Shame the Devil (Portland Devils #3) - Rosalind James Page 0,23

fling with a handsome guy once Dyma was off at school, though? When she was someplace other than Wild Horse, she never had to see the guy again, her eyes were wide open, and she was the one setting the terms? She could do that, if she wanted to.

Whoa, reckless thought. It felt more than reckless. It felt impossible.

Why should it, though? She was thirty-four. She’d been careful for, let’s see, nearly nineteen years now. For more than half her life, and face it, she was probably never going to look any better than she looked right now. If she wanted to be reckless, ever? This was her time.

And tonight was her chance to practice.

You look fat in clothes, and you don’t know how to make a man feel good.

Even if it was true, so what? You could always get better with practice. People could add muscle when they were over ninety. She’d read it in a book. If a ninety-year-old lady could get biceps, she could learn something new at thirty-four. Just because it felt impossible didn’t mean it was impossible. Feelings weren’t facts, and your insecurities didn’t have to be your truth. And so forth.

Meanwhile, she wasn’t looking for a fling, and she wasn’t looking for a savior. She wasn’t even looking for a meal ticket. She was looking for practice.

She zipped up her cute boots.

Owen told Harlan, “You realize you’re about to get your butt kicked again.”

They were sitting at a table next to the windows in the lodge’s too-rustic-to-believe bar. The metal lampshades had Christmas-tree designs cut into them, the rafters were tree trunks, and you could’ve roasted a steer in the stone fireplace. Harlan said, “Nope. I’m about to have a drink. A hot buttered rum, I guess, unless she drinks Tennessee whiskey. How come your dream girl never drinks Tennessee whiskey?”

“Because she thinks it has too many calories,” Owen said, “and that she’ll get drunk too fast. And she’s not into you, man. You’re going to pass up all those women who are into you and try for the one who isn’t? There’s a word for that. Masochism.” He looked at his watch. “It’s been half an hour. They’re probably not going to show. Too bad. I liked that little blonde. She puts her whole self into that laugh.”

“You forget,” Harlan said. “I’m not Thor anymore. Maybe nobody’s into me now, did you think of that?”

Owen said, “Yeah, that’s probably it, that you got ugly.”

Harlan laughed. He couldn’t explain this feeling. Like champagne fizzing in your veins. Like you’d run your pattern perfectly, and now you were turning, seeing the ball spiraling down toward you, and it was going to hit you right in the numbers. Right in the hands, and the goal line was right there. All you had to do was catch the ball, and the touchdown was yours.

He knew the women had come into the bar from Owen’s face. It didn’t get animated. It got still. He turned around himself, then got to his feet.

Well, damn. He’d been right.

The redhead, who wasn’t too much taller than the little blonde, was wearing a thin, ribbed turtleneck that fit her just as well as the ski pants had, a pair of snug, dark, boot-cut jeans, and Western boots to go with them, and she swayed when she walked, like she had too many curves to walk a straight line. She was just plain curvy-soft all over. Her hair was a mass of coppery-gold ringlets, her face was full of freckles, her nose was a snub kind of thing, and that mouth looked just as good as it had before. Except that she wasn’t smiling.

“Hi,” he told her, then indicated the chair he’d been using. “Sit here, and you’ll be able to see out. Snowing pretty hard out there.”

“I’m not sure I want to see that,” she said, but she did sit down. “I’m thinking a tropical beach vacation sounds a whole lot better at this point.”

“I know, right?” he said. “Australia. Great Barrier Reef. That’s a vacation. What are we doing in the snow?”

The blonde sat down beside her, facing the window, next to Owen. She was cute. Adorable, in fact, a little like a kitten, with her pointed chin, big blue eyes, and dimples in her cheeks. Her haircut was short and undercut to a buzz at the bottom, leaving the top to fall casually around that little face, and she was seriously pierced. Three silver piercings in the lobe of one