Page 9 of Love Me in the Light

He was fine as fuck. I was normally attracted to deep, brown-skinned men, so I was a little surprised by my attraction to this man who stood there in men’s lingerie, also known as a five-piece suit. When the corner of his lips turned up and he winked at me, it dawned on me that I was staring. Embarrassment covered me.

When he started to walk toward our section, my eyes widened just a bit. I didn’t think that I stared so hard that he would come over. Shit!

“Oh, there he is,” Milan said as she stood. There who is? Her smile was wide as the fine-ass mystery man approached us. “Hey! Ledger, this is Memoree Layne Smith. She is the lighting designer that I told you about. Memoree Layne, this is Ledger “Kryptonite” Johnson, the owner of Kryptonite Reserve.”

With a sexy smile, he walked into my personal space after I stood from my seat. His hand extended toward me. “Miss Memoree Layne Smith, how are you doing? I heard you’re a lighting expert.”

His voice was creamy yet deep. My mind cycled through how it would sound with different emotions behind it. Regardless of the emotion, his voice was sexy. The lower portion of my body certainly thought so.

I placed my hand into his. His palm was warm on my cold skin. It felt like he held my hand a few seconds longer than the acceptable three business seconds. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Johnson. This is a nice place that you have. I am the lighting designer.”

The corner of his top lip rose. “Sounded like you just corrected a nigga.”

His casual vernacular told me that he was laidback. His aura told me otherwise. Without knowing much about him, I knew a lot. I smiled softly, then responded. “I’m happy that you were able to identify the sound correctly. It’s important that you know my role, as I know yours.”

He gazed at me for a beat with his beautiful, grayish-green eyes. The low light didn’t take away from the beauty of them. He tittered. “I respect that fully. Correct me any time that you think I need to be.”

“That’s not a problem at all. I planned to,” I confirmed. I heard Milan Renee’s muttered damn. She was probably surprised by my directness with him. Hell, I was a little surprised myself. He brought this vibe out of me that made me want to challenge him for some reason.

He just nodded with a smirk. “So tell me what you think, Miss Memoree Layne.”

“I think you have a very nice club. It’s clear that it attracts money,” I said with a smirk of my own.

He snickered quietly. “I actually wanted to know what you thought about the lights since you’re the lighting designer. Also, this is a lounge, not a club.”

Are we locked into a battle of wits? That was what it felt like. It was sexy, and the thump in my pussy told me so. “Oh, okay. I stand corrected. The lighting in your lounge is . . . nice.”

“Why does that sound more like an insult than a compliment? I feel like if the lights were a baby, you would have just called them precious. We all know precious is another way to say something is ugly.” He chuckled. Even his chuckle was sexy.

I giggled. “It wasn’t an insult or a compliment. It just was. Whoever designed your lighting seemed to understand what you wanted. The concept is strong, but there are some missing markers.”

“Like?” he asked.

“Like your VIP sections are underlit, which is a problem,” I told him.

His handsome face contorted before he stepped down from our section. His body turned to face me, and his eyes explored his VIP section. That lasted for a minute before he reentered my personal space again. His cologne wrapped around me like a firm hug. “I like them dark.”

“Let me ask. Were you trying to accomplish darkness or intimacy? The two are not synonymous,” I pointed out. It was a common mistake that I saw way too often.

He crossed his arms over his chest that I’d bet was tatted. His behind-the-ear neck tattoo peeked out from under his collared button-down. “Explain, Miss Memoree Layne.”

“I will. First, it seems like you like my name. This is the third time you’ve said it.” I didn’t care if he said it a thousand times. It sounded great on his tongue.

He chuckled before he rubbed his fingers through his beard. “You have a very interesting name, so yes. I do like it. Do you not like me saying it?”

“No, it’s fine. I just wanted to point it out,” I said. I needed to get my shit together. “Let’s get back on track. You want people to come here to relax and stay a while, but they still need to have functional visibility to do things. You’ve got food, personal belongings, cigars on tables that they need to see. You certainly want them to see where they’re going. Your decorative lights are working overtime at their job and not getting it done.

“If it were up to me, near the seating and tables, I’d add concealed low lights and keep them warm and dimmable. People will be able to see what they’re doing without you having to compromise the mood you want,” I finished.

He studied me with intense eyes. I could tell that his mind was in the middle of processing my words. The fact that I could tell that he didn’t just hear me, but he listened, made him fuckable sexy. “What else would you do?”

My finger pointed toward the chandeliers in the middle of the room. “Those have to go.”

“Damn, you don’t like my chandeliers? I picked those bitches out, and they were expensive,” he said.

With a giggle, I responded. “No, I don’t. I won’t deny their worth. They look extremely expensive, but that has nothing to do with the lighting quality. They are decorative, like most of the lighting here, and they take up too much prime lighting real estate.”

“So you’re one of those unapologetic women who means what she says and says what she means, huh?” He stared at me for a beat. “I like that shit, even though you just tried to play me about what I thought was the signature piece of this whole place. If they go, then what are you going to put in their place?”