Everything You've Got: Anything & Everything, Book 2 (10 page)

Luke cleared his throat and shifted in his seat. Damn. That was the second time tonight she’d mentioned a blow job. He was going to need to dump his ice water in his lap if this kept up. “We’re not talking about
my
top ten.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Blow jobs are in your top ten?”

“Um, yeah. Absolutely.”

She grinned then grabbed her napkin and wiped her hands, pushing her plate to the side. “Okay, in no particular order they are kind, generous, funny, intelligent, charming, able and willing to perform oral sex, likes to talk during sex, is okay with me having and using my vibrator—even without him once in a while—not hung up on lingerie—I don’t like most of it personally—and reads some kind of fiction on a regular basis.”

He processed her list slowly, savoring it, memorizing it. This was good information. It made him want to strip her down and show her how willing he was to fulfill number six right here on the table.

“It’s official,” he said, wadding up his napkin. “I’m the perfect man for you.”

The waitress refilled their glasses and Luke downed half his water.

“Okay, now you,” Kat said.

“My top ten?”

“I know you have one.”

“I don’t,” he answered. It wasn’t actually written down anyway. He knew what the perfect woman looked like. He was looking at her right now. He didn’t need a list.

“You’re a perpetual planner and list maker,” she pointed out.

That was true. He was organized to a fault.

“There are more than ten things that are important to me,” he said. And she had them all.

She rolled her eyes. “We’re talking about the most important ten.”

“And you think you can get six?” He pushed his coffee cup to the side and leaned his elbows on the table. “Go for it.” This would be interesting. How well did Kat know him?

Chapter Four

This would be a piece of cake. She could get all ten without breaking a sweat. This was a subject she’d been studying for years.

“One, she has to be from Justice.”

He made a sound like a game show buzzer.

“Yes it is,” she insisted.

“It’s close,” he agreed. “But number one is she has to love Justice as much as I do and number two is that she has to want to make our life there. Being from Justice just makes those two things more probable. Not that it matters.” He winked at her.

She chose to ignore that. “Those really are number one and two on the list, huh? In order?”

“Yep.” He lifted his cup and sipped, watching her the whole time. “Think you can get the rest?”

“Maybe not in order.”

“Let’s hear them.”

“Well, we know blow jobs are on there.”

“Definitely.” He gave her a wicked half smile and a wink.

She took a deep breath, trying to slow her pulse. “Okay, let’s see. She has to believe in giving to charity, has to like to socialize, and has to have a career that she can pursue in Justice.”

It was important to Luke to contribute directly to the community with his work and she was sure he felt the same way about his would-be wife.

If it weren’t for the satellite medical clinic in Justice, she wouldn’t fit that criterion herself.

Frick.

She shouldn’t be having this conversation with him. Why confirm all the ways she seemed right when it would make it that much worse when—no,
if—
he found out some of it wasn’t true.

But she couldn’t resist.

The idea of being Luke’s perfect woman and having him know it, even if it was temporary, was too tempting.

“She has to fit into your family, get along with your friends, love The Camelot and she has to want kids,” she said.

“Hey, only one of mine was about sex. You got four.”

“It’s your list, not mine.”

“Liking lots of foreplay, having a vibrator—that I get to watch her use at least some of the time—and being good at dirty talk should all be on there too.”

“Top ten,” she reminded him, feeling her body get a little warmer with his words.

“Well then let’s move the family and friends down the list. Because honestly, vibrators and dirty talk would outrank those people any day.”

He grinned and she really wanted to grin back, but with his words the truth suddenly smacked her in the face and left her eyes stinging a bit.

He would never move family or friends down the list. But it was a moot point.

He’d never
have
to rearrange or change his list at all. Blow jobs and best friends would be equally appreciated by the right woman. Like Kat. Which was obviously the whole point.

She knew she fit every criterion—she’d made sure of it.

Her crush went back years. When you were crushing on a guy you didn’t let him see your flaws, your mistakes, your bad hair days, your bad
anything
. You tried to be what he wanted and you made sure he knew it.

But—and here was the realization that had her pie sitting like a rock in her stomach—a real relationship was about thinking someone was perfect even with the flaws, mistakes and bad hair days. It was about being yourself and being loved for it.

Dammit.

She had really screwed this up.

How would he react when he found out she wasn’t perfect for him? And how would her heart react?

She’d started the stupid top ten list conversation as a flirtation, just for fun, but now she was restless.

Because he should want her—or
whoever
he was with—whether his family and friends loved her or not. Whether she wanted to live and die in Justice. Whether she worked out of town or hated bake sales or had no desire to watch the high school basketball team play.

Whether she fit all his criteria or not.

Whether she was perfect or not.

“Well, that’s quite a list,” she finally said, grateful that her voice sounded normal.

“Proof that I know what I’m talking about, right?” he said with a cocky grin. “Not only do you fit all those requirements, but you can list them in twenty seconds or less.”

She gave a humorless laugh. “
Requirements
is an interesting word.” That made her stomach hurt.

“Well, I have requirements that need to be met when I buy a car or hire a waitress or choose a vacation. I think the person you’re going to spend your life with should be as careful a decision, don’t you?”

