He shrugged. “Dinner it is.” He looked around the crowded ballroom, focusing on the auction in progress. The bachelors were taking their turns on the stage, but Jake didn’t seem the slightest bit interested in the festivities. “Wanna get out of here now?”
Her heart skipped another beat and she had to chastise herself for getting excited. This was nothing more than dinner. Dinner between old friends. Old lovers. Just because Jake was eyeing her like he wanted to get her naked didn’t mean she’d let him. She was thirty years old, for Pete’s sake. A strong, resilient woman who could surely fight off the advances of one Jake Bishop.
Right?
“Sure,” she agreed. “But I’m serious, Jake, this is dinner.”
He reached for her arm, and the warmth of his touch seared her skin and sent shockwaves of desire through her body. “Of course,” he assured her. The wolfish twinkle in his eyes totally betrayed his casual tone.
“I mean it,” she insisted.
“Uh-huh.”
Bree gulped and followed him out of the ballroom.
Chapter Two
Jake wanted to lick every inch of Bree’s delectable body. Unfortunately, she was sitting all the way across the table, and there was all this damn food between them, acting like a barrier. He couldn’t believe how incredible she looked. And he’d forgotten how frickin’ smart she was. As she spoke in length about her latest case—a lawsuit against a pharmaceutical company that had knowingly sold defective drugs—it surprised him to discover that he was actually interested in everything she had to say.
“What are you thinking about?”
Her soft voice drew him out of his thoughts. Jake met her eyes, then reached for his wine. The stem of the pansy-ass glass was too skinny, and he felt awkward holding the damn thing.
“Jake?” she prompted.
“Trust me, you don’t want to know what I’m thinking,” he finally said.
Her blue eyes flickered with irritation. “You haven’t changed at all.”
“Should I have?” He smirked. “You always seemed to like me just the way I was.”
“Rough, crude, complete lack of restraint, smartass remarks?” She tilted her head, causing her raven hair to fall over one shoulder. “It was all very exciting when I was seventeen. Not so much anymore.”
“Bullshit.” He let out a deep chuckle. “You still like it.”
Rather than answering, she pushed away her empty dinner plate and dabbed at the corners of her mouth with a linen napkin. The private room of Carlotta’s boasted a romantic candlelit atmosphere, complete with a red silk tablecloth, white roses, delicate china and expensive wine. But Jake wasn’t looking for romance. From the second he’d seen Bree again, he’d been thinking about nothing but sex.
A wave of sexual nostalgia swept over him. “We were good together, weren’t we, sweetheart?”
A rosy flush rose on her pale cheeks. “Can’t deny that.”
Jake fingered the stem of his glass, noticing that her gaze was following the motions of his hand. “Remember the Derry Falls game?”
Her cheeks went even redder. “No, not really.”
“Sure you do.” He shifted in his chair, reaching down to subtly rearrange his growing erection. “The team stayed in the same hotel as the cheerleaders, you were on the second floor, I was on the third…we snuck away and met up in the bathroom…” He dragged his tongue over his lower lip. “I went down on you for nearly an hour in one of the stalls…ring a bell?”
Her arousal was written all over her pretty face. Oh yeah, she remembered. Jake’s cock stiffened to full mast as the wicked images flashed across his brain. Bree leaning against the stall door, one leg lifted up on the toilet paper dispenser as she exposed herself to him. The feel of the linoleum floor beneath his knees as he bent between her legs and licked her up like an ice cream cone.
“Jake, please,” Bree said, a wary expression on her face.
“That’s right—you said that exact thing, over and over again.”
She sighed. “You’re incorrigible.”
“Damn straight.”
A smile tugged on the corners of her lush mouth. “We’re not teenagers anymore, Bishop.”
He feigned an innocent look. “Adults can’t have sex?”
“We can’t have sex,” she corrected. “I participated in the auction to help my parents out, not to get laid. If you wanted some action, you should have bid on Sandra Cohen. I hear she likes to do more than bake cookies.”
Jake laughed. “I don’t want Sandra Cohen. I want you.”
“Why?” Frustration laced her tone. “We don’t even know each other anymore. We had a fling when we were kids, and then we both moved on. I don’t have time for flings. I’ve got a life.”
“Does that life include a boyfriend?”
“Well, no, but—”
“Does it include celibacy?”
“Of course not, but—”
“Then what’s the problem?” He shrugged. “You’re in town, I’m in town…aren’t you curious to see if the spark is still there?”
Without letting her respond, he pushed his chair back and stood up. Bree’s eyes widened as he rounded the table and sank to his knees in front of her.
“What are you doing?” she stammered.