The phone bleeped again. I put it away and looked at him. “I have to run.”
Our eyes met. He leaned in more, his warm breath reaching my face. “If you need to go, I get it. Maybe we can do a rain check.” Weren’t rain checks for half- or fully canceled plans? We had finished our meal and drinks. Was he asking me out?
My heartbeat pulsed hard against my ribs. I wanted him to clarify without having to ask.
But . . . I still had so much work to do. And I had to do it drunk. “I . . . I have to go hop on a call now, I’m sorry.” The waiter brought the final bill and we headed out the door. My apartment was closeish to the restaurant, he lived the opposite direction in Capitol Hill, so we ordered separate Liftr cars.
“Did you drive to work?” he asked.
“Yeah, I’m leaving my car there, I’ll just walk or take a Liftr tomorrow morning. How about you?”
“I take the bus sometimes, but lately since I work so late I’ve been renting one of those ebikes to get some exercise.”
Outside, we were no match for the relentless rain and the freezing temperatures. Because of some facade construction and inconvenient scaffolding, Nolan and I crammed together side by side under a small portion of the restaurant’s awning. He briefly opened his golf umbrella, but with the rampant wind, the precipitation seemed to be attacking from down below rather than from the sky.
As more and more people left the restaurant, Nolan and I found ourselves shuffling our positions as people did in crowded elevators. While the rain fell harder, I took a few steps back under the awning to get more coverage, coming flush against Nolan. His chest pressed against my back, and I leaned into him, shivering, convincing myself it was to stay dry and to get relief from the cold, blustering winds.
His breath was warm behind my ear, near the nape of my neck. My skin prickled as he gently stroked both of my arms, shoulders down to fingertips. His body pushed against mine, his heart beat in quick tempo, same as mine.
I lifted my chin up, tilting my head enough so I could look into Nolan’s eyes. With a wry smile, he steadily returned my gaze. My entire body felt airy and weightless, just by being so close to him. Losing my inhibition, I licked my lips, ready to make a move.
A blaring honk jolted me with adrenaline as a black Nissan Sentra with a Liftr sticker pulled up right in front of us. “Melody?” the driver asked through the rolled-down window. My phone buzzed soon after. My call with China was starting in fifteen minutes. Asher texted at the same time: Don’t be late.
I shoved my phone into my coat pocket and stepped out from under the awning. I turned to face Nolan, and with his gaze fixed on mine, he asked, “Hug?,” then opened his arms. Hesitantly, I stepped into him, feeling his lean, muscular chest press against me once again, this time from the front. Head to toe, my body flooded with little tingles. But of course, this blissful moment couldn’t go on forever. A brief wave of panic hit hard when I thought to myself, What if someone from work saw us together? What would they think? We were just two friends having a casual dinner at P.F. Chang’s, where we mostly talked about work. If anyone asked, the heat flushing to my face was from all the drinking. It was no big deal.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I murmured as I pulled away from him and got into my car.
He waved as my Nissan Sentra drove off.
AT HOME, I set up my laptop in bed and began adding my work orders into the project queue for the remote developers. It wasn’t an easy task for someone who had three glasses of wine. I checked to see if the China and Poland teams were online and the chat status showed Asher was still active. Damn. He worked through my entire dinner.
My phone buzzed with a message from Nolan. Got home safe. You?
Me too ☺
Tonight was fun.
I didn’t know how to reply to that. He could have asked to do it again sometime, but he didn’t. So I ignored it for the moment and logged in to my work email to see if any of our overseas