Blame it on the Champagne (Blame it on the Alcohol #1) - Fiona Cole Page 0,9

moving again.

“What was that?” he asked.

His hand gently rested on my shoulder, giving a soft squeeze. It swallowed my smaller frame, sending a heat that burned through my chest.

“Miss?” He spoke again and finally pulled me out of my trance.

Blinking and shaking my head, I reprimanded myself for becoming a woman who damn near melted into a pile of goo over some facial features.

“I’m sorry. Yes. You…you…” I looked down at the papers, pens, wallet, and other essentials scattered across the tile floor and collected myself. “Dammit,” I muttered, dropping to my knees to collect everything.

“Here, let me help,” he offered, dropping down next to me. I watched as he grabbed one of my small pouches, grateful I kept all my feminine products and condoms in there. Otherwise, they’d be scattered right next to everything else.

He held the black pouch between his long fingers and offered it back to me. Taking a few discreet deep breaths, I finally found the courage to really look up and see the man who sent me from angry to a puddle in point two seconds.

His large body crouched next to mine, and as soon as my eyes met his again, familiarity hit me, forcing my heart to flutter a little harder in my chest.

The man from the restaurant. The one Raelynn said I should offer a night to.

What were the odds?

Was it a sign?

“It’s you,” he said, his eyes scanning my features.

Like a record scratching, his words stopped my fantasies of fate with confusion. “What?”

“Sorry,” he said with a laugh. He shook his head and looked down, running his hand through his hair. When he looked up again, his lips tipped, stretching his cheeks over sharp cheekbones, resting underneath glassy eyes. “I saw you at the restaurant the other night.”

Biting my lip, I tried to hold back my smile from growing too big. This man oozed sophistication, and I didn’t want to come off as a giddy little girl. “You did?”

“You and your friend were hard to miss.”

Did he mean Raelynn? Or me? Did he mean we were hard to miss because Raelynn owned a room and could get loud? Or did he really notice me? “We may have noticed you, too,” I admitted, feeling bold.

He studied me a moment longer before grabbing the last of my papers and passing them over. We both stood, and he shoved his hands into his pockets. His shoulders pulled wide, and I guessed I was lucky he only clipped my shoulder. He could have taken me down completely with his size if he really bumped into me.

“I’m sorry I knocked into you,” he apologized again. “I was looking at my phone.”

His smile faded to a firm pout, but his eyes still twinkled. Usually, that would’ve been my moment to smile and walk away.

But I didn’t want to.

Maybe it was the confidence of crushing the interview. Maybe it was Raelynn’s voice in my head, reminding me to have some before I was sold off. Maybe it was something about this alluring man and the power he exuded that called to me—challenged me—to handle him.

I didn’t know what the reason was, but it pushed me to throw caution to the wind and flirt with him—to see where it went.

“Responding to a girlfriend?” I asked, relaxing my posture, letting him see some of the desire brewing.

His head tipped to the side, his eyes narrowing, and I feared I went too far. Despite the embarrassed flush fighting its way into my cheeks, I held it back and stood strong. He flirted with me first.

Right?

Oh, god. Did I make it up? Had he just been friendly, and I assumed it was more because I was lost in gaga land?

Just as I was about to abandon ship and slink away, his lips soften again to a smirk, his tongue slicking across his bottom lip again.

“No. No girlfriend to talk to. What about you? A boyfriend?”

A boyfriend? No. An arranged fiancé? Well, he didn’t ask about that.

“No.”

“Well, then there is no one to protest me asking you out.”

“I guess not.”

His smirk grew at my evasive answers as he took a step closer. I craned my neck back to meet his eyes that now looked like pools of warm chocolate without the sun bringing out all the hidden depths. “How about drinks this Friday?”

“How about dinner on Friday, and we’ll see about drinks?”

God, who was I? I wasn’t this dominant woman who demanded what she wanted. I wasn’t meek by any means, but usually, Raelynn

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