I rattle the ice cubes at the bottom and give him a little smile. “Hmm. Seems like you’re right.”
See, I can do this.
I can flirt.
Awkward Hyacinth: 0.
Sexy, Confident Hyacinth: 1.
“So, then it seems like I should get you another,” Blue Eyes suggests.
I gaze at him through my lashes, and my mouth suddenly feels very dry. Men this hot usually take one look at Rainey and never see past her. After another few seconds of staring like an idiot, I sort of shrug, then smile shyly.
“If you want to.”
“Oh, I want to.” He winks, then pushes himself up to standing. “Don’t go anywhere, beautiful.”
He saunters down to the other end of the bar and, out of the corner of my eye, I watch him chat with the bartender. Her body language is anything but subtle; she’s practically shoving her rubber-clad cleavage in his face. And, yet, his piercing blue gaze returns to me, and I see that smile again. He’s got those mouth parentheses I love—you know, the indents that are like their own kind of smirk on either side of his lips? I’ve always liked them far better than mere dimples.
I’m starting to feel flushed and a little dizzy. Tomorrow, I’ll recognize this sensation as “tipsy” but, right now, I’m going to call it “confidence.” Because the hottest man I’ve ever seen is carrying a drink toward me, wearing my favorite kind of smile, and the music blasting from the dance floor has a throbbing, insistent beat that is repeating a mantra in my mind—Number Three, Number Three, Number Three.
Find the hottest man in the room and take him home.
I lick my bottom lip and smile.
I think he’ll do.
“So,” he says as he approaches, setting the drink down in front of me, “what do you do? When you’re not exploring your fetishes, of course.” I smile, then swallow a sip of my new drink, which seems even more potent than the last. “I’m finishing up my last semester of grad school, actually.”
His brows raise. “Wow. You don’t look old enough to have a master’s degree.”
I quirk an eyebrow back at him. “Is that your way of saying I look young for my age?”
He laughs. “I guess so, yeah.”
“Well, thanks.” I can feel my cheeks color and I force myself not to look down—not when this gorgeous man’s attention is completely focused on me.
“I aim to please,” he drawls. “Besides, I have to do something to keep you from getting seduced away from me by some of the more—ah—interesting clientele.”
He nods his head toward a man walking past, wearing a tight silver T-shirt and an equally shiny cone-style bra over top.
I snort a laugh and shake my head. “I’m up for an adventure, but I’m not sure that’s quite my speed.”
Blue Eyes takes a swig from his beer, then grins. “Well, you’ll get an adventure here, alright. That’s for damn sure.”
“You say that like you come here often.”
He shrugs noncommittally. “I wouldn’t say often—but I’ve been here enough to see a lot of crazy shit go down. Sometimes I’m not sure how this place stays open.”
I lean toward him a bit. “So, since you’re the resident expert, can I ask you something?”
“Sure—shoot.”
“What’s up with the no-names thing? I mean, why is it important that we are strangers who stay strangers to each other?”
He rests an arm on the bar, letting his finger run along the edge of my coaster. Something in my lower stomach flips over itself as I watch his hand move back and forth.
“It’s kind of a rule—everyone stays anonymous in the club,” he says. “If you leave with someone, all bets are off. But, while you’re in here, you’re supposed to be whoever you want to be, not the person you actually are.”
I wrinkle my nose. “Sounds a little sketchy to me.”
He laughs. “I couldn’t agree more.”
“Well, then why do you come here?”
“A couple reasons.” He scoots a little closer. “Partly because my friend owns this joint and I get in for free. But mostly because majority of the clubs around town are meat markets. That shit gets old fast.”
Now it’s my turn to laugh. I send a very obvious look over at our bartender, then back at him.
“And you’re telling me this place isn’t a meat market?”
He cocks a sexy half grin that makes my knees feel a little weak. It’s a good thing I’m sitting down.
“I was mostly referring to the guy meat market—the Jersey Shore types with their ’roid muscles and hair product and fake tans. I’m just saying—people don’t come here only to hook up—they have fun. They dance. They let themselves go a little bit. It isn’t all about the score.”
I can feel my slightly intoxicated heart take a sad little nosedive into my belly. If he’s anti-meat-market and anti-score, then he’s definitely going to be anti–Number Three. I take a long sip of my drink to increase my bravado.
“So, are you—not interested in scoring, then?”
When I grow enough balls to look up at him, he’s staring at me, his gaze slightly hooded. His lashes are impossibly long, giving his eyes a darker frame, almost as though he’d lined them.
“I wouldn’t say I’m not interested,” he says slowly. “I just think I’m selective.”
“Selective?”
“Yeah.” Now, his smile doesn’t just unfurl—it practically prowls over his face in a slow, sexy bloom. “Selective about who I talk to at the bar. Selective about who I buy drinks for. Selective about who I score with.”
I force myself not to bite my bottom lip, because I really want to, and I know that it makes me look like a terrified high schooler. Instead, I fiddle with my straw.
“Good to know,” I manage to say.
“So,” he says, leaning back toward the bar and taking a sip from his beer. Unlike me, he seems completely unfazed by our conversation. “It’s your first time at Cave. That means there are a couple things you have to do.”
“Oh, yeah?” I glance up at him. “And those would be?”
He holds up two fingers. “First, you have to dance.” I roll my eyes. “You sound like my friends. They’ve practically bullied me about getting out there.”
He shrugs. “That’s because you have to. That, and you have to get your body painted.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Why not?”
I lift an eyebrow at him. “Um, for one thing, I’m not an exhibitionist.”
He snorts. “Please—it’s not a big deal.”
I cross my arms. “You don’t think getting completely naked and prancing around in nothing but burnt umber and Prussian blue is a big deal?”
His mouth kicks up on one side. “I don’t know, Bob Ross. It doesn’t seem like all the people who get painted are completely naked. And, besides, the artists here are completely legit. Most of them own tattoo shops or work in graphic design studios by day. They do killer work.”
“Well,” I say, finishing the dregs of my second drink, “you’ve neglected to account for one minute detail.”
“And what’s that?”
“That I don’t want to get my body painted.”
Blue Eyes lets his narrowed gaze travel over my face like he can read it. I feel warm under the scrutiny—or maybe it’s just the alcohol. Or, you know, both.
“You don’t want to or you’re scared to?”
I roll my eyes.
“I’m not scared. I’m just . . . selective,” I say, tossing his word back at him. He smirks.
“Selective about what?”
“About who I let touch my body.”
“Ah.”
There’s the slightest hint of a smile on his mouth, and a flash of tongue when he licks his lips.
“While I think that’s probably good in theory,” he says, shifting to lean into my personal space again, “it seems to me like you’re just making excuses.”