
“And what if that kind of attitude doesn’t get you where you want to go.”
He shrugged and resettled against the wall. “You want this, too. Don’t deny it.”
“I cannot believe …” She looked around, expecting G.B. to make an appearance at any moment. “… you.”
The surreal sense that this couldn’t possibly be happening resurged, making her feel a little dizzy. Then again, she wasn’t breathing right and her heart was pounding.
If she fake-fainted, maybe he would catch her and then she could get a real feel for him.
Oh, there was a plan.
“Excuse me?”
Great, she’d said that out loud—
Abruptly, she narrowed her eyes. “How did you know I was going to be here?”
His shrug was casual. “You told me you went to that café for the singer. It’s not that tough to extrapolate you might want to see him again. And he put on his Facebook page that he’s doing backup here tonight. I took a gamble—and you walked through that door. I didn’t know you were meeting up with him.”
Interesting. He expressed himself like he had an education, and he enunciated his words without any accent at all. But the Iron Mask was a hard-core club of some kind—she’d seen its ads in the CCJ. So he had to be a bartender or … given his build, a bouncer?
That really shouldn’t have made him even hotter.
Really.
Like, not at all.
“And that doesn’t bother you,” she said absently.
“What? That you’ve got a date with some singer? Christ, no. I don’t care if you were here to meet … Channing Fate-um or whoever that stripper dude is. The only thing that would stop me would be a husband, and you don’t wear a wedding band.”
“What if I told you I had a boyfriend? A partner?”
“Then why are you going out with the singer.”
“I’m not meeting you in the middle of the night. I don’t know you—and the fact that you gave me two random names and offered your palm doesn’t change that.”
“Google me.”
“Not helpful.”
The man, Duke, whoever he was, leaned in again. “Bank on this. If you come over after my shift, I’ll tell you anything you want to know about me. And then I’ll show you the more important stuff.”
Cait licked her lips. “And what would that be.”
“You’ll find out. If you think you can handle it.”
With the smooth move of an all-man type, he walked around her, his body shifting with barely reined-in power. As he passed, he didn’t touch her, brush her arm, lay a hand on her. But he didn’t have to.
He’d already left his mark.
“Damn it,” she whispered as she stared over her shoulder and watched him leave.
Chapter Twelve
“There you are, Cait!”
As Cait heard her name, she turned around. G.B. was weaving in and out of the crowd, waving his hand at her, making progress even as he was recognized and stopped by people.
Forcing a smile, she struggled with a ridiculous sense of guilt as she waved back at him and met him halfway.
“I’m a hugger,” he announced, holding his arms wide.
She went in for the clinch out of reflex. In reality, she could barely concentrate—but as their bodies came together, the woodsy scent of his cologne and the feel of his chest cleared out some of the cobwebs.
Boy, did he smell good.
And close up? He was even more handsome … and that hair was softer than it looked as it brushed against her cheek.
“Hey! G.B.!”
Someone broke up the embrace, and that was all right with her. As she pulled away, she needed a minute.
With a vague thumper starting up behind her eyes, Cait went to rub them—and stopped herself just in time. She had makeup on, so unless she wanted to do this date thing raccoon-style, she’d better chill with the scrubby-scrubby. And it was hard to keep still as G.B. chatted with some woman, her hands fiddling with her purse, the collar of her coat, her hair as she played bystander.
The idea that another man had just come on to her, and that she’d been seriously attracted to him … seemed like something she had to confess—but come on. That was bullcrap. Number one, she was not in a relationship with G.B. Number two, she hadn’t asked tall, dark and wow-are-those-pecs-real? to show up. And number three, even if she decided to meet a stranger at a public place and get to know him in a very “personal” way? That was her choice as an unattached, adult woman.
She wasn’t living under her parents’ roof—or their closed-minded value system—anymore. And she and G.B. had a long way to go before they knew whether there was a future ahead of them.
In fact, if she wanted a chance with Teresa’s favorite singer? The one guaranteed way to screw it up was to start babbling about what was essentially a nothing-at-all.
“So come on back,” G.B. said, taking her arm. “I’ve got you a pass to the green room. We just have to pick it up in the office.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful, but really, you didn’t have to go to any trouble—”