“You should have told me you don’t like horror movies,” I tell her as we walk down the street. Her cheeks are burning like her whole face is about to burst into flame.

“Yeah, I’m the type that screams and ducks down to avoid looking at the screen, but you know what? I think I really like them now.” She gives me a teasing smile.

Her eyes are bright and sparkling and I stare at her in awe. I’ve never felt like this about any woman before. I used to laugh at my friends for acting like love-sick pussies and now I’m doing the same. I put my arm around her and catch another whiff of her shampoo. It hints of lime and coconut. I can’t believe it but I’m rock-hard without her having to do anything but rest against me.

What the hell?

I brush my mouth against her forehead and relish the softness of her skin. There’s something seriously sexy about this woman. She’s gorgeous but she acts like she isn’t, for a start. She goes to my head like a glass of champagne, the way the old song says. I never quite understood that until just now. I feel dizzy, foggy, like I would if I were half-drunk. I might as well be, only it’s her I’m drunk on. And making her come like that in the movie theatre. No woman has had that effect on me. I can’t keep my hands off her.

I love how she just let herself go like that. I can’t remember the last time I did anything so risqué in public; it’s not usually my thing. But tonight I didn’t have a choice. I could fucking smell her arousal and I had to taste her, or I would have gone raving crazy in that cinema. It had been seriously hot though, and I’m still buzzing from it.

“I enjoyed watching you scream,” I say with a wink.

She blushes bright red.

Damned if that doesn’t turn me on.

“No offense, but I think there would have been way more screams if I’d had to actually watch the whole thing!” she says.

My eyebrows rise. “Is that a challenge?”

She gives me a look, full of daring. “Maybe.”

I don’t know if she’s trying to be seductive or not, but fuck it, it definitely has me all wired up. “You’re on.” I glance at the time. It’s just 10:00. Time enough for one drink. “I know this great little place around here that does out of this world cocktails. Feel like having one?”

“Well, I can’t say no to out of this world cocktails,” she says, slipping her arm through mine.

Work has kept me busy and I haven’t been there for a while, but when we arrive, the cocktail list is still impressive.

“This is nice,” she murmurs, looking around, “How did you find it?”

“I used to come here with my grandfather,” I tell her. “He lived in a care home nearby and we used to sneak out and drink cocktails here.”

“That’s so adorable,” she gushes, smiling that unashamed smile of hers that makes me smile too.

I’d deliberately chosen the example I knew would make her heart melt. Telling her I’d brought numerous girls here probably wouldn’t have gone down so well, not that she needed to worry. None of them had anything on her. But that was all a while ago now anyway, the days before when I was a carefree young man.

In truth, it had only been on one occasion that I’d been here with Gramps, when he was still around. But the memory was so vivid it could have been a hundred times. The bartender had laughed at the sight of an old man in a hospital gown and a scruffy student sitting together drinking cosmos in the middle of the afternoon and the thought still makes me smile. We’d felt like naughty children sitting there, drinking in a bar, breaking the care home rules. It was one of the last afternoons spent together before the cancer finally got the better of him.

She’s perusing the cocktail list, biting her bottom lip, which is the sexiest thing ever and I feel a stirring in my pants. It’s incredible how much this girl turns me on. I almost feel out of control. “Anything take your fancy?” I ask her.

“I always go for the same thing.” She hands the menu to me. “Why don’t you surprise me?”

I order us two cosmopolitans. It’s what Gramps and I had, all those years before.

“This is great,” she says, taking a sip.

Her eyes look so beautiful tonight. So sparkly. I could look at her forever. Jeez, what’s happening to me!? “Oh. Um…” And since when do I trip over my tongue like this? “So tell me about what you do, then. I know hardly anything about you.” Totally bizarre, but I actually want to hear everything about the woman I’m dating.

She hesitates and crinkles up her cute little nose before telling me about an amusingly bad day in her life. She screws up her nose again. “It’s so frustrating because I know our system is the best out there and I wish my colleagues would recognize that .”

“For what it’s worth, I agree with Danny. If it were my company, I would only give the job to the company most qualified and with the best solution to my problem. A shoe landing on my face would not affect my decision.”

“I really hope Danny and you are right,” she says, sipping her cocktail and looking straight at me.

It’s weird and beautiful and maybe I’m quietly going totally crazy here, but the way she looks at me with that vulnerable, open expression, makes me feel as if I can see straight into her soul. I’m trying to concentrate on what she’s saying...

I nod and hold her hand, I love watching her talk. Her eyes twinkle and she’s so expressive, gesturing wildly with her other hand.

“I’m finished. Next drinks are on me.”

Before I can act macho and tell her I’ll get it, she is already up and away. I watch her walk to the bar, her hips slender and shapely in black jeans. Her hair long, so shiny and glossy, swishing against her back as she moves. My head might be scrambled with work and trying to get my apartment finished, but I have to admit to myself that the only thing I really care about at the moment… is her.

She comes back and as she settles my drink in front of me, I get another whiff of her hair. And my dick is instantly hard again. What did they make her shampoo with? Sex hormones?

“What is it?” she asks, looking at me with wide, innocent eyes.

She has no idea where my thoughts are, of course. My filthy, filthy thoughts. If she did, she’d probably barricade herself in her house and call the cops. Oh, but the things I could do to this woman.

I grin, and I can’t help how wolfish it is. “Would you believe I’m ready for more Appleton pie?”

The way her cheeks become rosy is just beautiful.