Marrying Mr. Wrong (Dirty Martini Running Club #3) - Claire Kingsley Page 0,37

divorced?”

“Why worry about that now? I like to live in the moment.”

“They do say the present is a gift.”

I glanced down at her. Fuck, she was cute. “That it is, sugar.”

Johnathan came back with a key fob and led us out a set of side doors. The car was everything I wanted it to be. Deep blue with a sexy black interior. Sleek, aerodynamic lines. It looked like a million bucks and by some people’s estimation, it was a bargain with a sticker price of less than half that.

Fine, maybe I was showing off a little.

But I really had been looking at this car. And driving it with her in the passenger seat was going to be fun.

Johnathan handed me the key fob and took a few steps back. I ushered Sophie in through the gull wing door—they lifted up, instead of opening out. Such a hot car.

Sophie looked hot in it too.

I went around to the other side and got in, then shifted my weight around on the seat. Felt good.

“This thing is like a race car,” she said as the doors lowered. “I feel like I should be wearing a helmet and one of those jumpsuits.”

“Maybe we should get you one. I bet you’d look sexy as hell dressed up like a race car driver.”

She shook her head and laughed. “Are they really going to let you drive away in this?”

I started the engine and it didn’t just hum. It growled. “They know I’m good for it.”

Ever so gently, I backed us out of the parking spot. A man did not simply drive a supercar. A man had to coax it. Caress it. Make love to it from the driver’s seat and be respectful of its power.

I wanted to get out of the congestion of the city, so we headed east. I opened it up a bit on the freeway and damn, all that potential speed was tempting. Sophie’s eyes flicked to me a few times and I swore the look she was giving me said go faster.

We cruised down the freeway, getting past most of the suburban sprawl before exiting. I turned north on a two-lane highway that wound through a patchwork of farmland.

“What do you think?” I asked.

“You were right. It’s fun.”

“Told you.”

She smiled, and I sensed a little bit of her guardedness easing away.

That smile of hers tickled at something in my memory. I chased it down, trying to grasp the image before it fled behind a whiskey haze. Sophie in Vegas, wearing her purple dress. Smiling over a dish of—

“Creme brulée,” I said.

“What?”

“You love creme brulée. I just remembered. We had some in Vegas.”

“I do love creme brulée.” She paused. “That’s right. You asked me my favorite dessert and I said creme brulée. Then you had J.J. find a place that served it at whatever time that was.”

“J.J.?”

“He was the limo driver. He took me back to my hotel the morning after… you know.”

“Good man.”

“He said you pay well.”

“Indeed I do. Someone takes care of me, I take care of them right back. Or in this case, takes care of my girl.” I winked at her.

She didn’t argue with me about the my girl comment. Just smiled at me.

Progress.

I kept on driving, feeling the curves in the road, hugging the turns. This car was a dream to drive and I liked that Sophie was enjoying it, too. Obviously I didn’t need her opinion—or permission—before I bought it. I just liked teasing her. But there was something pleasurable—not pleasant, pleasurable—about gliding down the road in this sexy car with her at my side.

“It’s so pretty out here,” she said. “So open compared to the city.”

“It is nice, isn’t it?”

“Where did you go when you moved away? When we were kids, I mean.”

Overall, that wasn’t a time in my life I particularly wanted to revisit, but there was no harm in answering her question. “Texas. We’d lived there before and my mom still had family there.”

“I wondered where you got your accent.”

“You can take the boy out of Texas, but you can’t take Texas out of the boy.”

“How did you wind up back here?”

“I took a job in Seattle not long after college. Been here ever since. What about you? Have you always lived around here?”

She shifted in her seat. “Yeah, born and raised.”

I glanced at her. “You stick close to your dad.”

“I do. We’re the only family either of us has.”

“I look forward to meeting him.”

She laughed softly. “Yeah… my dad is… You know how