“That’s exactly when it happens,” Hunter informed.
Dex nodded. “It blindsides you.”
“Well, not me,” he declared with certainty. His priority was to adjust to his new life. “Besides, you act as if women find me irresistible. That’s Sinjin, remember? Not me.”
“What about Tara?” Carter grinned.
“Tara?” He frowned. “Tara who?”
Dex snorted. “The waitress from the bar near the base. You know, the one with the bad eyesight. She choseyouto flirt with, for over two years.”
“Yeah! Her!” Carter slapped his knee.
Amusement lit Mac’s gaze as he lifted a shoulder. “They’re right. She never seemed to realize there were other guys with you.”
“Oh, Holden, how are you today?” Carter said in an over-exaggerated, raised, feminine tone. “What would you like today, Holden? I’d be happy to get you anything you want.”
He snorted and elbowed the idiot. “She wasn’t that bad.”
“Yes. Yes, she was,” Carter insisted.
“Ease up, man,” Dex said. “Holden can’t help it if he appeals to jailbait.”
He shook his head. “Again, I think you have me mixed up with Sinjin. I seem to recall women falling all over themselves to get to him.”
“They did,” Mac agreed. “But if he wasn’t around, you were always the one who caught someone’s attention.”
Carter snapped his fingers. “Like the chick in Houston last month.”
The guys had just finished a job in the city, and thanks to a canceled flight on his way to Virginia from Phoenix, where he’d been visiting Dante—another D-Force buddy—Holden’s two-hour layover had turned into eight. The men took advantage of the situation and rendezvoused at a honky tonk near the airport.
“Yeah, what was her name?” Dex asked, brow furrowed.
“Colby,” Carter replied. “Like the cheese.”
Holden rolled his eyes as he swallowed a mouthful of beer. He wasn’t interested in either. “She was just being polite,” he felt obliged to say.
The pretty blonde hadn’t tripped over her feet to serve him, nor had she referred to him by name despite the fact his idiot friend had supplied it, even going so far as to tell the woman Holden was moving to Harland County.
Although Colby hadn’t been overly attentive, she had smiled at him several times across the bar. A few too many to be friendly, but he wasn’t about to admit that to his buddies.
“Trust me, Holden,” Dex said. “That woman was being more than polite.”
He shrugged. “I wasn’t interested.”
His tastes never favored women who pursued him. He preferred a challenge, or someone not looking for a relationship.
Both were kind of hard to find.
Not that he was looking. Hell, no.
“That’ll change with the right woman,” Mac said.
“And when you least expect it,” Hunter repeated his earlier words.
Holden huffed out a breath. “Not to me.”
An instant later, several people hollered “look out” just before the volleyball smacked the side of his head, sending a wave of beer out of his can and onto his shirt.
