I laughed, shooing away the goose bumps prickling my neck from his gentle touch.
“I know I don’t.”
He crossed his arms, concern etching his devastatingly proportional features. “I’m worried you don’t know what you’re getting into.”
I crossed my legs. His gaze dropped to my exposed thighs for barely a blink before returning to my unadorned ears. That never happened. My legs were ten feet long. Men looked. I guess that confirmed Adam Wainwright wasn’t interested. Which was good because I wasn’t interested either. Nope.
“I have no idea what I’m getting into.” I giggled at the cold swab Pixie used on my nose. “That’s what makes it fun.”
He sat down on the stool beside my chair. From the corner of my eyes, I saw him studying me and the proceedings with a frown. He leaned forward as close as he could get without his nose touching mine—which wasclose. With Pixie on my other side prepping the needle, I was surrounded. And still, I wasn’t nervous.
Suddenly, Adam’s warm hand enclosed mine. One of us was shaking, and it wasn’t me.
“Is this when I should admit I fucking hate needles?” he whispered, making me grin.
“It’s the exact right time,” I whispered back.
Adam made a stabbing motion with his fist. “And then—bang! She didn’t even flinch!”
The bartender nodded, glancing at me then Adam before moving down the bar to serve the next customer. Unfazed, Adam handed me my froufrou cocktail to go with my froufrou dress.
“There was no banging,” I corrected.
My nose was a little sore, but after my first drink, I barely felt it. Adam had insisted on buying me a birthday cocktail, and since I was all dressed up, I accepted. One cocktail had turned into three, and he was telling everyone we encountered about my nose piercing.
Fortunately for him, I’d taken him to an off-the-beaten-path dive bar with a clientele who’d been sitting in the same spots since the seventies. In other words, no one recognized Adam Wainwright as the lead guitarist for The Seasons Change. And if they did, they didn’t give a shit.
“Sorry—stabbing.” His grin was seasoned with mischief. “I still can’t believe you don’t have your ears pierced.”
I lifted a shoulder. “I’ve never wanted them done. My nose on the other hand…”
“Why wait?” He took a long pull on his beer. “How old are you? Twenty-five…six?”
“What?” I squealed and spun around on my stool from that insult. Facing him again, I crossed my legs, not caring how much thigh was showing. “I’m twenty-three, Adam. Are you kidding?”
His eyes rounded. “I’m sorry. Shit. It wasn’t an insult, promise. You give off this really regal vibe. I don’t know if that makes sense. You carry yourself older.”
“Regal? Because I’m tall?” No one had ever said anything like that to me before.
“I don’t know. Maybe? I’m half-drunk, neighbor. Don’t make me explain myself.”
Another reminder he didn’t know my name. This man had been in my father’s apartment for a party. We’d shaken hands. I’d mildly flirted with him. He did not remember me.
That thought sank into my stomach even heavier than my breakup with Jason—something I’d hardly thought about since stomping into the tattoo shop a couple hours ago.
“Fine. I’m regal. I accept.” I sipped my drink. “As for why I hadn’t gotten my nose pierced yet…well, my father told me it was unprofessional and trashy. Two of my past boyfriends said something similar. So I just never did it.”
“I hope you dumped those guys.” He slammed his bottle down, displeasure pulling down his mouth.
“The dad, no. The boyfriends, yes. I seem to have a habit of breaking up with boyfriends. I stuck it out with this last one the longest. But he—” I shivered.
Adam’s fingers landed on my arm, cold from his beer bottle. “What? The suit from the hallway? What’d he do?”
I rolled my eyes. “Tonight, specifically, or throughout our relationship?”
Adam winced slightly. “Let’s roll with tonight and go from there.”
“He didn’t like my dress, so there’s that. Then he took me to a cocktail mixer for Wharton alum. When he wasn’t trotting me around like a show pony, he was ignoring me. That wasn’t the final straw, though.”