CHAPTER SIX
Jovana
I had no idea what Grayson was still doing at the bar, considering everyone he’d come here with had already left, but he was sitting in the same spot, nursing his latest round of vodka.
His fourth, to be exact.
It seemed that with each new glass I set in front of him, his stare intensified.
I felt it everywhere.
When I tended to the other tables, I swore his gaze followed me. When I went to the bar to pick up drinks, it burned through my backside. When I dashed down the hallway where the restrooms were located, I could even sense it there.
Though his eyes followed, he stayed put.
During the time he’d sat there alone, he didn’t speak to any women. He didn’t appear to be waiting for someone else to join him—at least there were no signs of that by the way he was staring at me. And with his large, well-stocked bar at home, he really had no reason to still be here.
Unless it was to watch me.
In that case, he was getting quite the show.
I’d taken every bit of Sloane’s advice and made that asshole see what he was missing.
When I walked, I shook my butt a little harder than normal. When I approached my tables that were full of male patrons, I amped up the flirtation. When I brought Grayson and his party more drinks, I looked everywhere but at him.
If he wanted my attention, he was going to have to earn it.
But things had taken an interesting turn right before his guests had left. The woman with the red glasses, who had been sitting next to him, had approached me. The business card she’d handed to me showed she was a publicist with an office in the Back Bay, not far from the bar, where she’d asked if I would meet her this week. She wouldn’t say why. She wouldn’t say what she wanted. She was just adamant that we chat.
Since my interest was piqued, I’d told her I would see her tomorrow morning.
That was about thirty minutes ago, and I still couldn’t figure out why someone associated with Grayson would want to speak to me.
It was that lingering question that made me want to join him and ask.
At least that was what I told myself.
I collected the check from my second-to-last table, the bar now almost empty, and I entered the tip into the computer. Just as I turned away from the screen to walk to his table, I felt him again.
His eyes.
A stare that deepened its way through my body. That dipped and rose, like the bouncing of a tennis ball.
A heat began to build between us as I made my way over to him. Once I arrived, I needed to do something with my hands and gripped the edge of the round wood table. At the very least, to keep them steady.
Why did he still have this effect on me?
Why wasn’t I glaring at him while breathing fire like a dragon?
Why was his stare unlike any of the others I’d received tonight?
One that made me feel.
One that made me yearn.
“Jovana . . .”
My name sounded different coming out of his mouth compared to everyone else who had spoken it this evening.
A voice that was deep, gritty.
Far too sexy.
“Yes?”
“I want to know something.” His arms landed on the table, his hands slowly crossing.
Those fingers. Oh God. I remembered them.
Their power.
Talent.
And even though I’d come here to ask a question, I was intrigued by his.
“Yes?” I shifted my weight, attempting to take a breath.
“Have you felt my eyes on you tonight?”
My face reddened, sweat now beginning to seep through my skin. “I have.”
“The last time I saw you, you were flipping me off before you rushed out of my place.” His exhales were raw, sounding almost like a huff, as if he were fighting to choose his words carefully. “Now that we’re alone, why aren’t you telling me to go fuck myself?”
“Well, for one, I’m at work.”
“That’s the only reason?”
I squeezed the table even harder, and somehow that moved me closer, his scent taunting the tips of my nostrils.
I already knew the smell. This wasn’t the first time I’d inhaled it.
But like the first time, it hit me.
Nagged at me.
Almost tore at me.
The breeze of citrus was equally balanced with notes of amber, as if the freshness of a spring sky met the center of the woods, where the trees were the thickest.
That was Grayson’s scent.
Full of confidence.
Sex.
And dominance.
“Believe it or not, I don’t make it a habit to raise my middle finger unless the situation absolutely requires it, like that night.” I tried not to label the color of his green eyes, because it shouldn’t matter—no, it didn’t matter. “Tonight, you’re a customer, and my parents raised me to respect others. So my middle finger has stayed put unless it’s raising to give you a drink.” I laughed, the uncomfortableness tugging at all my edges. “Would I like to tell you just how you made me feel? Yes. Do I think it would make a difference?” I shook my head. “No.”
He glanced at my hands. This was the first time he’d broken eye contact since I’d been standing here.
“I have a question for you.” I took another breath, waiting for his gaze to reach me. I wasn’t sure why I wanted it, why I missed the attention, but once I had it, I said, “Why does Laura want to speak with me?”
He studied my face. Looked at me as though he were counting my freckles and taking an inventory of each pore. And when he leaned to the side, I wasn’t sure what had prompted the movement until I realized he was freeing up a pocket to remove his wallet. He slipped a card from one of the slits and held it out to me.
“What’s this for?” I paused, waiting for a response. “Do you want me to bring you a check?”
“No.”
“You just want me to run it for the full amount of tonight’s bill?”
No one had paid before they left, so I assumed they were sticking him with the tab.
His eyes narrowed as he said, “That’s why I’m giving you the card, Jovana.”
There was my name again.
Just as coarse as it had been last time, with a touch of sarcasm, which I was learning that Grayson embedded into almost everything he said.
When I reached for the card, our fingers grazed.
Just that small movement, those few seconds of contact, and I was sucking in a mouthful of air, holding it, my pulse instantly hammering away.
The tingles now like tiny flames, licking me from the inside.
“I’ll be back—”
“Add four hundred.”
I blinked several times. “Excuse me?”
“Two hundred that you never charged me from before. Two hundred for this evening.”
“But—”
“Four hundred.” He nodded toward the bar. “Go.”
I shook my head in awe. “Does everyone in your life just listen to your commands? Because—”
“We’ll talk when you get back.” He took out his phone and hit the screen, completely tuning me out.
That man.
He was unlike anyone I’d ever met.
