“The police are on their way, Nieves,” Rock was saying. “You can either leave now or be escorted out.”
The woman simply shrugged and then lifted her brow when she met my gaze. “Is this your lovely date?”
“She is. Have a seat, Lacey.”
What the hell? “Thank you,” I said sweetly, and sat down across from the woman he’d called Nieves.
The other woman smiled, her dark pink lips framing perfectly straight, white teeth. “Nieves Romero. Nice to meet you.”
She actually sounded sincere.
“Ms. Romero is just leaving,” Rock said.
“Why?” I asked. “Why don’t the three of us have dinner?”
Rock sent me a dark glare.
I simply smiled. I’d called him to cancel, but he hadn’t taken me seriously. Then I’d come along anyway like a lapdog. So why not throw him for a loop now? I found the idea oddly exciting, plus this woman offered me a glimpse into Rock’s past—something he hadn’t been overly forthcoming about.
“That’s not what I had in mind tonight,” Rock said gruffly. “Besides, the cops have already been called.”
“You can take care of that,” I said.
“Sure you can,” Nieves agreed. “Call off the dogs.”
The maître d’ approached the table and addressed Nieves. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but I made a mistake. This table is reserved for Mr. Wolfe and his guest. You erroneously told me you were his guest. I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”
“I’ll be joining Mr. Wolfe and his guest,” she said.
“No, she won’t be,” Rock insisted.
“I’ve had to summon the police at Mr. Wolfe’s insistence,” the man continued. “If you’d like to leave now, we can avoid you being escorted out.”
Rock glared at her.
He was serious.
Bummer. I was hoping to get some information about Rock.
“Fine.” Nieves stood with a huff. “I’ll be in touch, Rock.”
“Please, don’t be.” He thanked the maître d’ and then sat down in the vacated seat. “I’m sorry about that.”
“So tell me,” I said. “Who exactly is she?”
“I told you. A blast from the past.”
“I’m looking for a little more detail here, Rock.”
He sighed. “We dated, okay? I’m sure you already figured that out.”
“Yeah. I guess I’m looking for more specific information. I mean, she must have meant a lot to you if she thinks she can hijack your dinner plans.”
“It meant more to her,” he said. “When things got serious, I ended it. This all happened almost a year ago. I haven’t heard from her since, until she showed up in my room last night.”
“She was in your room last night?”
“Yeah. She got someone to let her in. I had the night manager fired this morning.”
“Hmm. Normally I wouldn’t condone getting someone fired, but he shouldn’t have let her in your room.”
“Damn right.”
The waiter came by to take our drink orders. Rock ordered the expensive bourbon he’d had at the bar that night. I stayed with sparkling water.
“Tell me about her,” I said.
“Do you really want to spend the evening talking about Nieves Romero?”
“No, not really. I’d like to learn more about you, but you’re incredibly tight-lipped about that. If I learn about your former girlfriend, maybe I’ll learn a little something about you.”
“She’s a cosmetologist. She does hair.”
“How did you meet her?”
“On a ride. Her bike was in the shop, and she was looking for someone to ride with, so I offered to let her ride bitch with me.”
“Wait a second. Ride bitch?”
“Ride on the back. That’s all it means.”
“It’s a little demeaning, don’t you think?”
“Lacey, for God’s sake. It’s just a term.” He smiled. “I’ll let you ride bitch with me whenever you want.”
“Yeah. No thanks.”
“You ever ride before?”
“Big no on that.”
“You don’t know what you’re missing. This weekend, we go riding.”
“That’s in two days.”
“Yeah. You got plans?”
I didn’t, but truthfully, getting on the back of a bike with Rock scared the hell out of me. So why did I want to do it so badly?
“Lace?”
“No. But I’m not riding with you.”
“Not here, that’s for sure. We’ll fly home.”
“Home?”
“Yeah. To Montana.”
“I can’t just pick up and fly to Montana in two days.”
“One day, actually. We’ll leave tomorrow evening. That way we’ll have all day Saturday to ride. We can stay at my place.”
I squirmed, my skin tingling all over. This was so unlike me…and I wanted it more than my next breath of air.
“You haven’t lived until you’ve ridden under the big sky.” He sighed. “Man, I miss it.”
“You haven’t been here that long, Rock.”
“No, but riding is like breathing to me. You’ll see what I mean.”
“You don’t think I’m actually considering this,” I said. Though I was.
In fact, I’d already decided.
I was going.
If I wanted to learn more about Rock Wolfe, Montana was the place to do it.37RockLacey took a long sip of her sparkling water. Then, “Fine.”
“Fine what?”
“Fine, I’ll go to Montana with you.”
“Great. I can’t wait to get back to the fresh air of big sky country.” I took a drink of bourbon. “Man, this is good stuff. Expensive bourbon really is better than rotgut. Do you think pretty boy appreciated it after paying that big bill the other night?”