Oh, yeah, this just kept getting better and better. “Did you really just compare a romantic relationship to buying a car?” she asked.

“That’s my new approach.”

“To make unflattering comparisons between something emotional like love and something practical like hiring an employee?”

He shifted on the seat of the booth and then drank from his now-empty coffee cup.

She watched him acting very uncomfortable for a moment. Then a thought hit her and she sat up straighter. “Is this about Sabrina?”

He sighed. “Yes,” he admitted.

Well, of course.

“What about her? Exactly?” she asked.

“I made mistakes.”

“Uh-huh.” She personally thought both he and Sabrina had made a number of them.

“I reacted on emotion, got caught up in how I felt, without thinking, without being concerned about compatibility and…requirements.”

She blinked at him. He wasn’t kidding.

Awesome.

Yeah, he’d definitely been caught up in Sabrina. Kat felt a surge of jealousy at the thought. She wanted him caught up in
her
. But he clearly thought that was a mistake. Which meant he wasn’t overcome by his emotions for
her…
and he obviously didn’t intend to be.

“So this time you’re being more logical and less emotional about it all,” she said in a very logical and nonemotional way.

“Right.”

She stared at him, her heart heavy in her chest. “Because you wouldn’t want a relationship to be
emotional
.”

He sighed. “What I want is a relationship that will
work
. It can’t be
only
emotional.”

Shit. He just had to be…well, honest. This was honestly how Luke felt.

Things with Sabrina had been complicated and messy and, yes, emotional. Illogical, painful even, but emotional enough that he did it anyway.

He’d been there for Sabrina no matter what she did wrong, no matter what she said, even after she broke his heart and left. Not because it made sense, but because of how he
felt
about her.

Kat wanted that.

She didn’t want to have to be perfect for him. She wanted him crazy about her anyway.

She deserved that. She deserved someone who would be so stupid in love that he wouldn’t be able to think rationally, so preoccupied with thoughts of her he couldn’t make a grocery list, not to mention a list of qualifications in a potential mate, someone who would be unable to be
without
her rather than someone who needed a checklist to know he wanted to be with her.

Especially a checklist that might show how
not
right for him she really was.

She wiped her mouth with her napkin, laid a ten dollar bill on the table and slid out of the booth. “I’m going back to the RV.”

But only because it really was too far to walk, she didn’t have anyone to call and she hadn’t seen anyone she was willing to hitchhike with.

Well, dammit.

That was all Luke could really come up with as he paid the bill and headed for the RV.

Something had gone wrong in the diner, and he had come to the startling revelation that he was in new territory.

He simply wasn’t used to the women he was interested in thinking he was an ass.

Which Kat quite clearly did at the moment.

On the heels of that realization, he also understood that he tended to gravitate to women who thought he was amazing.

That sounded stupid, of course. Most, if not all, people tended to date other people who thought they were great. But it was more than that for Luke. He didn’t take chances. On anything, really—a fact that drove Marc nuts—but especially on women. He made sure that the woman would definitely say yes before he asked her—anything. Of course it came from his history with Sabrina, but regardless of that, he was used to women agreeing with him on where they were going, what they were doing and how the night was going to end.

He didn’t sleep with all of them.

But if he wanted to, they didn’t turn him down—because he made sure they wanted it,
him
, before ever even insinuating anything.

Now there was Kat Dayton. Who thought he was an ass and wasn’t shy about telling him. But he really wanted her anyway.

He approached the RV with the knowledge that they were about to spend the night together and for the first time—with a woman other than Sabrina—he didn’t know what was going to happen.

Well,
dammit
.

She was sitting at the table in the kitchen area, her feet up on the bench across from her, a bottle of tequila in one hand and a shot glass in the other.

“What are you doing?” he asked carefully.

“Drinking tequila.” She took a shot.

He propped his shoulder against the doorjamb. “Where’d you get that?”

She pointed with the bottle. “That cupboard. There’s also Kahlua. My second favorite.”

She hadn’t even known they were taking this trip so she hadn’t packed those herself. “Is it just a coincidence that your favorite liquors are here?”

“I’m thinking Marc is an even better friend than I realized.”

“He stocked your favorite liquors for you?”

“He’s the best.”

“Why would he think you’d need liquor?”

“Because he knows
you
.”

Luke couldn’t help his smile. “And he knew you’d need to drink to be around me?”

Kat shrugged. “He wasn’t wrong, was he?”

“So the tequila is making you—happier with me?”

“Not so far.” Then she took another shot.

“There’s only one bed.”

“So?”

If she thought this was the way to keep him from seducing her, well…it might work. He wanted her fully aware and with him every step when they made love.

But it was a
when
, not an
if
. She couldn’t rely on tequila for the entire trip.

“We’ll have to sleep in there together, you know.”

“Hmm.”

“Maybe you should put the tequila down.”

“You afraid I’m going to throw up on you?”

He was afraid that he was going to explode if he had to sleep next to her all night without touching her. Though the throwing up seemed more likely than the touching at the moment. “Maybe.”

“Yeah, well this whole trip was your idea. If you get puked on you have no one to blame but yourself.” She took another shot, then swallowed hard and coughed.