I giggled. “And what color are we painting the town, Mr. Aldrich?”
He looked down at the top of my red dress again and licked his lips like the cat that ate the canary. “Red, of course.”
I blushed. God, he was bad. This was a bad idea. Terrible, terrible, terrible. I should start the trek home now and get the hell out of here.
Whit must have read my thoughts all over my face because he pleaded, “Come on, Carolina. Hang out with me tonight.” He paused and then added, “Just as friends.”
Carolina. That was what did it. Him remembering where I was from and making it an adorable nickname for me. How was I supposed to say no to all of that sexiness he was carrying around with him. It was too much. He’d broken me down.
“Fine,” I acquiesced. “I’ll stay. As friends.” I shot my hand out like we were in a business meeting instead of the middle of a bar.
Instead of shaking my hand, he moved to stand next to me and covered my hand in his own, threading his fingers through mine.
I looked at him like he’d lost his ever-loving mind.
“What?” he asked, like he genuinely didn’t know what I was shocked about. “Friends can hold hands,” he defended. He then started pulling me across the room before saying over his shoulder, “Now dance with me.”
Whit
I had no fucking chill. None. Whatsoever. My heart was beating out of my chest like a fucking stampede of horses as I pulled Grace through the club and onto the dance floor.
As I stopped in the middle of a group dancing, I pulled her close to me until her front was pressed up to the length of mine, and God, it felt so good. Because, apparently, I loved to torture myself.
I had no business doing this. Not one little bit. She was too young for me. Too naïve. Too sweet. I was a grown man with a fucking kid and here she was all fresh faced and dewy-eyed and damn if I just didn’t want all that freshness and newness to be mine. It had been too long.
I was out of my damn mind, but I didn’t care. I’d never felt such an instant attraction to a woman. I held her to me, my hands on her hips. That sexy as hell red dress feeling barely there under my fingertips.
I should have taken my ass home.
I should have listened to reason.
But for the first time in a long damn time, I didn’t want to.
I moved her around the dance floor, sometimes twirling her and she would laugh her tinkling bell of a laugh and I’d feel like I was ten feet tall instead of just six foot two.
She’d agreed to friends, I reminded myself as I tried to keep my hands in neutral places, just thanking God that he’d somehow arranged for us to meet again tonight.
Fate.
That was what I’d told her and that was what I’d firmly believed. How the hell else would we run into each other three times in this big ass city in a matter of weeks? Grace may have been willing to ignore the signs but I wasn’t.
Even if I just had this single night with her, only as friends, I was going to take it. There were too many signs not to.
And after I spent the biggest relationship of my life ignoring all of the signs, I’d long since decided I wasn’t doing that shit anymore.
Looking out into the audience tonight and seeing her face right in the front row felt like the biggest sign ever. I wasn’t going to ignore it.
A slow song began to play and the crowd around us dispersed to nearby tables and the bar, but I pulled Grace Abernathy closer to me. Because carpe diem, mother fuckers.
I ran my hand down the velvety skin of her arm until my hand was finally in hers. I promptly pulled that hand right to my chest, holding it there while I kept my other at her hip, moving to the music.
She smiled up at me. “God, you’re smooth, Whit.” She shook her head.
I almost laughed. Me. Smooth. I was as out of practice as they got. “How’d you like the show tonight?” I asked close to her ear, breathing her in and the smell of fresh sheets made me want to take her right to bed.
Friends.
“Please, you know how amazing y’all are. How long have y’all been playing together?”
I rocked us back and forth to the slow music, trying not to fall in love with her simply because of the way she said y’all. Because it was fucking cute.
“They’ve been playing together for years, but I just moved back to New York about seven months ago. Their bass guitarist left so I replaced him.”
“Wow,” she breathed out, beaming up at me. “You could have fooled me. Ya’ll sounded like you guys have been playing together forever.”
We did sound pretty good. I’d played in a band in California. I was sad to leave them, but I wanted to be closer to my mom all of the time for Andrew. She flew out a lot and stayed with us, but it just wasn’t enough. We missed her.
When my old buddy, Rick, the lead singer of The Quiet, reached out to me asking me to be his new bassist, it was a no brainer.
I loved playing and I was a firm believer that if you didn’t use it, you lose it. And I’d been playing the bass as well as other instruments since I could remember.
Thinking of my own hobbies made me want to know about Grace and what she was interested in. What she did for a living.
“What made you move to New York, Carolina?”
Her pretty brown eyes peered up at me apprehensively. “For work.”
It appeared she didn’t want to talk about that and I didn’t want to press. I wanted us to have fun tonight. It seemed like both of us could really use it.
So I left it at that, and backed up, swinging her out and bringing her back to me. I leaned down into her again with a whisper and asked possibly one of the most important questions in the history of questions. “Are you hungry?”
I was fucking starving, but I was willing to miss a meal to stay here and keep dancing with Grace. Which said a lot about how much I wanted to get to know her. Unless, of course, she was hungry, too, and I could take her to my favorite food truck.
A few confused wrinkles broke out on her forehead as she said, “Maybe?”
Sweet. “Then, let’s go.” I grabbed her hand again, lacing my fingers with hers.
In my opinion, there was only one way to hold a woman’s hand; it was all in, finger to finger, knuckle to knuckle. I didn’t do shit in half measures and holding hands was one of them. I wrapped my fingers around hers and held tight as we made our way past the backstage area and out the back door of the bar.
I’d already packed my guitar and amps in the back of the van the guys had brought so I had nothing to take with me.
The cool Autumn air enveloped us as soon as we stepped outside.
“Where are we going?” Grace asked as I kept pulling her along to a small parking area behind Leo’s.
“To get some food,” I answered. I didn’t want to spoil it by telling her I was taking her to the best food truck in the city.
“Oh,” she answered as I pulled her along until we came to stand in front of my Harley Davidson.
I pulled my keys out of my pocket and reached for the helmet that I’d left locked to the handlebars. “You can wear my helmet,” I said, turning to hand it to Grace.
But she wasn’t looking at me. She was just standing there, staring at my bike like she was in shock. Like she’d seen a ghost instead of a fucking killer bike. I didn’t get to ride it much since I had Andrew with me most of the time. I was hoping she would love it.