He wasn’t sure what was going on, but he damn sure wanted to find out. Chase slammed the door of his pickup and rushed across the street to the bar.
It took a few seconds to spot Jane. She sort of…blended in to the background. Despite it being Friday night, her hair was still pulled back into a tight bun. She still wore her pricey-looking white suit. As he watched, she took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. Jane was getting sleepy. He was about to miss his chance at a date.
Chase pushed through the mingling crowd and stopped next to her table. “Hey, Jane.”
“Oh!” she yelped, slipping on her glasses before she pushed awkwardly to her feet. “Hello.”
“I’m really glad you called.”
“I…just…I had your card.” Her hands gestured helplessly, so Chase waved her back to her chair.
He glanced down to her glass of water. “Can I get you a drink?”
“Um…sure.”
Chase caught a waitress’s eye, and the woman sauntered over with a grin that faded when he tilted his head toward Jane. She ordered a martini and looked surprised at his request for a Coke.
“Aren’t you going to have something?”
“No, I don’t drink.”
Her eyes flew wide behind the glasses. “Oh! I’m sorry. I’ll cancel mine, then, and—”
“Hey, it’s no big deal.”
She shook her head. “I don’t want to be disrespectful or—”
“It’s no problem. I’m not an alcoholic, so you don’t have to worry that you’ll push me off the wagon. My dad’s a big drinker, and I thought it’d be better if I never started down that road.”
Jane looked doubtfully down at her water.
“Seriously!” He laughed. “You know I work in construction, right? I guarantee my friends can throw back a hell of a lot more alcohol than you can. So drink up.”
Her drink arrived as if on cue. “Well…” She picked up her martini with a bemused smile. “All right. Cheers, then.” Still, she took only a tiny sip.
“So why did you call? Not that I’m objecting.” When a blush climbed her face at his words, Chase grinned. A blush was good. Very good. The modest Miss Jane did like him, despite her earlier words. There was something about her that made him want to…mess her up a little. He’d never been interested in a woman like her before, but for some reason her coolness fascinated him. And this new nervousness pushed heat through his skin. She’d probably never even been alone with a guy like Chase.
Jane took another sip of her drink and swallowed hard. Her pearl earrings glinted softly, as if warning him of her modesty. “It’s my birthday. On Sunday, I mean.”
“Oh, happy birthday.”
“Thanks. So I just thought, um…Well.”
Chase blinked at the sudden blush in her cheeks. “What? You thought I’d make a good
birthday present?
”
“No!” she cried. “Of course not! That would be…No, I just thought I’d…celebrate.”
But that hot red burn belied her words. He’d been half joking, but now…
Jesus Christ, was he supposed to be the present she gave herself for her birthday? Chase wasn’t sure how he felt about that.
No, wait. He was sure after all. It felt pretty damn fine with him.
Jane finished her drink in one gulp.
“So,” he ventured, suddenly unsure what to say. All he could think about was the fact that Jane really was looking for a good time, and that good time apparently involved him. Still, she couldn’t possibly mean to be so forward. Maybe she thought they’d hang out tonight and go on another date on Sunday.
Chase cleared his throat. “How’s work going?”
“Fine. How’s the business of blowing things up?”
He grinned. “Pretty damn fun. Not that I get to blow things up very often, but when I do, it’s a rush. You wanna see a blast sometime? Maybe next week?”
“Oh.” Her soft mouth made a lovely little O. He noticed how perfect her skin was and wondered what it would feel like if he dragged his fingers across her cheek. Though her eyes had brightened with interest, she shook her head. “I can’t.”
“Think about it. I’ll call you next week.”
He ignored the way she frowned. She might be shy, but she’d called him. She
was
interested.
“Chase, I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, but…”
“Shit, did I screw up already?”
“No, I just want to be clear about something.” Jane sat up a little straighter, though he wouldn’t have thought that was possible. She always looked stiff. This girl needed some serious relaxing, and he’d be happy to show her how to get down and dirty.
“I’m not, um…” She cleared her throat again. “I just got out of a relationship, so this isn’t…This is casual.”
“Casual.”
“Yes. Temporary.”
Chase wasn’t sure why he felt a little twinge of hurt. After all, he’d asked her out while still riding an adrenaline wave. He hadn’t thought about much more than the challenge of getting her out for a drink, and then a little more. “Okay. Duly noted. I asked you out because I thought we might have fun, that’s all. No pressure.”
