the message that had been waiting for her on her personal flex was from her brother. Sighing, she’d ignored it. The third bit of bad luck. The last thing she needed was her asshole twin guilt-tripping her over whatever bee their mother had in her bonnet now.
So she’d escaped to Pat’s bar for her version of “me time.” She always sat at the rear of the bar with her back to the room. It stopped people talking to her and interrupting her little oasis of calm in the middle of the day.
Sighing, she lifted her coffee and closed her eyes, breathing in the steam from the top of the mug. She took a sip and murmured in pleasure. The stuff in the office was okay. It was hot and wet, but that was all that could be said about it. The coffee in Pat’s was the proper filter stuff and a balm to her soul. She treated herself to a couple more sips before she turned her attention to the toasted sandwich on her plate.
She was halfway through it when she became aware of someone’s attention. Her gaze flicked up to the mirror on the back wall to see someone weaving his way through the tables toward her. Not just any someone, but the same man she’d been studying earlier this morning on her security screens.
Allen’s mysterious friend.
She blinked and pinched herself, in case she’d fallen asleep in her office and this was all a dream. But nope, other than a sharp pain in her thigh, nothing altered. Tall, dark and handsome still walked toward her… and she still had a mouthful of sandwich.
“Hey,” he smiled as he reached her table, the dimples in his cheeks as sexy as all hell. “Do you mind if I join you?”
She raised an eyebrow as she swallowed quickly. There were empty tables all around them and men like this? They usually didn’t come on to women like her. She was too tall, too slender and too acerbic for anyone to want to flirt with. Eric had always been the charismatic one, not her.
“Why?”
She groaned to herself as the comment slipped out. Blunt and to the point, it was just this side of confrontational.
But he didn’t seem perturbed. Instead, he grabbed a chair, turned it around, and sat straddled, his heavily muscled arms folded over the back. “Because you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”
She just looked at him. The silence stretched out. Then she laughed.
“Yeah… right?” She looked around them quickly. “Okay, so where are they?”
He frowned. “Who?”
“The camera crew that leaps out to say ‘surprise!’” She picked up her coffee again and took a sip. “I take a dim view of shit like that. And believe me, pissing off the head of security on a place like this isn’t a place you wanna be.”
His expression froze, and he looked at her curiously. “You think this is a joke? Why?”
She snorted, putting her cup down with a small click. “Men like you do not look twice at women like me,” she told him shortly, really in no mood for crap like this today.
Yeah, sure, she might have semi-obsessed over him on the security feeds, but that was it. The charm offensive had to have an ulterior motive. Like Grayson, her shuddering ex, who had wined and dined her to get an in with station security so he could ship his hinky shipments without issues. Fortunately, she’d seen his game early on and thrown him in the cells herself. “So either your buddies have put you up to it, or you want something.”
“Someone hurt you, badly. Didn’t they?” he mused, rubbing at the stubble on his oh-so-kissable jaw with strong fingers.
“Pop-psychology as well, huh?” She was on the defensive now, her back well up. “What’s with the one-glove look? Some off-world fashion someplace?”
His eyebrow winged up a little, and she caught a flash of anger in his eyes, quickly smothered. Ha… so Mister Charm wasn’t as unrufflable as he seemed. Was he?
Pushing upright, he pulled the black leather glove off his hand, yanking at the fingers before sliding it off. The glove hit the table. Her mouth opened and closed like a guppy as heat spread over her cheeks. Metal met her gaze. His right hand was a replacement.
“I do apologize. I didn’t realize you were…”
His lips quirked. “What? Devastatingly handsome? Charming in wit? Intelligent?”
“Differently abled,” she ground out, more annoyed with herself than him. She’d taken the mickey out of his glove