suggesting that I lick Anton before I agree to have his children?”
This time Mike laughed. “At a minimum. I couldn’t marry a woman I didn’t like to lick.”
She could imagine it all too easily. Mike’s tongue on the underside of her breast and moving up. The mental image alone had Rori downing the rest of her wine in one swallow. “Well, I’m sure Anton tastes just fine.”
“But you still haven’t answered the question.”
“Which question?” she asked, eyeing the bottle across the room.
“Why you seem to want to avoid anything personal or romantic about your relationship with your husband before you get married.”
Yeah, she definitely needed a little more wine. Rori started across the room. “Feelings cloud judgment.”
“Or sometimes feelings can make things clear that would otherwise not be.”
“No,” she said, reaching the bottle and tipping it over her glass.
“No? It’s because of your feelings that you want to have kids right now, right?”
Her hand stopped pouring. “Excuse me?”
“You want kids. That’s a feeling, right? And since it’s a feeling, by your own logic, it could thereby be clouding your judgment in choice of fathers. You don’t care about personal compatibility. All you care about is that the guy commits to stay and that he’s a strong provider. Is that because of your dad?”
Rori set the bottle down none too gently and picked up her glass again, draining it all before making her response. “No, Mike. Not everything comes down to daddy issues, okay?”
“Sorry if I overstepped,” Mike said quickly. “I’m just trying to wrap my head around it.”
“No, you’re just trying to get laid,” she laughed, letting the wine do some of the talking for her. “Trying to talk me into finding out if I like how you taste.”
To her surprised, he responded with an amused chuckle. “That would definitely take us out of the friend zone, but no. That’s not why I was saying that. I’m just saying that you think people’s judgment is clouded when they get married because they want to be together, but you don’t think your judgment is clouded because you want children, and are fixed on the idea of having them with a man you’re not in love with. I’m just asking why.”
Rori tilted her head back, looking at the ceiling and trying to decide on an answer as she set her glass down and just picked up the bottle of wine next to it. Why even pretend she wasn’t going to finish it? Even if she didn’t answer the question, he’d still opened the door with his question. Whether she said it out loud or not, the answer was still in her mind.
She could use that bottle right about now.
“You don’t have to answer, of course,” he added. “It just strikes me as strange, that’s all.”
“Of course,” she agreed, her voice heavy with sarcasm. “In your mind I should be one of those girls in a line, trying to get into your pants and trying to give you a hand job in the middle of a restaurant.”
“No, I’m not saying—”
“Oh, c’mon!” she mocked, bringing the bottle with her as she crossed over to the loveseat. “Don’t deny it. Sydney was totally going for it under the table that day.”
He hesitated. And while hesitated, Rori took a drink. “Well, yeah. But it didn’t get too far.”
“Yeah,” she said, plopping down. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around that one, Mike. You say you didn’t sleep with her. Why not? She was nothing but green lights for you.”
“I, uh, think that’s my business.”
“You mean like who I marry is my business?”
“I guess so,” he said. “Look, clearly I’ve overstepped. And apparently I’ve stepped on sensitive ground, so how about we both just call it a night and I let you get to sleep?”
She laughed bitterly then, even as she opened herself to the warmth the alcohol was starting to spread in her. The comfort. It felt nice. “Just walk away when things aren’t easy breezy—when the girl isn’t doing all the work and it’s just not fun anymore, it’s time to go, right Mike? And because you feel weird, when you think about calling tomorrow, you won’t. You’ll tell yourself that you think I need space when it’s really you who’s uncomfortable and trying to avoid conflict. Right?”
He didn’t respond right away, so she plowed on.
“And this is just a stupid conversation. Nothing even all that serious. But it’s still enough to send a nice guy like you running. Why? Because emotions freak guys