“All right, then. Let’s go.”
“Go? Go where?”
“To dinner.”
Internally, I sighed. I’d been impressed by her willingness to accept the decision I’d made and move on. Most headhunters were relentless nags no matter how many times you said no, and I’d actually believed she was different—soft and forgiving of real human problems and circumstances and as pretty on the inside as she so visibly was on the outside. Fuck, she’s pretty on the outside.
Obviously, that was a ruse.
“Look, I really appreciate the offer of the job, and the time you had to take out of your day to come here and try to woo me, but as I told you, I have more here to consider than a salary and helping other people. My daughter is here. I’m not going.”
Her smile ratcheted up, and the creases of confusion at the corners of my eyes only deepened.
“Good. Let’s eat.”
“Ms. Hol—”
“Charlotte.”
“Charlotte,” I acquiesced. “I don’t know how I can be any clearer on this—”
“Nick,” she called, almost teasingly. The left side of my chest contracted at the friendly familiarity. “I’ve got it. You don’t want the job. But I want a burger, and based on the tired lines on your face and wrinkled clothes, you’re at the end of a long shift, probably without food, and you could use one too. So grab your wallet or your purse or whatever the fuck it is you carry, and let’s roll.”
“My purse?” I asked roughly.
She shrugged. “How would I know what you’re into?”
“I don’t carry a purse,” I assured. It obviously didn’t matter, but for some reason, it felt like I needed to deny it. I couldn’t quite explain the feeling of insecurity. Maybe I was just discombobulated by her lighthearted nature. For the last three years, almost everyone I talked to knew my past and carried it in every word, expression, and interaction they had with me.
The tiny hint of her breasts that peeked through the top of her blouse heaved, and sensation tingled in the tip of my dick.
Okay, maybe it’s not as complicated as expectations and tiresome interactions. Maybe it’s just my lower brain.
“Oh,” she hummed, turning to close up her soft-leather briefcase in the seat of her vacated chair, her blond hair falling down in front of her face in a cascade. “Okay.”
“Okay,” I agreed awkwardly. I honestly hadn’t made small talk with a woman that didn’t include aneurysms and traumatic brain injury in at least a year, and apparently, all of my parts—aside from my penis—and tools had a light coating of flaky rust. “Listen, I really don’t have to come with you to dinner—”
Her head flicked up, and her hair flared out in an arc as she did. “Would you stop trying to blow me off? It’s getting kind of insulting.”
Heat rushed to my cheeks at her offense. I hadn’t intended to make her feel bad. I’d just been trying to let her off the hook. Luckily, the heavy scruff roughening the line of my jaw would serve valiantly as camouflage.
“I’m sorry. Dinner. Sounds good. Where are we going?”
“Second Ave.”
“Jesus,” I said, my eyebrows pulling together. “The East Side, huh?” At this time, there’d just about have to be an act of God to convince me to trek across town on my own.
She smiled teasingly, and at the tightening of both my chest and my pants, I decided this was probably as close to me as God intended to come. “Yes, Nick. That is where Second Ave. is.”
I rolled my eyes and grabbed my suit jacket from the hook behind me, slinging it over my shoulders as I asked, “What’s over there?”
“Cornerstone Tavern.”
“Good burgers?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Perplexed, I froze, hands to the button of my jacket, before putting it through the hole. “You don’t know?”
“Nope.”
This woman was fucking crazy. She specifically said she wanted a burger and picked a place all the way on the East Side, and she didn’t even know if they had the relief to her craving. Maybe I was letting my hormones talk me into something I shouldn’t.
“Look, Charlotte—”
“You ready?” she cut me off to ask. Her delicate fingers curled around the handle of her briefcase and flexed as she waited for my response. Her other hand shot to the door handle and started to turn.
Her eyes danced with both mischief and mystery, and despite her ability to make me feel completely uncomfortable, something about their color called to me. A dark blue-green, rimmed with even darker midnight, they were both roguish and appealing at once.
With a quick pat to my pockets to confirm I had my keys, wallet, and phone, I nodded. “Yeah.”
I guess I’m fucking crazy too.
Around the desk and out the door, I flicked the light switch off as we left and allowed her to take the lead as we made our way down the hall from my office, down the stairs in the lobby, past the main desk, and out the front doors into the bustling energy of rush hour in Manhattan.
Horns blared, a sharp whistle sounded, and a taxi swerved to a stop right in front of us. I jumped back and moved to pull Charlotte a step with me, but her body held firm. It was only then that I noticed Charlotte’s fingers, curled into the clutch of her mouth, and her other hand in the air.
This taxi wasn’t a near accident; she’d hailed the fucker practically before we’d stepped out the door.
I nodded, flexing the corners of my lips as my eyebrows moved up. “Impressive.”
“Thank you,” she cooed with a giant smile as she opened the door and slid into the faux leather seat. I stepped off of the curb and into the open space of the door to follow, but she stopped. Her eyes danced as she looked up at me. “Some people train for marathons. I trained to be a world-record taxi hailer.”
I laughed. “Really?”
She cackled, outright and brazen, the volume of her downright obnoxious laugh nearly knocking me on my ass. I felt one corner of my mouth curve upward involuntarily.
Why is that hideous laugh so attractive?
“No, not really. Geez, Nick. You sure are gullible for someone so science-minded.”
