would be it. He’d know. Anticipation danced across her nerve endings, sending a thousand volts of electricity through her body.
Her eyes started to close. She swayed and then felt his fingers brush against hers as he took the keys from her and opened the door to her apartment.
“Good night, Frankie.” His voice came from close to her ear, rough, male and thickened with intimacy. He was close enough that she could see the rough texture of the stubble that shadowed his jaw.
“Matt—”
“Sleep well.”
She opened her eyes and stared into his.
Sleep well? That was all he was going to say?
He’d been racking up the tension all night, and he wasn’t going to kiss her?
Damn it, if he wasn’t going to kiss her then she’d kiss him. They needed to get it out of the way once and for all. She reached out to haul him toward her, but her hand closed over thin air. And he didn’t notice because he was already walking away from her.
This, she thought dizzily as she stared after his retreating back, was why she avoided relationships.
She would never in a million years understand men.
CHAPTER NINE
If your glass is half-full, open another bottle of wine.
—Paige
FRUSTRATED AND UNSETTLED, Frankie closed the door of her apartment. She was too wound up to sleep. Her mind was full of thoughts that were too uncomfortable to examine closely. Thoughts about getting naked with Matt. Hot, sweaty thoughts. Exciting thoughts.
Crap.
The date had been nothing like she’d expected it to be. She’d thought it would go the way all her dates went—a few awkward hours together where the conversation didn’t quite gel—the verbal equivalent of bumping noses when you kissed. Instead, it had been relaxed and fun. Matt had made it fun.
Central Park. Why had no one thought to take her on a date there before?
The answer was obvious. Because no one knew her as well as Matt did. It was always restaurants or a movie. And all her relationships collapsed long before the moment when her date might have realized that being outdoors was her favorite thing.
As far as she was concerned, there had been only one real thing wrong with the evening.
He hadn’t kissed her.
On the other hand if he had kissed her, it would have ruined the evening. Knowing that she wasn’t going to sleep, she decided that she might as well return Eva’s purse.
It took a while for her friend to answer and when she finally opened the door, Frankie backed away in shock.
“What happened to your face? If you’re auditioning for a horror movie the part is yours.”
“It’s a face mask, Frankie. It’s supposed to make me beautiful.”
“I hate to break this to you, but they lied. You should have read the small print.”
Eva smiled and the mask started to crack. “How was your date? I mean dinner,” she corrected herself quickly. “Dinner. I know it wasn’t a date.”
“It was—” how could she describe it? It had been magical, exciting, terrifying “—it was different.”
“Different ‘good’, or different ‘get me out of here’?”
“Good.”
“Where did he take you?”
“Central Park. We walked, we talked and then we had dinner.”
“Was it stressful?”
“It was pretty much perfect.” Apart from the point when he’d invited her to Puffin Island, but she was trying not to think about that.
And he hadn’t kissed her.
Dammit, why hadn’t he kissed her?
“Thanks for the loan of the purse. I’ll have the tunic cleaned.” Distracted, Frankie handed over the purse and took a closer look at Eva’s face. “Did you get some of that stuff in your eyes? They look bloodshot.”
“Oh!” Eva lifted her fingers to her cheek, flustered. “Maybe. Clumsy me. Do you want to come in? We could hang out for a while and open a bottle of wine.” She opened the door wider but Frankie shook her head.
She was about to ask where Paige was and then remembered that she was with Jake. Which meant Eva was on her own with plenty of time to brood. How could she have forgotten that? “Paige is staying with Jake tonight. Are you going to be all right?”
“Of course! I’m enjoying a quiet night in on my own. I’d forgotten how good it feels to do that once in a while. I’m going to rinse this thing off my face and settle down with popcorn and Netflix.”
“What are you going to watch?”
“I don’t know. Something you would never watch in a million years. There will be kissing. And happy endings. We both know romantic movies are your idea