She smiled, her eyes flashing happiness. “Good. Have you had dinner?”
“Yes. Have you? I’d be happy to—”
“I’m good,” she blurted.
So she didn’t want dinner or a relationship. Was he losing his mind or did that leave only one possibility? “Let me buy you another drink,” he offered, the only thing he could think of.
“No, but thank you.” Her eyes fell to the table. “One more thing. I wouldn’t normally go out with men with whom I have a working relationship. I mean, I wouldn’t normally do this at all, but…”
“I’m happy you’re making an exception.”
“I trust you’ll be discreet?”
“Oh, of course.” Chase tried to shake off the feeling he was being interviewed, but Coke sloshed over the rim of his glass when he picked it up.
“If you breathe a word of this to anyone, I’ll have to deal with come-ons and crude remarks. I can’t have that in my workplace.”
“No problem. You can trust me.”
“Good.” She nodded, her mouth serious. “Can we go to your place, then?”
His throat spasmed, choking off the soda he’d been swallowing. The Coke tried to escape another way, burning toward his nose. Chase coughed in a desperate attempt to retain some dignity, but he couldn’t stop his eyes from watering. “What?” he managed, swiping at the tears. Despite his theorizing, he hadn’t convinced himself that Jane had called him for sex. He was feeling more sure by the second.
Jane didn’t answer. She’d regained her composure, perhaps because he’d lost his, and now she sat in her normal prim pose, hands clasped and resting on the table in front of her.
“Why?”
She frowned at him over those little black glasses. “Why do you think?”
The noise in the bar seemed to grow louder, making it hard for Chase to think. Of course he knew
why
, but…
Chase didn’t normally jump into bed with any woman who showed interest, but there was some sort of
spark
between them. Something that made him want to throw caution to the wind. Since he’d met her yesterday, his interest had built minute by minute. Hour by hour. And now, even though they hadn’t even had a first date…Now he felt an urgency overtake him. She didn’t seem like a woman who propositioned men. This wasn’t likely to be an open-ended offer. Chase was working within a limited time frame.
And it
was
her birthday. Almost.
Hell, this was every man’s dream, wasn’t it? A woman asking permission to jump his bones? Jesus, his little fantasy about showing the uptight secretary a good time was unfolding in front of him like a puzzle unlocking. It seemed way too good to be true.
Too good to be true…but Jane was watching him, waiting, eyebrows raised.
“Let’s go,” Chase said, holding out a hand as he stood. If this sweet little secretary wanted a good time, Chase was damn sure going to do his best to give her one.
He led her out of the crowded bar and across the street to his truck. When they reached the passenger door, Chase stopped and turned to face her with serious eyes.
“This isn’t something weird, is it?”
“What?” The tipsiness she’d been comforting herself with made it hard to figure out his strange question.
“I don’t look like your dead husband or anything, do I?”
“What are you talking about?”
He watched her, his fingers sliding more deeply between hers. “You said you’ve never done this before.”
“I haven’t.” Not recently anyway.
His eyes narrowed to glittering slits as his gaze dropped to her lips.
Before she could think what to say, Chase dipped his head and pressed his lips to hers. She wasn’t ready for it. Strange, considering she’d propositioned him just a few minutes before. But she wasn’t expecting the taste of him right at the moment, his lips brushing over hers.
His mouth was nothing like his hands. His mouth touched her softly, a gentle pressure, testing her, feeling her out. When her shock wore off, Jane finally responded. She parted her lips a little, pressing into him, and Chase took the hint.
A shock of warmth against her bottom lip revealed itself to be his tongue, touching briefly before drawing away.
“Mmm.” She sighed, angling her head in encouragement. He tasted her again, teasing her until she followed his tongue with her own.
Oh, my. His work-roughened hand slipped around the back of her neck as he pulled her closer. Chase’s kiss became deeper, deeper, until Jane found herself clutching his T-shirt and hanging on tight. His tongue thrust slowly. There was going to be no jackrabbit action in this man’s bed. This was a careful, controlled assault.
The shivering in her knees climbed higher, shaking through her thighs. As if sensing his work was done, Chase brushed his lips over hers one last time before pulling away.
“Well,” he murmured. “Ready to go?”
Jane nodded. “Definitely.”
