“Um, everyone?” she whispered, tinking her fork against a wine glass. “This is my friend Nox. Nox, this is Darren, Peter, Julia, Juliette, Frank, Toby, my dad, Brutus, Gabriella, Donner, Cassie, Brantly, Sarah, Brie, Tanner, Sawyer, Leslie, Jack, Fanny, and my mom, Darla.”
“Your name’s Fanny?” Nox asked her sister-in-law. “Like a butt?” He scrunched up his face. “That sucks.”
Nevada tried not to giggle, truly she did, but she’d said the same thing earlier, and Fanny looked so mad right now.
“Please tell me you’re joking,” Mom said, her voice trembling with fury.
“Your face is getting really red,” Nox observed. “Not good for the blood pressure. Heart disease is more prevalent in women than you’d think, and it’s best if you keep calm and—”
“Shut up,” she said, slamming her open hand on the table. One of the wine glasses fell over, but it didn’t break, thank goodness.
Nox reached forward and grabbed a shot, then handed it to Nevada with a wink. “New drinking game. Let’s take a shot every time alpha mom loses her shit today.”
Stunned, Nevada took the shot from him and then startled when he tinked her tiny glass with his. She didn’t even want to see her family’s angry glares, so she tossed the shot back with Nox, then gestured to her dress. “Um, I tried to match you.”
“Next time I’ll get you a pair of baseball socks, too.” His eyes were such a vivid blue as he gave her a sexy smirk. “My dad told me to wear them for good luck, and he said girls like guys in short shorts, so…you’re welcome.” He leaned back and checked his crotch. “I think my pecker is gonna play peekaboo at some point, so keep an eye on it so you don’t miss the show. Why were you late? It was super boring sitting at the bar watching your family talk about stock markets and hearing about some girl named Candy who slept with half the eligible bachelors. I don’t think Peter is your match because he ripped a gnarly fart like four seconds before you sat beside him.”
Mom choked on the water she’d been sipping, and Nevada pursed her lips against the loud laugh she really wanted to give. “H-his name is Darren,” she corrected him, “and ew.”
“Right? I would’ve waited until at least the fifth date for that kind of grotesque behavior.” Nox deepened his voice and said the last two words in a hoity-toity tone, and now Nevada had to put a whole lot of effort into not laughing.
“I can hear you, you know,” Darren said. “I’m right here, and I did not…pass gas.”
“You look sexy as fuck in that dress,” Nox said, his gaze twitching to Nevada’s cleavage and back to her eyes.
“R-really?” she stammered through a shy smile.
Nox’s blazing eyes dipped to her lips and held before his cheeks swelled with an answering smile that made her stomach do weird flip-flops. Beard and all, he was stunning when he smiled.
“I know you,” Darren said with a frown in his voice, “don’t I?”
“No one knows me. There’s really snails on the menu.” Nox pointed to the escargot appetizer. “You wanna share some? It sounds disgusting, but try everything once. We should share all our food so we get to try more.”
“You want to share food with me?”
“Woman, I shared my nachos with you yesterday. We’re practically married. Do you want the duck or the sea bass or both?”
“Both?”
“Good choice.” When a four-string quartet began playing elevator music, Nox leaned back in his chair and looked at the band. “This is my jam.”
“Can you go now?” Jack asked rudely.
“Sure. I wanna take this little hottie-with-a-body around the dance floor anyway.”
Her sister, Leslie, snorted. “I know you’re not talking about Nevada.”
Nox gave Leslie the dirtiest look Nevada had ever seen on a man’s face. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“There isn’t a dance floor,” Mom gritted out.
“False, you can make any patch of flooring a dancefloor,” Nox said, resting his arm on the back of Nevada’s chair and stroking her arm gently with his thumb.
Could he tell she was having trouble breathing? What Leslie had said embarrassed her.
“Look,” Nox said, pointing to the carpet beside mom, “a dance floor. Oh, and over there?” He pointed near the quartet. “Another dance floor. There’s like a hundred of them in here. Seriously, Leslie, what did you mean by that comment? You don’t think Nevada’s hot?”
“Do you?” Jack scoffed.
Nox pointed to his short shorts. “Boney McDickerson says yes.” As a not-so-quiet aside to Nevada, he said, “Your family’s awful. Do you wanna dance?”
“Ummm,” she said shyly, looking around. “No one else is dancing.”
Nox shrugged a shoulder up to his ear and grinned. “I don’t care what other people are doing. I want to touch your waist and hold your hand and move with you. Most of all, I want to get you away from here because you’re worked up and uncomfortable. Your family isn’t that nice, and my animal wants heads to roll right now. We can take a break, laugh a little, get a drink at the bar, and come right back if you want. I gotta give the beast a break, though.”
Okay, all that actually sounded amazing. Nox stood like he could see the agreement in her smile. He bowed magnanimously and offered her his hand like she was a princess. And when she slid her palm against his, he kissed her knuckles gently. It would’ve been romantic if he wasn’t flipping off Jack with his other hand. Or maybe that made it even more romantic; she didn’t know about these things.
“Please excuse us,” she murmured, her gaze on Nox’s muscular legs. “I’m gonna go dance with…my…Nox.”
“Nevada, sit down,” Dad commanded.
She’d never disobeyed anyone her whole life, but she wanted to dance. And Nox was right. She was really uncomfortable with her family. With the entire den, really. She hadn’t realized just how uncomfortable until tonight.
He led her through the tables, winding this way and that until he turned in front of the quartet and pulled her into a smooth waltz.
“Well, this is shocking,” she murmured.
“That I can dance? My dad made me learn. He said I needed as many women-gettin’ weapons in my arsenal as I could get ’cause I was probably doomed to be single forever without them.”
“Why would he say that?”
“Because I’m a lot like him.” Nox twirled her easily and brought her back to him, picking right up with the steps they left off on.
“Well, I took dance lessons, too.”
“Let me guess, for all those highfalutin fox dances where your parents tried to pair you up with eligible boys your age?”
“Well, it sounds gross when you put it that way.”
“Well it is gross. Look, that wine has bubbles in it.”
“It’s champagne,” Nevada said through a giggle. “Have you never tried it before?”
“Um no. If wine doesn’t come from a box, it’s too fancy for me.”
“But you said try everything once, and if you’re willing to eat snails, you should be willing to drink a sip or two of bubbly wine.”
“Fine. Don’t tell any of my friends I did this,” he muttered, taking two glasses from a passing server. “Just kidding, friends are for losers, I don’t have any of those. Bottoms up, Sexypotamus.”