CHAPTER 11
“Quite the choice Frankie had for the location of your third lesson in seduction,” Scott said, glancing around The Gilded Lily as he pulled out a chair for Doc. He’d been surprised when he’d discovered Dragon Lady had chosen the location. The atmosphere didn’t lend itself to instructing a person on romance. It was more geared toward falling in love with the one you’re dining with.
“I feel like I’ve stepped into another world,” Doc whispered, taking a seat. “Every person’s laugh sounds prep school perfect.”
He understood why Doc felt intimidated. The small restaurant was a fortress of wealth. The people who dined here were the type who owned things like banks or small countries. If one listened carefully, they could hear the clink of money being made over the clatter of silverware. The diamonds worn on the fingers of the ladies present could fund Ms. Birdie’s fairy godmother habit for a year.
“Oh,” Doc said, looking startled by his sliding into the seat next to her rather than the expected one across the table.
“Being this close is crucial.” He spoke in a hushed tone. “I wouldn’t want all my strategies to become public knowledge.”
“I call bullshit.” She gave him a bland look. “They’re already public knowledge. You’ve written about them in your columns.”
“A man never shares all of his secrets.”
“Interesting…or at least, I hope the secret strategies are better than the ones you’ve shared,” she teased.
He liked that their hostility toward one another had turned into something else. Something comfortable. He watched Doc as she took in the lavish surroundings.
“I feel like a fish out of water,” she confessed when she turned back to him, her brows puckered.
“That’s part of the lesson.” He resisted an urge to smooth her brow with his fingers. “Rakes are naturally drawn to a woman who can hold her own in opulent settings—someone adept at navigating the worlds of both old money elitists and new money innovators. Last night, you hung out with the new money crowd. Tonight is the old money. Try to enjoy the experience.”
Doc burst into an unexpected, hearty laugh. A laugh louder and more uninhibited than anything Scott had heard from her before. One more out of place than someone wearing white at a royal funeral.
Scott loved it. Her unguarded moment, so starkly contrasting with the poised environment of the restaurant, was refreshing in his world. He raised a brow and waited for her to explain.
“Enjoy?” Doc managed to say between chuckles. “That’s like my gynecologist telling me to strap in and relax.”
Her explanation caused Scott to laugh. After a moment he shook his head, grinning. “You’re something else, you know that?”
A smirk played at the corners of her lips. “I aim to please,” she replied, the words wrapped in the same velvety tone as her laughter. She took another look around the restaurant. “I can’t help but wonder what diabolical reason Frankie had for insisting tonight’s lesson took place at a snob-fest like this.”
He leaned back. Snob-fest. Another new saying for him to add to the list of America’s unusual idioms. “It has been my experience,” he began, “that anytime Frankie gives a diabolical order—”
A server stopped at their table, cutting his reply short. “Is everything to your satisfaction?” he asked with a practiced smile.
Scott nodded.
“Excellent,” he said. “May I take your drink orders?”
Normally, Scott would order a bottle of their best Cabernet Sauvignon, but that would defeat part of tonight’s lesson, so instead he glanced at Doc. “What would you like to drink?” The drink a woman ordered told a man a lot about her personality. The right one was a pickup line all in itself, and after last night’s fiasco, it was obvious to Scott that Doc would be far more successful if the man approached her instead of the other way around.
She glanced at the drink menu and then blinked up at him as if caught in her undergarments. “You go first.”
“I’ll have a dry martini, Hendrix, in and out with the vermouth, stirred, not shaken, three olives.” He smiled at Doc. “And for the lady, she will have…?” He waited, giving her the space to choose for herself.
“I love olives,” Doc said, her tongue briefly darting out to wet her lips. “I’ll have the same but make mine dirty.”
Scott felt a jolt of surprise. Had it been his imagination or had the reserved psychologist just put a suggestive spin on the word dirty? Clearing his throat, he quickly regained his composure. “Please bring us an assortment of your appetizers as well,” he told the server. “We have work to do before we’re ready to order dinner.”
“As you wish.” The server departed their table, his nose in the air.
“So, what’s on the agenda for tonight’s lesson?” Doc inquired, her fingers grazing his arm.
The awareness the casual touch sent through him momentarily stalled Scott’s response. His mind wandered back to last night’s kiss—a moment that had lingered in his thoughts, keeping him awake and restless well into the early hours. Regaining his focus, he said, “I think we’ll start with the importance of your drink order when trying to capture the attention of a man.”
“Yes. Yes. I know,” she said, ruefully. “I’m not allowed to order water. Although I think the rule asinine.”
Scott leaned in, enjoying his role as seduction coach. Something Ms. Birdie had approached him to teach the group of men who’d be at tomorrow night’s gala. Men she’d set her fairy godmother sights upon. Men who—according to the dear busybody—desired to possess more rakish qualities.
He assumed she’d found another for the job. Was their coach any good? Would every one of them have the ability to capture Doc’s attention tomorrow night at the Flirtation Gala? Would tonight truly be his and Doc’s last evening together with him acting the part of teacher and her the naughty student? The possibility didn’t settle well.