I immediately thought of Lexi. She’d been the majority of my female contact outside of work for a couple of years now, and everything she said was fact. There wasn’t a need to read between the lines or interpret the joke. It just was. I supposed that had largely impaired my ability to detect sarcasm.
Instead of giving Charlotte all of those details, I bit the pride bullet and admitted a fault. “Yeah. I guess I am.”
“Good. I like that. It’s entertaining.”
I smirked and climbed inside the car, shutting the door at my side, and she told the cabbie where we were headed.
Her lively eyes came back to mine, and her body turned toward me, the skin of her bare knees just barely brushing against the thin wool fabric covering mine. “I wouldn’t get too used to the gullible version of me. I’m a quick learner.”
“I just bet you are, Mr. Brain Surgeon,” she agreed smartly, seeming to transform from working professional to fun companion right before my eyes. Coral painted lips gave way to a nearly perfect white smile—just one bottom tooth jutted slightly out of line.
At the strange compulsion to put my hand to her knee, I clasped it with the other one and settled them in my lap. Not only was it completely unprofessional, it was dangerous. This Charlotte seemed to attack life, and that kind of sirenlike vibrancy screamed of trouble.
“So…” she started, only to pause until my eyes lifted from their carefully focused spot on my lap and met hers. “You have a daughter?”
“Yes.”
“Does that mean you have a wife?”
I smiled. I thought I’d seen the sparkle of a lure in the water when she’d challenged me to turn down her dinner invitation again, but I hadn’t believed it. Just like with sarcasm, I was entirely out of practice in the art of flirting. I’d messed up so badly when Winnie had told me she was pregnant and I’d gotten the job offer in California. Our relationship had ended after that, and it’d taken me years to get back the time I’d lost with my daughter. Hell, I was still working hard to get back that time, to nurture and strengthen our relationship.
Growing up had been a long learning curve for me, and now that I had, I was scared of falling back. I just wanted my daughter, and everything else was a distraction. “No, it doesn’t.”
“What about a girlfriend?”
I shook my head. “No to that as well.”
I had to admit, the lifestyle had turned a little lonely as of late, though. I didn’t have Lexi all the time, and I didn’t deserve to. She had Winnie and Wes and a whole other support system.
When I didn’t have Lexi, I had the hospital. That was how it worked.
I was used to it.
But the taste of Charlotte’s temptation was treacherously sweet.
“Hmm,” she hummed thoughtfully.
I spoke just to fill the silence. “Married to the job, I guess.”
“Mmhmm,” she agreed. “I’ve heard all about you doctor types. Forty-hour weeks are nonexistent.”
“Hey, I try to keep it to sixty. That’s normal, right?”
She laughed again, and the sharpness of its high note made me smile. “Hardly. But normal in the world of medicine? Maybe.”
The cab pulled to a stop between 51st and 50th, and Charlotte reached into the outside pocket of her briefcase to get money. I put my hand to hers and pressed.
“No,” I said with a shake of my head. “I got it.”
She rolled her eyes, but she pushed open her door and climbed out without paying all the same.
I pulled a twenty from my pocket and handed it to the driver, as I followed her out. “Keep it.”
“Hey, thanks,” he said looking at the seven-dollar fare and then back to the twenty.
“Come on, come on,” Charlotte called, waving her arm in a dramatic circle as she held the door to the restaurant, the cold air of the air conditioning pouring out recklessly into the summer heat.
Shaking my head, I still quickened my step, almost as though my body felt compelled to comply, and scooted behind her to take the weight of the door. “Go on,” I directed, nodding to her to lead, and she didn’t hesitate.
My eyes took a minute to adjust to the darkness as I stepped inside, and as a result, I bumped softly into Charlotte’s back when she stopped to avoid a group of people ahead of us.
Her ass grazed the front of my pants, and the soft lavender notes of her perfume hit me like a wave.
My whole body came alive.
Good Christ. Relax, Nick. I know it’s been a while, but Jesus.
Side to side, she jumped from toe to toe trying to see over the crowd and up to the hostess station. But, even with the five-inch heel of her stilettos aiding the fight, she was still a half a foot shorter than me.
Impatient, she reached back for my hand and dragged, sidestepping around the people in front of us, and making a charge. “Come on. We’re late.”
“Late?” I questioned. “Late for what?”
She didn’t answer me though, instead nodding to the hostess and skating right by, taking two steps to my every one until she found two free stools at a table in the bar.
“Hi,” she greeted cheerfully, unfazed by the table of strangers we’d just invaded. To be fair, they didn’t seem all that affected either. I was apparently the only one who found it strange.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
She smiled gleefully, settling into her stool and hanging her briefcase on the high spoke of the back. She reminded me a little of an evil overlord as she rubbed her hands together.
“Charlotte, what’s going on?”
“Welcome, folks!” a man with a microphone said, clipboard in hand, from a corner of the room as Charlotte took off her blazer and got comfortable. Silky tanned skin glowed at her chest and shoulders, and a flowy white blouse billowed to cover the rest. “I see a lot of familiar faces, and some new, but you’re all on time. And that’s all I really fucking care about. Let’s get trivial!”
“Charlotte…”
She smiled, a little shrug just barely lifting the bare skin of her shoulders. “It’s trivia night. And I have a feeling I’ve finally got a good partner.”