“Oh.” I lick my lips, now desperately in need of lip balm. If a server walked by with a dish of butter, I’d swipe a finger through it and apply it to my lips. “How do you know I didn’t?”
“I watched.” My heart takes off at a gallop at the two sexiest words I’ve heard in my entire life. I swallow hard and hope he can’t tell how much I want to grind against him to relieve the ache between my thighs.
He shakes his head. “You barely waited until the last chorus of ‘Happy Birthday.’ I don’t think I’ve ever seen a person extinguish a fire so quickly, and I’m a trained firefighter.”
I file that little tidbit of information away. No wonder he has the build of a lumberjack jock. And is it some kind of law of nature that all firefighters have chiseled jawlines?
I take a step away from the locked bathroom door and look around for the jealous woman waiting nearby to deck me and pull him from my claws. Isn’t that how it usually goes in a movie or bad TV show?
I really need to get out of the office and stop letting Netflix tell me how the world works.
His gaze bears down on me, and his eyes make a slow trip to my lips, lingering there until my mouth feels so parched that I may need his firefighting skills.
I nod, letting out the sigh that took up residence in my chest about halfway through dinner. For the first time in an hour, I feel my stress about the ranch ebb away.
“It’s a silly tradition.”
A tiny twitch in his cheek reveals a dimple. “What tradition?”
“Birthdays.”
The dimple leads the way to a smirk, and he barks a laugh. “Not really what I’d call a tradition. They come around every year, whether you want them or not.”
“I mean the whole ‘blowing out candles and making a wish’ part. It seems…unnecessary.”
“Unnecessary? Too old for a wish?” He crosses his arms, emphasizing the bulge of his biceps under his denim shirt. I knit my hands together to keep from caressing his arm to see if it’s as firm as it looks.
“I live too much in reality for a wish.”
Says the woman who dreams about court cases.
His dark eyes flash with something like recognition. “Can’t a person live in reality and still wish for something else?” His defiant tone brings my gaze back, and I’m surprised to find him regarding me with the kind of easy smile that says my wish is plastered across my flushed face. I hate that he seems to know something about me that I don’t fully understand. I also love the feeling of bantering with a stranger about nothing important. About everything important.
He also knows how charming he is. Like he’s used to getting what he wants. Am I flattering myself to think he wants me?
He takes a step closer. I feel the heat of his body, and I want more of it. He makes me feel tipsier than those lemon drops ever did. More impulsive.
Every nerve center in my body urges him closer. He’s easily a foot taller than me, framing my face with one forearm on the wall above my head. This is the last place my sisters would expect to find me, caged in by the hottest guy in the room, my lips inches from his.
And it’s right where I want to be. The idea of not knowing what will happen next offers a thrill I haven’t experienced since…
Well…until now.
It’s a small area, just a dark wood paneled hallway between the restaurant and the kitchen, where servers bustle in and out and squeeze past us.
I tip my face up to his, boldly daring him to do what I think he plans to do anyway. My tongue slips out and wets my bottom lip. His eyes go hazy beneath dark brows. When he swallows, his Adam’s apple lurches in his throat. So. Smoking. Hot.
I flinch when his hand touches my cheek. My eyes flutter at the anticipation of his fingers tangling in my hair, but that’s not what I feel. Instead, he tugs at the tiara, which I’d pushed up intomore of a headband to keep my hair out of my face. It’s warm in here. Maybe it’s the drinks.
Maybe it’s the cowboy.
“Something tells me this wasn’t your idea, Duchess.”
“Duchess?”
“Yes.”
“Feels like a demotion from princess, but I’ll go with it.”