He ordered himself to stop thinking about how his and Doc’s relationship would end. “One of the easiest ways to capture the attention of a man in a bar is by ordering a drink that intrigues him. Just like leather pants, it’s a silent pickup line.”
“How is it a pickup line?” Doc asked.
“Men will form an opinion about you based on your drink of choice. Something intriguing can be a perfect conversation starter.”
“In other words, a rake will come running if I loudly order a screaming orgasm?” The corners of Lux’s lips twitched with amusement.
Scott chuckled, appreciating her boldness. “You do that, and every rake in the room will think you’re confident in your sexuality and looking to hook up. On the other hand, it will scare off the nice guys.”
“And a Bloody Mary?” Doc asked, her eyes gleaming with interest. “How would you interpret that order?”
Scott mulled over the drink’s name. “I’d be intrigued and on alert.”
“Alert?” Her curiosity was evident.
“It says you’re comfortable with edginess, maybe even a bit of danger,” he said.
“How did your brain go there?” Doc asked, fascination written all over her face.
He shrugged. “The mention of blood.”
She nodded thoughtfully. “As a psychology professor, I find this entire exchange compelling.”
“I thought you might.” It pleased him that she’d engaged for real in this conversation.
“What kind of man will a frozen strawberry daiquiri net me?”
Scott pinched the bridge of his nose. “That order will catch the eye of the professor you’re secretly hoping to snag someday. The one who wears elbow-patched sweaters, corduroy pants, brown shoes, and enjoys a pipe and the Sunday crossword puzzle in the New York Times.”
Doc’s mouth dropped open. “How in the hell do you know the type of guy I long for?”
Because after Ms. Birdie had left his office, he’d gone in and read Doc’s dating profile. Just as Ms. Birdie had hinted at, Doc’s ideal man was the antithesis of everything Scott embodied. “I did a bit of homework,” he admitted. “I went through your profile on the dating app. You were quite specific about the type of guy you’re looking for, which, incidentally, limited your options. Guys who didn’t fit the bill, like me, dismissed you.”
Her perfectly groomed brows shot up. “Men like you?”
He leaned back slightly. “I’m a rake with honor. I don’t pursue nice girls whose hearts are yearning to be loved.”
Her response came swiftly. “My heart is most certainly not yearning to be loved. I believe a woman can be perfectly happy without a man. In fact, I believe they are most likely to be happy without one, because men are fickle. They love you today, and ten years down the road, they chase after a prettier bauble.”
Scott felt a twinge of something unexpected at her words—anger…for her. “It’s not every day you meet someone who dreams of the white picket fence yet views relationships like the most seasoned rake.”
“Who taught you to be a rake with honor?”
The question caught him in the heart. “Before Mum passed away, she sat me down for a serious talk. Not the typical sex talk, but about how to treat a woman with respect and integrity.”
“I bet it went nothing like my mother’s version of the ‘how to treat a man’ talk,” Doc said dryly.
“No?” He’d never met her mother, but instinctively did not like her.
“Not unless your mother advised that the way to a man’s heart, especially for a plain girl like me, was through his balls. Her exact words were, ‘Keep them empty, and he’ll stay around longer. Not forever, but longer.’”
“Your mother called you plain? Was she blind?”
“Multiple times, and no, she wasn’t.”
Scott had to unlock his clenched jaw to respond. “Your mother sounds…like Frankie. A person with horrible people skills.”
“She’s not great.” Doc hesitated before adding, “To her credit, though, my father cheated on her and broke her ability to trust a man. Since then, she’s made it her mission to date only men who are at least a decade older than her, and then she leaves them before they have grown tired of her.”
Doc’s response hung in the air, and Scott found himself momentarily lost in thought, as the weight of her words settled over him. “Bloody hell. That’s rough,” he finally said. “I take it she never remarried?”
“That would seem logical, but no one has ever described Mother as logical. Her solution is to marry a man for five years and then divorce him,” Doc explained.
As they spoke, the server arrived, balancing a tray of artfully arranged finger foods and their drinks.
Once they were alone again, Scott raised his glass and initiated a toast. “To unlikely connections. Ours.”
“To unlikely connections,” Doc echoed, her glass clinking gently against his. She took a tentative sip, and immediately her face contorted in disgust, and she coughed.
Scott quickly patted her on the back and handed her a napkin. “Did it go down the wrong pipe?”
Doc’s expression was one of pure horror. “This tastes like rubbing alcohol. How do people drink these things?”
Scott couldn’t help but laugh, drawing disapproving glances from nearby tables. Doc, oblivious to the stares, frantically rubbed her tongue with the napkin, trying to rid herself of the gin’s sharp taste.
Their moment of levity was abruptly interrupted as Frankie appeared at their table, her expression a blend of shock and disapproval. “What on earth is going on here?” she asked, her eyes darting between Doc’s frantic napkin rubbing and Scott’s barely contained amusement. “You two are representing Naked Runway and this behavior is not acceptable.”
“To be fair, Doc is representing Columbia University,” Scott corrected.
The withering glower on Frankie’s face told him exactly what she thought of that.
Why did he have the feeling she wasn’t here to wish Lux good luck with her upcoming dates, but instead because she was working an angle to get around Ms. Birdie’s no cheating rule?