“You’re not safe to be let out. Let’s cancel.” They were talking, teasing, both of them ignoring the undercurrent of tension.
“No. And when it comes to flirting and relationships, you’re as out of practice as I am, so I’d be pretty stupid to take advice from you.” She patted his arm. “Relax.”
He couldn’t relax when she was standing this close to him. “You’re not serious about being a bad girl?”
“Oh, I’m serious about that part. But I promise I’ll be careful.”
“Because you’ll filter what you say?”
“No, because I’ll use my condom.”
Ten
The best accessory is confidence.
—Paige
“Head straight for the best-looking guy in the room.” Paige’s voice echoed through the speaker on Eva’s phone. “Text me his name and Jake will do a background check and see if he has any hidden habits you need to know about.”
“How can he do that? Actually, forget it, I don’t want to know.” Wrapped in a towel, Eva leaned closer to the bathroom mirror as she stroked mascara onto her lashes. “Why are you all so suspicious? You and Frankie are worse than Lucas, and that isn’t a compliment.” She slipped the mascara back into her bag and checked her reflection.
She already knew who the best-looking man in the room would be, but he was off-limits. There was chemistry, but he seemed to have no problem resisting it.
He didn’t want what she wanted. And that was why she was resisting it, too.
“You can’t be too careful, Ev.”
“Being too careful is probably the reason I haven’t had sex in so long. I’m happy to make a mistake once in a while.” But there was one mistake she wasn’t going to make, and his name was Lucas. Her hand hovered over her choice of lipsticks. “I will not be texting you and you will not be conducting illicit background checks or whatever else you have in mind. Tonight I am using that old-fashioned method of doing a check on someone. It’s called using my instincts.”
“Not sure that’s foolproof in a place like New York City.”
“Relax.” She went with a shimmery pink. “And now I have to go. I still have to get dressed.”
“What are you wearing?”
“I don’t know why you’re asking me that when we both know I only have one dress suitable for a black-tie event.”
“The black one? You look great in that.”
“We both know it’s boring, but I couldn’t afford to splurge for just a few hours. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” She turned and gave a gasp of fright.
Lucas was standing in the doorway watching her, the expression in his dark brown eyes stealing the breath from her lungs.
“Holy crap, you scared me.” She pressed her palm to her chest. “Is this another of your horror-writer party tricks? Lurking in the doorway and giving your victims a heart attack?”
He was already dressed, the fabric of his dinner jacket hugging the dense muscle of his shoulders.
“I knocked. You didn’t hear me.”
The fact that he was dressed made her all the more aware of her own seminakedness.
She clutched the towel self-consciously. “So you thought you’d come right on in anyway and make me jump out of my skin. An innovative way of skinning your victims.”
His smile connected straight to her insides.
She tried to hitch the towel higher but realized that just revealed more of her thighs. The bathroom felt too small and there was a tension in the air that hadn’t been there earlier. A slow, lethargic heat spread through her. Her nerve endings tingled and her stomach contracted into a tight knot. It was the same feeling she always had around him, but she knew she had to ignore it. “What do you want, Lucas?” Frustration made her unusually irritable.
“I bought something for you. It’s on the bed.”