Chapter 2
AIDEN
Tension and booze flowed through my veins. It wasn’t an ideal combination, but then again, I hadn’t asked to attend thee social event of the season. Instead, I’d been unceremoniously kidnapped by my best friend, who insisted I was the perfect plus-one for the occasion.
What Victoria had failed to mention as she dragged me along to her cousin’s wedding, was the fact it was Halloween-themed. And not just color scheme and a few tasteful decorations.
The asshole who came up with the bright idea of holiday-themed weddings, especially Halloween-themed weddings, needed to be shot. Pronto.
My fingers picked at the stringy cobwebs draped across the edge of the bar and flicked at a plastic spider.
It skittered across the shiny blood red bar top, until it slid off the edge on the other side of the bar.
Damn. Maybe I shouldn’t have done that, considering that was the only company I had for the evening.
I snorted into my drink, the bartender giving me the side-eye.
Honestly, half the night I thought he was hitting on me and the other half I thought he was trying to get rid of me.
It had left me half hard and fully frustrated that I couldn’t get a read on the guy.
He politely smiled at most of my flirting but didn’t give me much to work with.
Knowing my luck, he was probably straight and thought I was a creep.
Hell, he probably thought I was just another dumb guy at a wedding who wouldn’t leave him alone, but since I was tipping him well, he kept his mouth shut. Couldn’t blame the dude for that.
Fuck. That did make me a creep.
Despite the fact the wedding had mostly died down to just a couple dozen guests, the loud bass of the music continued to blare, grating on my nerves.
My jaw twitched as I clung to the glass in my hand and willed myself not to beg the bartender to leave the whole damn bottle—despite the fact I was usually a two-drink max kind of guy.
I swear, there was nothing worse than being stuck at a social event that you couldn’t leave.
Scratch that. Being stuck at a social event alone when you don’t really know anyone else should definitely be its own circle of hell.
When I agreed to come as my best friend’s plus-one to her cousin’s wedding, I assumed she’d stick with me most of the time.
And to her credit, she had. Right until a tall, dark, gorgeous six-and-a-half-foot god came up and asked her to dance.
Not that I could blame her, because if she hadn’t been interested, I might have tried my luck to see if the guy also swung my way.
But alas, Victoria seemed as enamored with the man as he was with her.
I flicked my gaze up to the mirror behind the bar and sought out my potentially former bestie.
She was easy to spot with her red curls that had come loose and now flowed over her shoulder and her bright orange creamsicle-colored dress.
My lips twitched and my heart fluttered as she clung to the man at her side.
Even with the distance between us, I could hear it when she let out a laugh I’d never heard from her before.
It wasn’t that I wasn’t happy for Vic. She deserved the world and if this guy was willing to give it to her, then she deserved him.
But if he broke her heart, well, then he better hope he doesn’t meet me when I have my gun on me. Because I wasn’t afraid to use it.
So, I found myself sitting at the bar, sipping top-shelf liquor and mixed drinks that went down way too smooth.
If I didn’t stop soon, I’d definitely end up embarrassing myself.
And that was the last thing I wanted to do, especially in front of Victoria’s family.
She’d never let me live it down. And considering I had to put up with her at work, giving my partner ammunition she could use to get the entire precinct to tease me over, was the last thing I wanted to do.
As I sat at the bar, sipping my third—no, fourth—martini, I scanned the crowd that had considerably thinned since the evening had started.
I knew some of Victoria’s family, since we had been partners for almost a decade.
But most of them had already turned in for the night.
Besides the bride and groom, Victoria, and Shelby, Victoria’s sister, there wasn’t anyone else who was still mingling through the crowd that I knew.
By the way Victoria and her man were moving on the dance floor, it was obvious I was going to go back to the room by myself. With a sigh, I turned back in my stool to lean against the bar.
I brought my drink to my lips and drained the glass dry.
“I’ll have another one of these, whatever you wanna call them.”
The bartender raised a brow but didn’t make a move toward me as he continued cleaning out the glass in his hand. “You really think that’s a good idea?”
His smirk sent butterflies crashing through my stomach. Maybe I hadn’t lost my touch after all and still had a chance with him.
I leaned forward against the bar and gave him my best charming smile. But the way he snorted and shook his head had me frowning and second-guessing myself. I knew I’d had more to drink than usual, but I hadn’t thought I was that drunk.
Dammit.
“I could think of a few better ideas.”
The bartender leaned down on his elbows and his eyes slid over me in a slow caress. “Sorry, handsome. I don’t date cops.”
It was my turn to raise an eyebrow at him as I lifted my glass for another drink, only to realize I was still empty.
“That so? Why? You a criminal or something?”
He smirked as he refilled my glass and dropped it in front of me, but didn’t answer my question. It shouldn’t have made him even more interesting, but fuck, it made me want to drag him back to my room even more.
“Oh, that’s a dangerous question,” came a deep voice from my right.
I turned and saw a man in an impressive-looking, well-tailored charcoal suit. He grinned and let out a chuckle, at my expense, no doubt. His deep chocolate eyes didn’t quite match the warmth in his voice, but they were still hypnotizing as I found myself letting out a chuckle in return.
“Is that so?” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the bartender cast a glance between us with a frown before he turned his back to us and moved off before I could say anything to him.
I wasn’t sure what it was about the newcomer that had sent him scampering, but there was a tangle of nerves I couldn’t define that clenched in my gut.
When I glanced back over at the man who had joined me at the bar, his eyes also seemed to track the bartender’s movements.
