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My avenging angels had arrived. At the sound of Natalie’s voice, Lucas finally stepped away from me. Had I really asked him to do that? The space between us now felt like a chasm. One that threatened to swallow me whole.
“Right here,” I squeaked.
Zoe, wide-eyed, looked at us both. She knew about Lucas. Everyone in my life knew about Lucas, so no surprise there. But she’d never met him before.
“Zoe, Lucas. Lucas, Zoe,” I said by way of introductions.
And damned if the man didn’t turn down the heat and warm right up to her. “Nice to meet you, Zoe,” he said in a perfectly normal, perfectly civil, non-sexy voice.
“Nice to meet you too,” she said, clearly stunned.
Yeah well, same, girl.
“We were coming to pull you out on the dance floor,” Natalie said just as the music stopped.
“This one,” the singer said, beginning to strum a new tune, “is for the lovers out there.”
Sure enough, “Gettin’ You Home” by Chris Young, a favorite of mine, began to play. Just what I needed in my life right now. A song about sex.
“Do you still like to dance, Charlee? Or is that something that’s changed about you?”
Now he was just mocking me.
“She loves to dance,” Natalie pitched in.
“And so, we dance.” He put his drink down on the bar and took the liberty of doing the same with mine. Without giving me a choice, he asked Natalie to look after our drinks, grabbed me by the hand, and steered us to the dance floor.
“Why do I have a feeling your words have a double meaning?”
“Because they do,” he said, lifting our still joined hands. “Exhibit A.”
I did pull away then, prompting a laugh from Lucas.
“Now you’re laughing at me,” I quipped.
“Come here,” he said, pulling me toward him.
Without a word, I half reluctantly and half more than willingly put my hands around his neck.
His arm went around my waist.
And we began to dance. And not just on the dance floor if Lucas’ tone had meant what I thought it did.
CHAPTER TEN
lucas
I was nothing if not inconsistent this week.
I’d learned discipline from my years in the military. From basic training to sniper school and NCO training, I learned and then executed. All the while shedding the version of me that I’d left behind in Kitchi Falls.
Yet here I was, after just days ago telling myself to stay away from this very woman in my arms.
Thanks to Mazzie.
“You’re not even going to at least hear her out?”
As I’d readied the shop for opening, Mazzie had continued to grill me about last Friday. For some reason, the woman had the ability to get under my skin like a little sister might. I’d fessed up, and that was the beginning of the end.
