said something today—”
“You saw Oliver?”
Jesus. Surely he wasn’t jealous. Of his best friend. He knew Oliver was with Naomi, that he and Claire were just friends, and yet . . . he also knew that Oliver and Claire were the same. They both had the same polished manners, the same genteel way of speaking. They were alike in a way he would never be like Claire.
“Yeah, I ran into him at Starbucks. I always forget what a small town Manhattan can be. Anyway, he got me thinking that just because I never want to get married again doesn’t mean I have to be a nun.”
“And you’re telling me, because—”
“Well. Rumor has it you’re sort of a no-strings-attached guy. I’m wondering how that works.”
She took a sip of her wine, and then pulled a spoon out of the drawer and took a taste of the chili. Her head waggled from side to side as though she were contemplating something, and then she pulled out another spoon, held it out. “Here. Taste. Does this need more salt?”
He didn’t want to talk about salt. He wanted to know more about this no-strings-attached sex thing, and how he fit into it. But he also sensed it wasn’t something he could rush her on, so Scott went to her side, taking the spoon and tasting the chili. “A bit, yeah.”
He watched as she sprinkled some salt into the pot, a little surprised by how non-weird it was to be standing in the kitchen of a woman he’d just met, talking about sex and seasoning and the philosophy of the color white.
“Did Oliver tell you we had a pact?” she asked, glancing his way. “Me, Audrey, and Naomi?”
He searched his memory. “Sounds vaguely familiar. Remind me.”
She placed her wooden spoon on the spoon rest and leaned against the counter. “The day of Brayden’s funeral, the day we all first met, we were all . . . hurting. Not only because he’d died, but because we’d been so blind. And we—well, Naomi—had the idea to make sure we never fall for the same bullshit again. Never let ourselves be so charmed by a guy that we can’t see him for what he really is.”
“I can’t decide if that’s smart or cynical.”
Claire shrugged. “Both, I think.”
“Why tell me?”
She studied him over her wineglass. “Just trying to figure out where you fall on the bachelor scale. Snake or one of the good ones.”
“Verdict?”
“Both, I think,” she repeated with a smile.
“I’m not sure I’ve shown you much of the good side,” he said, not at all sure why he felt the need to defend himself.
“You haven’t,” she confirmed, making him wince in regret. “But Oliver’s a good judge of character. And he likes you. And Bob likes you, and in my experience, dogs are good judges of character, too.”
“I thought you said you hadn’t had much experience with dogs.”
“Really? You want to argue with me on this?”
No. No he did not. They were making progress, and he was strangely pleased she didn’t completely hate his guts.
Scott had no intention of making any kind of move on Claire Hayes. All her talk of no-strings sex aside, she was not a woman to be bedded and left, and Scott always left. But maybe they could be friends. Of sorts.
“So you’re trying to figure out what, exactly?” he asked, taking another sip of wine, finding it was growing on him. “How to have sex?”
She leveled a peeved glare at him. “I know how to have sex. I was married.”
To an ass.
“Sure,” he granted. “But relationship sex is different from sex for sex’s sake.”
“It is?” Then she winced. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation in my kitchen, over chili, with my contractor.”
“Don’t think of me as your contractor until tomorrow morning. For now, think of me as a friend of a friend.”
“All right.” She took a deep breath, as though gathering her courage. “Friend of friend, will you set me up on a blind sex date?”
He mentally applauded himself for not laughing. “A blind sex date?”
“You know. A booty call. A one-night stand.”
Scott shook his head. “You can’t be set up by a third party for a one-night stand.”
“Why not?”
“Because it gets weird for everyone. It’s the same reason you and I will never sleep together. We care about Oliver and Naomi too much to put them in an awkward place, having to know that we’ve seen each other naked but aren’t a couple.”
She pursed her lips. “I would never sleep with you