Chapter 9
Was it possible to get bored to death? To the point you decided that ceasing to exist was a better alternative to a date as boring as this.
I had been mulling over this phenomenon for the past thirty minutes. All the while my date sat opposite, not noticing or caring that I stopped listening to him, giving only perfunctory nods and noises of acknowledgements when necessary.
God, I was losing the will to live.
Michael—or was it Mitchell? I couldn’t remember—sat across from me at the table tucked into the corner of the crowded restaurant.
I had the suspicion the date was doomed from the moment we entered.
Michael’s lip curled up in distaste at the rustic atmosphere.
All the furniture in here looked several years old, and the fanciest thing they had on the menu was something called creamy pasta, which I had the suspicion was carbonara without the confidence.
So when Michael, yes, definitely Michael, turned up his nose the second we entered and asked if I was sure this was the place I wanted to eat, with the air of someone who thought dining in anything less than a Michelin-star restaurant denoted terrible life decisions, my hopes for the date had dwindled.
I shifted in my seat, picking up my wine glass to take a large gulp.
The lace body suit I wore wasted on the man before me.
He’d spent the first twenty minutes of our conversation talking exclusively to my tits.
The conversation had been stilted and awkward.
I struggled around the social convention of small talk in general, but it was even more difficult when you had a man who didn’t ask questions unless it was not-so-subtle comments about your body.
‘You must work out a lot. Didn’t know being a vet put you in that good shape. ’
I’d taken every lousy attempt at a compliment with a curt smile—biting my tongue from saying what I wanted to say.
My will to live had rapidly declined when I’d made the fatal error of asking him about his hobbies.
Cricket.
His eyes bugged out of his head when I’d asked him what he did for fun, and he’d got a severe case of verbal diarrhoea and started to drone on about the world’s most objectively boring sport.
He clearly wasn’t the kind of person who required any input from anyone else to carry a conversation—taking my grunts and weak laughs as all the encouragement he needed.
I finished the dregs of my wine, feeling it slide down my throat and warm my belly.
Doing nothing to dissuade the hunger pains that were starting up.
We hadn’t even got around to ordering food yet.
Michael kept waving the server away when he’d come over, still in raptures over talking about cricket.
‘It was completely out of bounds. I knew it; the umpire knew it. But they let him get away with it.’ Michael rolled his eyes, lifted his glass of Shiraz to his lips, sniffed it, and then put it down with a grimace.
He had yet to sample the wine. For the past hour, he kept bringing it halfway to his face and sniffing it before deciding against it.
I’d watched him do it nearly five times; each time, my frustration grew to a boiling point, and I was seconds away from pouring the contents of the glass down his perfectly pressed suit just to see a little colour on him. I restrained myself… barely.
‘Hmm.’ My stomach rumbled loudly, clearly having had enough of waiting around and being tortured by the smell of the dishes passing our table every few minutes.
Michael halted in his story, a smarmy grin playing on his lips. He was handsome—in a bankerish sort of way. His about me section online had said he loved animals, so I thought I’d struck gold. But he seemed to have missed something vitally important in his bio.
Has no personality.
‘Sorry, listen to me waffling on.’ He reached out to his glass again, and I gritted my teeth. If he picked it up again without taking so much as a single sip, I was leaving. However, his hand bypassed the wine and turned up in the middle of the table.
I glanced down at his waiting palm. When my eyes flicked back to his face, his lips parted in what I assumed he considered a sensual pout.
‘You really are a stunning woman. I saw your profile, but you can never be certain. There is such a thing as angles and flattering lighting.’ He gave a soft chuckle that sent a shiver of disgust snaking down my spine. ‘But you are beautiful.’
I ignored his palm and folded my arms over my chest, leaning back in my chair.
And with practised confidence, I shrugged, saying, ‘I know.’
He blinked a few times, taken aback by my brazen response.
His fist snapped closed. He mimicked my movements, eyeing me carefully.
The smile I’d previously considered nice turned into a sneer.
This was the first time he had given me his full attention all evening.
I searched his steel-grey eyes for a sparkle, a tingle, something that told me there was a single flicker of chemistry between us.
