“Her name is Dre?” Yeah, that tough-looking chick was tall for a woman, but only like his height, and he just nudged past six feet in boots. Which bugged the fuck out of him. Duncan and Zach were both about six-three in socks. Even Pop had an inch or so on him. He literally did not measure up.
“Theirname is Dre, yes,” she said. “Why are you lurking in the shadows behind my bar, Jacob? If you’re not a stalker.”
A cattle prod zapped him at the sound of his full name. He thought of himself as Jay, but he didn’t really have much of a care about how he was called. His parents usually called him Jake, Zach used Jake or Jay, the Bulls called him Jay or JJ. JJ was the name on his kutte. He answered to it all equally. But the only time anyone—almost always his parents—ever called him Jacob was when he was in trouble. His sphincter clenched hard when his mother screamedJACOB CONRAD JESSUP!, but that hadn’t happened in a long while. Maybe moms didn’t use the three-name thing when their kids were grown.
Also, how did she know his—oh, right. ID.
But he didn’t know her name. He’d never thought to ask.
“I don’t go by Jacob,” he said now, taking a couple steps closer. She eyed his movement suspiciously but didn’t back off.
“Are you Jake, then?”
“That works. What’s your name?” He took another step.
She made note of that step and met his eyes again. “Why are you here?” she asked, ignoring his question.
He heard the undercurrent of fear in her voice. She was hiding it well, but she was worried.
“I had a question. Wanted to ask it.”
“So ask.”
Feeling too weird to think of a slick way to ask, he just asked. “Are you gay?”
Thatmade her back up a couple steps. It surprised him, that those three words would be what made her actually, openly afraid, until it dawned on him: she’d moved on from worrying he was a stalker to worrying he was preparing to perpetrate a hate crime.
Fuck.
“Why are you asking?” she asked before he could say something to assure her he wasn’t a gay-basher.
“Because I’m hoping you’re not.” Whoa, his stomach did that twisting thing; usually he only felt that when he was pulling his piece.
Her head fell to one side, and she almost smiled. “Are you hitting on me, Jake?”
Not sure if she was flattered, enthusiastic, or amused, Jay prepared himself to deal with ridicule and took another couple of steps. Now, if he stretched, he could touch her car. Not much more than the hatch separated them.
“How would you feel about it if I was?”
Relaxing, she set the box in the back of her wagon, and then the bag. “I’m older than you, you know.”
Well, that was definitely not ridicule—and it suggested that she was not, in fact, a lesbian. And, while she didn’t look it, he’d figured she had to be alittleolder; she owned the bar, and twenty-three, his age, was pretty young to be a business owner.
“I figured. It doesn’t sound like you hate the thought of me making a move. So you’re not gay?”
“I’m bisexual.” A weird look cramped her face briefly, and she cast a look back and up, to that lighted window. Then she turned to him again and smiled. His cock perked up and took notice. There was a chance here.
She walked around the open hatch, right to him. She came with such determination, and it was such a reversal of her wariness, Jay didn’t know what to do, how to react. When she put her hands on his chest and pushed, he went backward, until he hit the side of her car.
“I remind you,” she said, staring into his eyes, “that all I have to do is yell one time, and Dre will be at that window, locked and loaded.”
Too confused—and wildly turned on—to make words, Jay nodded.
“So kiss me, and let’s see.” She put her hands on either side of his head, curled her fingers to grab his hair, and pulled his head to hers, stopping with just a couple inches between their mouths.
His head spinning, his stomach churning, Jay grabbed her hips and pulled her against him. She gasped when their bodies met, and she smiled. He could feel her breath over his lips. Somehow that itself, not even a kiss but the potential of it, was so intense he could feel his muscles and skin tighten and all the hairs on his body stand up.
“I don’t know your name,” he said, keeping his voice soft and low so the electric moment continued uninterrupted.