Chapter 8 #2
But then, she looked suddenly uncomfortable, which had him wanting to drop through a hole in the floor. He hadn’t thought about how his request might come across. Suddenly, he realized he was going to be disappointed if she said no.
He cleared his throat and jerked his gaze away from hers. “Unless you have somewhere you need to be.”
“No!” she said quickly, reaching out to brace a hand on his arm. “Sorry, I … I’d love to.”
Mateo didn’t take the time to dwell on the relief stealing over him. He found an empty table in the corner of the café and gestured toward it. “If you want to go sit, I’ll order. What are you drinking?”
“Café au lait on ice, please.”
“You got it.”
As she turned to make her way to the table, his turn in line came.
Within minutes, he walked back to the table with a basket of half a dozen beignets and two cups of café au lait on ice.
He had never been much for prissy coffee drinks with foam and crap sprinkled on top, but he’d watched them make Melody’s and realized it was merely a special blend mixed with milk.
Once seated across from her at the table, he took a sip through his straw and then reached for one of the beignets.
Still hot, it left the residue of powdered sugar behind on his fingertips as he devoured it in a few quick bites.
His eyes widened at the taste of the fluffy, flaky little donut, and he found himself wishing he’d ordered more than half a dozen.
“Told you,” she teased, reaching out to snag one for herself. “Now you’ve been officially welcomed to New Orleans.”
“Are you from here?” he asked, reaching for his second donut. Her accent indicated she wasn’t, but he needed to be certain.
“No, but I’ve lived here for about a year. It’s become home.”
“Seems like a fun place to live.” Not that Mateo had spent any time exploring it. When he wasn’t at the field office, he was holed up in his hotel room trying not to explode with restlessness.
Her face brightened. “It is. I love to go for a walk during the day, with no destination in particular. It’s really the best way to see the city.
There are some cool tours and all, but most of the great things to see and do aren’t on any of them.
You can make any turn down any street and find something new. ”
Mateo watched her as he finished off his second beignet and wiped his hands off on a napkin. Her face grew animated when she talked about the city she so clearly loved.
“What brought you to New Orleans from …”
“I needed a change of scenery,” she said, easily side-stepping the part of the question she obviously didn’t want to answer.
Interesting.
“Where are you from?” she asked.
“I moved to D.C. over a decade ago.”
“You mentioned being here for work. Let me guess what kind of work that might be. Insurance? Traveling carnival? Secret society recruiter?”
He raised his hands as if in surrender. “You got me. It’s totally the recruiter. You interested?”
She wrinkled her adorable button of a nose. “I’ve never really been the joining type, but good luck with it. Is that why you came to Solstice the other night? Recruiting?”
He shrugged. “I came for the same reason any guy would.”
She stared at him over the top of her cup, the straw lingering near her bottom lip. Mateo wondered how the milky coffee would taste off the edge of that lip.
“I don’t know about that,” she said, giving him a probing look. “You sat at the same table all night, babysitting a single glass of Scotch neat and glaring at anyone who came too close.”
Mateo winced, seeing himself the way she had. It had been his intention to fly under the radar at the club, but he had obviously failed. “I wasn’t that bad, was I?”
Melody went for her second beignet, flashing him a teasing smile before biting into it. “You seemed uncomfortable. Clearly not the nightclub type.”
“Not since my twenties. But Jack likes the place, and he dragged me along. I didn’t hate it, you know. The music was nice, and the waitresses are pretty.”
She lowered her eyes as if he’d embarrassed her, but Mateo couldn’t imagine that people weren’t constantly telling her how beautiful she was. It wasn’t an opinion as far as he was concerned. It was a straight-up fact.
“How long you in town for?” she asked, now avoiding looking at him.
He should be relieved that she’d stopped looking at him.
There was something uncanny in her stare, as if she could see things about him that were better off hidden.
It made him anxious. It made him want to stare back until he’d uncovered her secrets.
“Until my work here is done. So, a few more weeks at least.”
“Got any plans for your time here? Anything you plan to do or see between work stuff?”
Yeah, sexy. You. I’d like to do and see you all over my hotel room.
No. Absolutely-the-fuck-not. His mind recoiled from the thought as quickly as it had tried to root itself in his mind. He pushed away from the table, suddenly feeling as if his skin were pulled too tight. Melody frowned, staring up at him as he shot to his feet.
“Everything okay?”
He shook his head, unable to let go of the images filling his mind and stoking his blood like a set of bellows to a fire.
Melody pulling that crisp white T-shirt off over her head.
Melody going to her knees in front of him unbuckling his belt.
Melody wrapping her pretty lips around his dick while staring up at him with those hypnotizing eyes.
No, no, no!
“Yes … I mean, no, I …” Mateo pinched the bridge of his nose as a pounding sensation began behind his eyes. “I’m sorry, I just remembered a conference call for work. I need to get to my hotel before …”
He was already fleeing, backing away from the table and preparing to make a run for it.
He knew he looked insane to her, jumping up to leave when he’d been the one to ask her to join him.
He had been the one to flirt and tell her she was pretty and watched that goddamn straw press against her lips.
He had forgotten that he was on the job just long enough to imagine that the look in her eyes meant she was as attracted to him as he was to her.
“Okay,” she said slowly, standing to her feet. “I guess I’ll see you around?”
If he wasn’t careful, she was going to see him everywhere. Now that he’d appeared out of nowhere during her regular routine, he would have to be more careful.
“Yeah,” he replied. “I’m sure Jack will drag me back to Solstice tonight. He said something about a special event.”
She smirked. “Saints and Sinners night. Costumes encouraged.”
Melody moved to walk past Mateo, but then paused, reaching out to him.
He froze, unable to do anything other than watch as she slipped her fingers under the sleeve of his T-shirt and pushed it upward.
She’d only been able to see the edge of the tattoo on his bicep, but now revealed the battlefield cross made up of boots, rifle, and helmet; an army ranger tattoo.
“Nice tat,” she murmured, tracing her finger over the black lines and sending pinpricks of awareness up Mateo’s arm and into his chest.
On his chest, the tattoo of Mari’s portrait burned like a hot coal. “Thanks for the coffee. See you tonight, Mateo.”
He stood where she’d left him until the bell over the door chimed and her scent melted away.
Until that smell of vanilla, spices, and musk had faded from the air around him.
Until the woman behind the counter began eyeing him nervously, as if wondering why he was standing in the middle of the café scowling like a storm cloud.
Until he was certain he could leave without giving in to the urge to follow Melody to wherever she was headed next.