The truck beeped, the locks popped open and Chase reached for the door handle. “After you, Miss Jane.”
She flushed a bit at the reminder of who she was to him, but that didn’t stop her from climbing up and snapping the seat belt into place. This was a bad idea, but Jane wasn’t really a good girl and she never had been. She’d been faking it for ten years without a slip. Ten long years.
Frankly, it was a miracle she’d lasted.
Now she was tipsy and he was hot, and she wanted to drop the good-girl act for a few minutes. Or hours.
Chase slipped into the driver’s seat and flashed her a wicked smile. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, Jane, but I definitely like it.”
Finally she could respond to that grin exactly the way she wanted to. Jane smiled and slanted him a look from the corner of her eye. “Just drive.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She felt the looks he kept aiming her way as he drove, as if he found her impossibly intriguing. Amazing how an offer of free sex could monopolize a guy’s attention.
Jane squeezed her thighs together, thrilling at the darts of pleasure that resulted. The dream she’d had the night before had gotten her body primed for pleasure. Now just that one kiss had her squirming.
Thank God she’d put on sexy underwear that morning. She didn’t always wear lacy bras and panties, but it was one of the small pleasures in her life. Sexy lingerie. A tiny concession to her true nature. A secret beneath her professional clothing. It was a secret she wanted to let Chase in on. Quickly.
She hid her body beneath perfectly tailored clothing, because otherwise she drew too many eyes. Her curves had drawn attention from the time she’d hit puberty at eleven. The wrong kind of attention for a young girl, but wrong was just what she was looking for now.
“My place is just around the corner,” Chase said, breaking the silence.
Only two blocks from Main Street. Wonderful.
“Are you cold?” he asked. Even though she said no, he pushed the Up arrow on the climate control system. “Music?”
She shook her head and he dropped his hand. They had nothing in common, nothing to talk about, but Chase seemed determined.
“Do you live here in town?”
“Mmm-hmm.” His big hand was sitting right there next to her hip. She wanted to pick it up and put it on her knee, maybe run it up the inside of her thigh so she could feel his calluses rasp against the softest part of her body.
They turned onto a narrow side street, and Jane held her breath in anticipation, counting the seconds until Chase slowed and pulled up to a three-story building. His brow furrowed. “I’m not sure my place is clean.”
Jane opened the door and hopped down before he could back out of this. If he backed out, she’d never get the guts to do it again. Clutching her purse, she met him at the driver’s side door, thoroughly enjoying the way his body kept on rising as he stepped onto the driveway and stood straight. God, he was big. “I’m not a neat freak,” she lied. “It’s no problem.”
He unlocked the door to his condo and stuck his head in to look around before swinging it open. “Good news. It looks okay.”
It actually did look okay. A bit bachelor-pad, what with the flat-screen TV complete with multiple gaming systems. But it didn’t smell funny and there weren’t pizza boxes lying around. Just a few newspapers and a coffee cup…plus one pair of muddy steel-toed boots. Why, oh, why, did those make her heart pitter-patter when fine Italian loafers made her lip curl?
She had an illness. Hopefully, sleeping with Chase would work like an immunization. Tetanus shots lasted only ten years. Perhaps degrading sex had the same rate of effectiveness.
Jane wandered toward the black bookshelves while Chase turned on more lights and picked up the papers. Unsurprisingly, the shelves held DVDs instead of books. Hundreds of DVDs. She peered closer. There were action movies, sure, but they were outnumbered by big award winners. Movies like
Being John Malkovich
and
Atonement
.
“This was a really good book,” she murmured, running her finger along the edge of a case.
“I don’t read much.”
She didn’t feel a smidgen of surprise at that. Her family had never had books around either.
“So,” he said, the word fading into silence as he walked toward his small kitchen and opened the fridge. “I’ve got a couple of beers in here. You want one?” He was jangling his keys nervously, so Jane decided she’d better give him a task. When she asked for ice water, he looked relieved.
They could draw this out with drinks and awkward conversation, or they could skip all the pretense. Jane moved to the stereo system and the iPod connected to it. She scrolled through the songs, looking for something that fit her mood.
Before Chase had even shut off the faucet, Jane found the perfect album and hit play. Then she turned the volume up and let the bass beat drown out the voice of the woman she was now. Tonight she was going to embrace the bad girl who lurked deep inside.