Authoritative. Irritable. Yet charming in the weirdest way.
To the point where I found myself walking to the bar to run his card, perplexed at how obedient I was when it came to his demands.
Two hundred was an astronomical tip. I’d thought so last time, which was why I hadn’t listened and had given myself nothing.
But it was more than just an outrageous number; it was an amount that had made me feel bought, as though that were a fair price to pay for me to go home with him.
Even now, knowing how much of an asshole he was, I felt uncomfortable as I looked at the tip line, the computer waiting for a total.
The difference between then and this evening was that I wasn’t going home with him.
Period.
That was what made it a little easier to type in the four hundred. That I knew he didn’t need it.
That I did.
I printed out his receipt, and while I was walking back to his table, it hit me. He’d never answered my question as to why Laura wanted to meet with me.
So, once the table was within reach, I placed the paper and pen in front of him and said, “I’m going to ask you again, Why does Laura want to—”
“Are you done for the night?” He signed his name across the bottom of the slip and dropped the pen.
I released a burst of air that was a mix between a laugh and a gasp. “No.”
He glanced over my shoulder. “There’s no one else here. I must be your last table.”
“I’m closing.” I crossed my arms. “That means I have a bunch of duties I need to get done before I leave.”
He returned his card to his wallet. “Do you have a second to walk me out?”
“Walk you out?”
He slid his legs toward me, spreading them, so that even though I was a few paces away, it made me feel like I was standing between his thighs. “Yes, Jovana. Walk me out. That doesn’t mean come home with me. It just means I’m asking you to come with me to the door. Can you do that?”
He made everything sound like a sexy argument, even a simple trip to the exit.
And a submissive side of me that I had no idea existed replied, “Yes.”
He took the pen and receipt off the table and tucked them into my apron. The scrape of his fingers against my waist should have triggered nothing.
But it triggered everything.
A seductive explosion vibrated through me.
As it did, he laughed. “You don’t mask your feelings well, do you?”
I couldn’t when it came to him.
This was what he brought out in me.
What he stirred.
The amount of power his eyes and hands had over me.
But still, I played coy and said, “I’m not sure what you mean.”
He was off his chair, towering over me. “I barely touched you and your reaction was as strong as if I’d cupped your face and dragged your lips to mine.” His tongue gradually darted out, licking the top of his bottom lip. “Is it that you’re not touched too often or you’re just that turned on by me?”
I was positive my eyes bugged out when I snapped, “Dick.”
Despite what had just come out of my mouth, something very different was happening between my legs.
A wetness that was taking hold of me.
That was what his directness did.
“Answer me, Jovana.”
“I wouldn’t give you that satisfaction.”
He chuckled. “All right, we’ll see.” He took a step, which only brought us closer. “Follow me.”
I stayed next to him, passing the tables, and when I assumed he’d head for the front of the bar, he turned and we began to go toward the hallway where the restrooms were located. At first, I was worried this was going to be a replay of our first night, since I couldn’t understand why we were going in that direction, and then it became obvious.
Grayson wanted to leave through the back, the door that was nearest to his condo.
Once we reached the end point, he leaned into the glass while facing me. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
He took several deep breaths. That was what I did when I was searching for words, but I didn’t get the sense he had a hard time coming up with replies.
As his mouth opened, it pulled into a smile. “For not flipping me off.”
“You haven’t left yet. I still have time.”
He laughed. “That’s fair.” He lifted his arm, holding the top of the doorway. “I have a question of my own.” Still gripping the molding, he leaned forward, closing the space between us.
My muscles tightened.
My lips parted, drawing in more air.
He wasn’t going to kiss me.
He wouldn’t dare.
Not after telling me that nothing would happen following our one night together.
Because a kiss would be more.
And Grayson Tanner didn’t do more.
But his lips were opening, his gaze locking with mine. “I want to know if I can feel it.” As he spoke, his words hit my mouth, his breath soft, smelling of vodka and cologne.
“Feel what?”
He didn’t answer. He just moved in a bit more, his mouth hovering above mine.
As the seconds passed, wetness pooled between my thighs.
My nipples tightened, hardening to peaks that I was positive were pointing straight through my bra.
I’d lost control of my body.
It was as if he held a string that dictated my reactions and was pulling on it.
With every ounce of his strength.
I had to force my hands to stay at my sides and stop my body from leaning into his.
“Us.” His free hand lifted, his palm holding the base of my neck, tilting my face up, his mouth rising so that it didn’t touch mine. “The chemistry that everyone says we have.” His stare traced my eyes, nose, down to my lips, where his thumb moved across my pout. Back and forth. A speed so slow, it was making me yearn for more pressure. “Is that what this is?”
He hadn’t earned this.
He hadn’t even begun to grovel his way out of the hole he’d dug himself into.
But, my God, there was no way I could demand that now.
I was . . . lost.
“Yes. I feel it too.” My voice wasn’t any louder than a whisper.
“I can see how turned on you are.” His teeth bared. “I can fucking feel it.”
“Then what’s stopping you from kissing me?”
His eyes closed, and his lips briefly grazed mine, like the passing of a windshield wiper, before he pressed our foreheads together. “Laura. That’s who’s stopping me.”
My body was beating in a way that made it hard to breathe and impossible to process what he was saying. The only thing I could get out was, “What?”
His face pulled away, his hand moving to my chin, holding it while he replied, “You’ll find out why tomorrow.” He separated our bodies and opened the door and began to walk through it.
I grabbed the handle, keeping the door ajar while I watched him, dumbfounded, confused as to what had just happened, what he’d even said, and what this all meant. “Grayson?”
He didn’t turn around. He didn’t even look over his shoulder.
He just said, “I’ll see you in the morning, Jovana,” and it was loud enough for me to hear.