Chapter 1 #3
Her laugh caught me off guard. She let out kind of a giggle snort and clasped a hand over her mouth for a moment while her shoulders shook.
“Why would I do that?” she asked, still smiling.
“What do you do for a living?” I wasn’t usually this twisted up over a woman, and this one was going to take more than my normal amount of skill.
I needed to get out of the quicksand and back on firmer ground.
She paused for a fraction of a second, and I had the impression it wasn’t a question she always answered willingly.
Which meant she either trusted me—fat fucking chance—or she didn’t care enough to lie to me about the answer—sad but far more likely.
“I’m a divorce attorney.” She said it as if daring me to make a comment. I had no intention of being half that predictable.
No wonder she was prickly. She saw the worst things people could do to each other, all wrapped up in the language of love and loss.
“So, if I was considering marriage, it would make sense for me to trust you to give me advice on the best way to protect myself in case things go ass over teakettle?”
She laughed, and I could almost see her relax incrementally.
“That’s easy. Don’t do it. It’s not worth it.”
I’d never considered marriage before. Beyond the occasional handcuffs on the bedframe fucking, I’d never been a fan of being tied down.
Not as more than a far off in the future concept.
I hadn’t rejected the idea completely, but I hadn’t found it.
I certainly hadn’t been looking for it. Still, the finality of her words made me inexplicably sad.
“See,” I said, ignoring the tightening in my chest that made no fucking sense.
“I don’t know you, but I can already trust that your advice comes from an informed perspective.
So, you sat down looking for a cocktail, maybe you could trust..
.” I left the rest of the sentence unfinished so she could fill in the blank.
“I sat down looking for a Bombay Sapphire, dirty with extra olives.”
Well, damn. The corner of her luscious red lips curved up just enough to let me know she enjoyed messing with me.
I was good with that. Whatever gave her pleasure.
Which begged the question...why? Why her?
Why did I suddenly care whether this woman was enjoying herself or not? What was it about her?
Or I could ignore the questions and keep going, because whatever the reason, I wanted to see what happened when she really felt something, even if it was only enjoyment in her drink choice.
“Is that what you’d still like, cher?” I asked, resigning myself to the inevitable.
I had no doubt the internal battle this woman waged over a cocktail choice took more energy than most people gave to much bigger decisions. It was clear; control was a huge part of who she was.
“No, dammit.” The frustration was clear in her voice, and I barely managed to hide my smile. It wouldn’t do to have her think I was laughing at her. “I still can’t believe it’s a thing, but I want to try the artichoke bitters.”
“Trust me?” I repeated, hoping for a different answer this time.
She tipped her head to the side, exposing the long, slender column of her throat.
I pushed back against the image of running my nose over her pale skin, breathing in her scent before following the path with my lips.
My teeth. Some of what I’d been thinking must have shown in my eyes because I heard her breath catch and watched her swallow hard.
She nodded, reluctantly, but it was there.
I grabbed a grapefruit from the well, the bottle of bitters, and the small-batch gin I’d picked up at the new distillery I’d found outside Thibodeau.
It had an herbal note that worked beautifully with the juniper.
She watched me cut and juice the grapefruit into the shaker before pouring in the gin and bitters and topping it with ice.
Her blue-eyed gaze followed my movements with an intensity that would have made me uncomfortable if I didn’t love it so damn much.
She watched as if she were trying to understand the steps.
Not like the hipsters who came in looking for a free mixology lesson; more like her mind couldn’t be quiet, and she was determined to take in as much information as she could.
I was fine with that. Better than fine. In my experience, when they let themselves, curious people felt pleasure more intensely. Everything about that worked for me.
I grabbed a rocks glass from the freezer and strained the drink in the frosted heavy glass before flaming a rosemary sprig and tucking it and a paper straw into the drink. Setting the glass on the coaster in front of her, I waited and watched.
She didn’t hesitate. She picked up the glass, slid the straw between those gorgeous red lips I’d already imagined wrapped around my cock—God help me—and took a sip. She took another one before setting the glass back on the coaster and hitting me with a smile I wanted to see a lot more of.
“It’s good.”
“It’s better than good and you know it.” I leaned on the bar, letting a little of my smugness show.
“You’re not plagued by lack of confidence, are you?” She searched my face, as if she were cataloguing ideas.
“I imagine that’s something we share. My name’s Ford, by the way.”
“Charlotte.” She raised her glass in a mock toast and took another sip.
“Is the herbal taste from the bitters or gin? It’s more than just the rosemary.” There was the barest hint of a wrinkle in her forehead, and I resisted the temptation to smooth it with my thumb.
“It’s the gin. They use a two-step distillation process.
Some of the heavier aromatics—the juniper, cassia bark, lemon peel—are immersed in the spirits.
A second batch of botanicals are put in a copper basket the vapor from the distillation passes through, infusing it before it condenses again.
” I watched her, looking for any sign she’d glazed over during my gin documentary.
“Like a gin-making potpourri,” she said, catching the essence and knocking me off guard at the same time.
“It’s actually a lot like that.”
It was a testament to how focused I was on the woman in front of me. I didn’t notice the suit until he slid onto the stool beside her.