Nothing.
The wine sloshed in my empty stomach. Need food.
‘Confident too,’ he continued as his gaze appraised me like a prize show pony. The longer he stared, I felt an oily film coat my exposed arms. I made a show of licking my lips and his eyes latched onto the motion. I leaned forward, propping my elbow on the table and resting my chin on my palm.
In a low, sensual voice, I said, ‘I know I’m beautiful. I know I’m smart. I don’t require validation.’ The smile that graced my lips was so sweet it nearly gave me a toothache.
His brows pinched together. He opened his mouth to say something, but when nothing came out, he snapped it closed.
My feet were poised under the table, ready to call time of death on this date.
Even though the prospect of trawling through dating apps and entering into mind-numbing small talk with another man made me want to hurl.
Some things couldn’t be saved. And I couldn’t go another second with his asinine comments about cricket or my appearance.
I’d rather salvage whatever was left of my evening by going home and putting my vibrator to good use.
One of my favourite authors had just released a brand new book that promised to be a far more enjoyable way to spend an evening.
I was dreaming of hot chocolate and my warm bed when I felt it. A prickle of awareness curled in my veins, causing the hairs on the back of my neck to stand to attention.
Michael’s attention had fallen to the menu and its lack of options, droning on, even when I stopped responding to him.
My head turned to look around the half empty room.
A bar sat at the end of the room. Stools filled with people casually chatting.
My eyes danced over them until they landed on a familiar set of blue eyes.
Eyes that were locked onto mine. Staring at me across the room as if nothing else existed to him. Even when the bartender placed a full pint of beer in front of him, he jutted his head in acknowledgement, not tearing his gaze away.
My skin was on fire. The heat from the room, coupled with the fact that I had drunk wine on an empty stomach—always a bad idea—I felt my cheeks flush.
He was sitting on a stool at the bar, tucked into the corner, away from the rabble and close enough that I could see the ghost of a smile play on his lips.
Soft and teasing. He dropped the magnetic eye contact and shifted his gaze to my date.
George’s face was inscrutable as he surveyed the man sitting opposite me.
For one insane second, I was desperate to ask him what he thought. What had that line appearing between his brow? His eyes flipped back to me, and once again, my stomach did that stupid flip.
The wine must have done a number on me.
After a few more seconds of blistering eye contact, his brows lifted in an expression that said, seriously? This guy?
I wanted to blurt out that there weren’t that many options, and he seemed the most innocuous alternative to a gym bro who talks about different protein powders for hours on end.
A small voice in my head piped up, Like cricket is any better? Fair point.
‘Shall we?’
Michael’s question made my head snap back to him. His eyes creased, clearly searching for an answer I didn’t have because I hadn’t been listening. He lifted his menu in the air, laughing awkwardly.
The side of my face and neck grew hot, still feeling George’s impenetrable gaze. Before I knew what I was doing, I rose to my feet, throwing my napkin on the table. Michael looked taken aback by the sudden movement.
‘I’ll be right back,' I said to his dumbstruck expression.
My brain had ceased to function properly as I sailed across the room towards the gruff, bearded man who had the audacity to look amused.
He took a sip of his drink, and goddamn him; the casual move was so at odds with the searing eye contact he held with me.
When I reached him, it only then occurred to me I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to say.
My mind was blank. George placed his beer down on the bar, cocking his head to the side.
‘Hi there, sweetheart.’ I will not blush.
Folding my arms over my chest, I schooled my expression. ‘George.’
He peered around me. ‘You appear to have a very confused accountant at your table.’ His gravelly voice vibrated through me. I blamed the lack of sex and the terrible date on the effects that voice had on my body.
‘He’s not an accountant.’ Because that was the most important thing to say. After a moment of tense silence, my shoulders slumped. ‘He’s a stockbroker.’
George barked out a laugh. ‘Christ, that’s worse. How’s it going? From where I’m sitting, you looked utterly enthralled by him.’
‘I’m considering defenestrating him or myself. Either would work.’
He looked behind me to the window next to the table I’d just come from. ‘I’d go for him; it’s started to rain. Don’t want you to get wet.’