But I feel you there already, and it scares me, I thought but didn’t say.
If I ever thought to dream of the perfect man, it’d be you. Blue nails and all.
He searched my eyes like an archaeologist with a careful, deliberate intent, stirring up things I wanted to keep buried.
“For now, I’m just a man gettin’ a manicure from the best girl in Entrance,” he said, slowly leaning back in his seat, a manly sprawl of spread denim-clad thighs and slouched, broad shoulders that made my mouth water. “For now, I’m just askin’ to get to know you a little more. So play a game with me.”
I peered at him through my lashes, unable to resist the wicked little grin on his mouth. “I like games.”
That grin widened. “Excellent. So would you rather hafta live in the nude for six months or not be able to bathe for one year?” When I laughed, he added, “I gotta tell ya, I got a preference for you pickin’ to live in the nude.”
I didhis fingers and his toes, but he demanded a cobalt blue for those “the same shade as your hair.” By the time I finished, he had the other women in the pedicure stations beside him gasping for breath as they laughed over his story about the night Curtains and he tried to install a new laundry machine and ended up setting fire to their house.
“I still feel the trauma every time I do laundry. It’s my excuse for bein’ lazy, at least,” he finished, eyes crinkled, pink mouthsplit wide by the kind of smile that dazzled like a sunrise at dawn.
You could love him if you let yourself, a little voice whispered in my head.You wouldn’t even have to try.
He was just a loveable man. Confident enough to get a mani/pedi and regale other clients about his trials and tribulations. Sexy enough to make my gut pool with heavy warmth. Even his feet, long and lean with tanned skin and high arches, were absurdly attractive, and I’d never before entertained the idea of a foot fetish.
He was a supernova or a daytime eclipse, something so outlandishly magical it was impossible to look away.
So I stopped trying.
When I went to dump the water out, I heard one of the women approach him and ask him for coffee. The bottom dropped out of my stomach, and all the happy hope that inflated me rushed out on a whoosh of punched breath.
I waited, arms straining as I held the heavy tub over the sink, unwilling to spill it because I wanted to be able to hear his response.
“Sweet’a you, but I’m taken.”
My heart commenced thudding inside my chest.
“Girlfriend?” the woman asked dejectedly.
“It’s complicated, but I’m waitin’ for her to un-complicate it by lettin’ me take her out on a date.”
What would a date with Aaron look like?
I wanted to know so badly that it was as if every molecule in my body was magnetized to his. But it was also impossible to ignore the fact that Rooster would kill him, and maybe even me, if I went back on my oath not to run away again.
In fact, knowing my father, he wouldn’t stop at Aaron and me. He’d kill Grouch and Zeus and the entire club, the finalspark to ignite the bonfire of hatred he’d compiled against perceived wrongdoings by The Fallen MC over all these years.
My happiness simply was not worth that price.
Aaron must have seen the conviction on my face when I came back to his station because there was a frown between his dark brows that didn’t suit him well at all. I led him to the front of the shop silently, and when he tried to pull out his wallet at the reception stand, I waved him off.
“My treat,” I stated firmly. “As thanks for everything you did to help me that night.”
That frown tightened into a glower. “Don’t insult me by implyin’ I need payment for services fuckin’ rendered, Blue.”
The sigh that unwound from me was as long as an unspooling ball of yarn. “I didn’t mean it as an insult. Honestly. I just…I wanted to do something nice for you, and I don’t have anything else to offer.”
He stepped closer, boxing me into the small space behind the reception desk, one hand against the wall and the other gentle at my hip. I was so much shorter than him that the owl tattoo inked on his neck was as high as I could see until he tipped his head down and gave me those coal-dark and burning eyes.
“You’re the only thing’a worth I want, and that’s got nothin’ to do with owin’ me anythin’,” he announced.
“Aren’t you getting tired of playing this game with me?” I asked wearily because I was.
Tired and suddenly so lonely I just wanted to hug myself in the back room for a few minutes.