He turned back to me and gave a shrug as he swiped my glass and took a sip before giving it back with a grimace. I grinned at his obvious distaste and pulled the glass back toward me, only mildly disappointed we wouldn’t be sharing.
“Yeah.” He shot me a grin as he tried to catch the bartender’s eye, I assumed to order his own drink. “I learned a long time ago that it’s never a good idea to ask a question you don’t already have the answer to. Especially, if you aren’t sure you want the answer.”
I leaned back in the chair and studied the man before me, his answer seeming a bit too serious for a silly question at a wedding. And while there was a niggling at the back of my brain that there was something, I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. But it was enough to have me intrigued.
The detective in me needed to know more, not to mention the man. Unanswered questions were like my kryptonite.
Not to mention, there seemed to be something familiar about him, and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.
I assumed I’d probably met him at one of Vic’s family gatherings, considering we were at her cousin’s wedding.
But it only made my curiosity increase the more I watched him and thought about him.
“Who says I didn’t already know the answer?” I quirked an eyebrow at him as I raised my glass to my lips, never breaking eye contact.
He let out a chuckle as he cast another glance at the bartender with a frown.
There was something about the way they’d glanced at each other, or carefully kept from looking at each other at the same time, I couldn’t help but wonder if they knew each other.
The thought twisted my gut in an unpleasant way.
I let out a soft hum as I turned away from him and rested my elbows on the bar, focusing on my drink once again.
When the bartender brought over a beer and slid it over to the stranger next to me, without him having to ask for anything in particular, it only reinforced my suspicions. I had no reason for the way jealousy clouded my vision and clawed at my insides, but it tended to be an irrational bitch.
I squashed down the voice yelling mine! and tried to ignore the handsome man, instead keeping my gaze on Victoria in the mirror.
“Waiting for your wife?”
My drink sputtered out of my mouth as I tried not to choke any more than I already had at his words.
“What?” I turned and looked at him, my brows drawn in confusion.
He shrugged. His dark eyes roaming over me, assessing. Caressing… possessing. Like he owned me.
Which was ridiculous, considering he didn’t even know me.
I didn’t even know his name.
So why did I want it to be true?
“The way you’re watching that mirror. It’s obvious you’re watching someone.” His voice was a low growl. The jealousy was obvious and it sent a spike of arousal and need through me.
It couldn’t be wrong to be happy he was just as jealous as I had been just moments ago, right?
I thought about teasing him. But the way my cock was quickly plumping had me ready to squirm in my seat and I didn’t think I’d last much longer. He seemed like a sure thing to take back to my room.
“Honestly, I’m just wondering if I need to wait for my friend to tell me she’s ditching me or if I can ditch her first. But it doesn’t seem very gentlemanly to leave her alone.
” Not that I would ever insinuate to Victoria that she was incapable of taking care of herself.
She’d been a cop before me, but my instinct would always be to look after and protect my partner, even in a social situation that comprised mostly of her family members.
“So, not a girlfriend, then?” Tall, dark, and handsome quirked up an eyebrow. I let out a full-bellied laugh that left him looking perplexed yet amused.
“Oh, God no. Just a friend. We work together. I’m a hundred percent gay.
” I felt my cheeks darken, unsure as to what prompted me to blurt out that declaration.
Not that it was a secret. But it wasn’t usually something I led with before I even exchanged names with a stranger.
The tug of his lips at the information left me thinking maybe it hadn’t been such a bad thing, though.
The way we’d been dancing around each other, flirting, I was sure he’d picked up what I was putting down already. But I still wasn’t used to being so blunt about it.
“Sorry,” I muttered, turning back to my drink.
I was such an idiot. I didn’t know this guy, despite the flirting, or being at my bestie’s family event. Not that I was overly worried. While I wasn’t the biggest guy, I had almost a decade as a cop with more than my share of experience where I had to be able to handle myself in a fight.
“For what?” the guy next to me asked, the puzzled expression clear on his face.
“It’s not usually something I just blurt out, especially to random men. Sometimes people get the wrong idea.” I tried to shrug it off, not feeling as confident as I had a few minutes ago, but the way he stared at me made me feel exposed and vulnerable, but I wasn’t sure if it was in a sexy way.
He continued to study me for another moment before he gave a slight nod and took a sip of his drink. “What about when the wrong idea is the right idea?”
My head snapped in his direction, sure I had heard him incorrectly.
“I’m sorry. What?” I felt like an idiot as the other man sat there and smirked at me.
“Nathan Turner,” the man said, extending his hand.
Flustered, I slid my hand into his, my eyes widening at the way I would have sworn literal sparks flew when we made contact.
“A-Aiden. Aiden Cooper,” I replied, tripping over my own name. I wasn’t sure what it was about this man, but he left me feeling tied up in knots. While I usually didn’t have much game when it came to flirting, there was something about Nathan Turner that left me feeling equally relaxed and on edge.
Or maybe it was just that I wanted him to put me on edge.
Over. And over. And over.
I shook my head, eradicating the stray thought.
“It’s nice to meet you, Aiden.” His voice was low and raspy, deep in a way that turned my insides to jello. “What do you say we live a little and get out of here?”
My breathing hitched. There had been no way I’d heard right, that this gorgeous, put-together man wanted me.
Despite the way we had flirted when he first sat down, I never thought I’d actually stood a chance.
Pushing my reservations aside, I knew the last thing I planned to do was let a man like him slip through my fingertips, even if it was only going to be for one night.
“Your room or mine?” I asked, barely able to recognize the sound of my own voice.