“Carla, what the hell am I supposed to do now?” Esa hissed. “It’s clearing ahead of me. I can’t sit here and block traffic while you flirt.”
Carla ransacked her bag, never taking her eyes off Vito. She withdrew her cell phone and held it up for him to see. “It’s okay, Esa. You can drive. I’ve seen more than enough,” Carla conceded breathlessly.
“What are you doing?” Esa asked as she stomped on the accelerator, leaving Vito in her proverbial dust. That smirk on his face really bugged Esa for some reason.
“I gave Vito my cell phone number online. He’s going to call if he…you know…likes me.”
“Why does he get to be the one to decide?” Esa asked irritably. “What a conceited bast—”
But her tirade was cut off when Carla’s cell phone started beeping the tune to a popular rap song.
Esa stewed while Carla giggled and simpered, catching phrases like, “Gosh, you must get so tired after working so hard in the sun for almost twelve hours…Oh you poor thing…Are you going to be at One Life then?…What?…I can’t believe you lied about that. You are so bad…Seven-thirty? Sure, we’ll be there…” And then as Carla ducked her head and faced the passenger door, “Yeah, I really liked you too.”
Esa rolled her eyes as she changed lanes. So touching to be a witness to lust at first sight.
“How do you know he’s not setting up dates with every woman on that stupid flirting chat loop, not to mention every single female advertising for a man in Metro Sexy?” Esa accused the second after Carla hung up.
“Esa, you’re such a bore. We’re not planning on marriage and two point five children. It’s just for fun!”
“It’s just for sex,” Esa corrected.
Carla laughed. “And your point is? Sex is fun, Esa. It’s not my fault you’ve forgotten that.”
Esa simmered in the seconds that followed, unable to come up with a sufficiently acidic comeback. Besides…Carla was right. Wasn’t she always encouraging her older adult patients to continue to express their sexuality in a safe manner? Sex was a crucial aspect of human behavior after all.
Lately, however, Esa preached much better than she practiced. At what point had she become such a prude?
The question rankled.
She mentally schemed for a way of getting out of going to One Life with Carla but for some strange reason Vito’s grin kept popping behind her eyes like a cocky little dare.
She’d go all right…to protect Carla. Her friend was used to swimming with the sharks but Esa’s intuition hinted that this particular animal was downright dangerous.
* * * * *
Esa peered at her reflection in the mirror. For some asinine reason she’d actually listened to Carla and gone to the lounge at One Life to remove her glasses. She really only wore them when she drove anyway, but all that talk about how boring she was certainly caused her to make a point of checking her appearance.
The sounds of a live reggae band filtered through the walls. Maybe it was the sensual beat of the music or maybe it was just all the reminders of how lame her life was that coaxed Esa to unfasten her blouse one button…then two.
She gave her reflection a shaky grin after she caught a glimpse of the shadowed valley between her breasts. Not sexy Kitten Ormond perhaps, but Esa still knew how to hold her own at a place like One Life.
The music immediately enveloped her once she left the ladies’ room and went in search of Carla, whom she’d left sipping a sidecar and casting anxious glances toward the entrance. Her step faltered when she saw the back of a tall man wearing jeans, leaning over and talking to her friend. She scowled when she noticed the burnished brownish-blond hair and tight buns.
Well, apparently Vito had arrived and was getting right down to the business of making time with Carla. Or Jess had, anyway. That was one of the many things that Carla had gushed on about after she’d hung up her cell phone earlier. Vito was really a Jess. Obviously Jess was a tad more concerned about meeting clunkers online than Carla and was protecting his identity. Why the gorgeous Jess needed to use a chat group in a singles’ magazine to land a date, Esa couldn’t fathom.
Probably dumber than the concrete he poured on the job.
Her good friend’s hoot of delighted laughter pierced through the music. Esa veered toward the bar, suddenly much in need of a stiff drink. Jess and Carla obviously weren’t going to miss her.
After she’d finished half a martini, Esa felt lightheaded. When was the last time she’d actually had one of these, anyway? Esa wondered as the band broke into Red, Red, Wine. Her body instinctively moved to the rhythm. She’d always loved the reggae classic.
Someone took her hand. Her mouth opened, the protest she’d been ready to utter melting like powdered sugar on her tongue when she looked up into the face of the man who held her fingers lightly.
Esa supposed the time period between when she stared into those arresting, amused blue eyes and when he spoke was only a few seconds but her brain stretched it surrealistically long. Her heart skipped erratically beneath her peek-a-boo cleavage when Mr. Adonis smiled—not cockily like she’d imagined from a distance. No, instead that slow grin was the equivalent of potent foreplay. Ever so briefly, his gaze flashed down to her chest…as if he were a magician and knew precisely what effect he was having on her.
“Would you like to dance?”
Esa nodded, thoughts of loyalty to her friend evaporated to vapor by the brilliance of his smile. Carla? Carla who?