Chapter Five
Michael
Princess hangs up with her girlfriend, but before I suggest what a “real man” I can be, her phone rings again. She doesn’t say hello but launches straight in.
“Steven, you need to stop calling me.”
Her tone makes my shoulders tense, like I need to throw my body in front her and take a bullet.
“Because I asked you to stop,” she says, “and that is reason enough.”
Who the fuck is this Steven? I don’t like the way he’s got her hackles up.
“What do you mean, you asked around?” Now she sounds pissed. Good for her. I’m feeling pissed on her behalf.
“Not that it’s any of your business, but despite your extensive research into my personal life, I do, in fact, have a date for the gala. Now leave me the hell alone.” She ends the call and throws her phone into her purse.
“Trouble?” I ask.
“No.” She crosses her arms.
“Who’s Steven?”
“My ex-husband.”
It takes me a second before I reason out the rest of the partial conversations I’ve been privy to. “And you’re trying to find a date for your fancy shindig because you want to make him jealous.”
“No!” Her whole body turns in my direction, swinging her dark brown hair over her shoulder. Her expression is horrified.
“You’re lying.” All women want us to be jealous. That’s their number one play.
“I am not lying. I don’t want him to feel anything for me. Not love, not attraction, not jealousy, but especially not pity.”
Pity? Who would pity this woman? She’s got to have all mankind by the balls. I want her to have me by the balls.
We pull into the shop. The front lobby is glass walls on three sides. Jimmy is behind the front desk. I pull past three bays, each with their garage doors closed, then park behind the building where there are no windows. I turn to face her.
“I’ll take you to your party, Princess.”
“You?” she asks, her eyebrows shooting toward her hairline.
I cock my head, questioning. I’m not used to being turned down, but then she’s not the type I usually ask out. “Something wrong with me?”
“No, but... No. It’s just that... I don’t know you.”
“That’s the definition of a first date.”
She stares at me, looking stunned and saying nothing.
“You know... A lot of women get off on the idea of slumming it.”
She rolls her lips inward and narrows her eyes, then she lifts her finger and points at me like she’s the sexy schoolmarm and she’s going to teach her naughty boy a lesson. Fuck, she’s hot.
“First of all, Mr. Sexy, whatever you’re used to, I’m not it. Second, don’t be so crude as to say ‘get off.’ Third, spending time with any human being is never slumming. That’s offensive.”
I don’t comment on her amusing nickname for me—I don’t think she meant to say it out loud—so instead, I address each of her points in turn. “First, I’m sure you’re right. Second, I am crude. That’s just the way it is. Third, I stand corrected on the whole slum thing.”
She gives one firm nod. “You should have a much higher opinion of yourself.”
This draws another low chuckle out of me. “Oh, Princess, don’t worry. I do. Ask anyone in the shop. All good guys. Good friends. But every one of them will tell you, I’m the most arrogant asshole they’ve ever met. I was just working an angle I thought might get me in there.”
“In there?” she asks. Her voice, originally irritated has dropped to something low and curious. Her neck is pinking up, and her eyes drop to my mouth. It doesn’t take a genius to pick up on her signals. I slide across the seat, closing the gap between us.
“Yeah. I want in there, and I’ll let you in on something else.”
“What’s that?” she asks.
“You can quit acting like a prude. I know your uppity reaction to ‘getting off’ is just for show.”
She raises one eyebrow and then—suddenly—both when realization hits. Yeah, honey. I know what you were up to when I left you alone.
She inhales sharply, then I watch the wheels turn as she figures she can convince me I imagined the whole thing. “Oh, is that so?”
“Yeah. That’s so.” My gaze drops to her mouth. She licks her bottom lip, and my cock jumps as it strains behind my zipper.
“And are you always such an expert on complete strangers’ sensibilities?”
I drop my head and fight back a smile at her princess-talk.
“You’re a shameless flirt,” she says.
My head jerks up, and I set the record straight. “I have no shame, but I don’t flirt.”
“You don’t?”
“Boys flirt.”
She blinks those thick, dark lashes as my meaning sinks in. She said she didn’t want a boy. She needed a real man. Men didn’t come any more real than me. I hope she gives me the chance to prove it.
“If you’re not flirting, then what exactly are you doing?” she asks.
She’s leaning into me, and I accept the offer. Slowly I raise my hand and draw a lock of her long, glossy hair behind her ear. “Testing your boundaries.”
Her voice drops low. “I’m not getting the sense you’re good with boundaries.”
My fingers had been stroking against her skull. Now they stop. “You want me to be?”
There’s a look of panic in her eyes. Then she says, “God, no!” and launches herself at me.