He slid his hand forward, brushing his fingers over the base of the glass. She crooked her finger around the stem. “Not so fast,” she instructed, her voice breathy and low, but compelling all the same.
He questioned her with raised eyebrows.
She stepped up on the lower shelf behind the bar so she could lean forward and keep their exchange private. Max wanted to glance aside to see if Charlie or anyone else was watching, but he was slowly, surely, losing himself in the depths of her fathomless eyes. To hell with everyone else. She was just offering him a drink, not her body.
“This is my most special specialty.” She skimmed her finger on the top layer of ouzo, careful not to disturb the rainbow of liqueurs underneath, then dampened the rim of the glass—precisely where his mouth would be when he took a drink. “I don’t make it for just anyone.”
Max’s mouth dried. He moistened his lips with a thickening tongue. “I’m flattered.”
“You should be. But you have to do your part, too.” She dampened her finger again, but this time she touched the taste of ouzo to her lips. “This drink is called a Flaming Eros. Just like good loving, it takes two to make it hot.”
Hot? Oh, yeah. Max was learning about heat very, very quickly. His collar grew tight around his neck. His body dampened with sweat. The perfectly starched shirt beneath his perfectly pressed jacket was starting to buckle.
“Makes sense,” he managed to say.
Her fingers dipped into the pocket of her apron, then she slid her hand toward his, something small hidden beneath her palm.
Her phone number maybe? The key to her apartment?
He glanced down. A box of matches?
“So,” she said, slightly louder, but still in a voice meant entirely for him, “care to light my fire?”
2
ARIANA SWALLOWED, savoring the ouzo she’d boldly stolen from his drink. She didn’t know where the seductive move had come from; she wasn’t exactly experienced with this sort of thing. But she’d spent enough time tending bar to watch some real pros work the room. Judging by the way Max Forrester’s pupils expanded and darkened his eyes from pale jade to pine green, she wasn’t doing half bad.
One week of freedom was all she had and, dammit, she wanted to spend at least one night with the man she’d lusted for since the first time she’d seen him. She’d never had an indiscriminate affair and, quite honestly, she wasn’t starting now. Hell, since her divorce, she’d become the most discriminating woman in San Francisco. But Max Forrester exceeded even her high standards. He was gorgeous, had not just a steady job, but a full-fledged career and, according to Charlie, wasn’t in the market for a wife.
She’d made the mistake of marrying her first lover and ended up waylaying her own goals and dreams in favor of his. Charlie claimed Max was a man of strong ethics, but he wasn’t interested in long-term entanglements. And according to her own personal observation, he was potently sexy, inherently classy and, most important, he was undeniably interested.
Max took the box of matches from her, fumbling slightly wile sliding it open, and extracted a single match without spilling the others. She couldn’t help but be impressed. She, being incredibly clumsy, had long ago taken to inviting her customers to remove a match rather than risk her sending them flying across the polished teak countertop. But she’d never made the offer with such a libidinous double entendre as “Care to light my fire?” Or if she had, the second meaning simply hadn’t occurred to her before. That invitation to fire her personal hot spot belonged to Max and Max alone.
He shut the box, then poised the red-tipped end of the match against the flint. “My mother told me never to play with matches.”
She leaned forward a little closer, unable to stop herself. Once she’d made the decision to seduce Charlie’s best man, she wouldn’t back down. Couldn’t. The tide tugging her toward Max Forrester was more treacherous than the waves outside Alcatraz, and just as invigorating.
“She told you that when you were a little boy, right? Well, you’re not a little boy anymore. Are you?”
He struck the match, inflaming the head, emitting a burst of smoke and sulfur that tickled her nose. She listed closer to him like a boat following the command of the waves. Amid the wispy scent of fire, she caught wind of his cologne. A musky blend of spices and citrus flared her nostrils and rocked her equilibrium.
He held the match toward her and she blinked, knowing she’d better get a hold of herself before she lit her Flaming Eros. She was already hot enough without adding third-degree burns.
She skimmed her fingers beneath his, brushing his hand briefly as she took the match away. The warmth of his skin was soothing. The look in his eyes was not.
She slid the glass back and skimmed the fire over the alcohol until the drink ignited in an impressive blue and orange flame. The bar erupted in applause and Stefano shouted last call. Ariana couldn’t wait around to watch Max drink her concoction. She immediately had orders for three more. After sliding a small plate from beneath the bar to help him extinguish the flame and instructing him to do so before the fire burned through the grenadine, she grabbed his half-empty beer and her bottle of ouzo and moved farther down the bar.
She needed space. She’d probably only imagined the increase in her body heat the moment he’d stroked the match against the box, but she hadn’t imagined the look of utter fascination in his eyes. How long had it been since a man looked at her that way? Since she’d let a man look at her that way without extinguishing his interest with a sharp phrase or quip?
Since her marriage? If she took the time, she could count it down to the minute. But she wouldn’t. For the life of her, she was going to make sure that her marriage and divorce would cease to be a milestone in her life. Tonight would be the turning point.
She mixed the three flaming aperitifs, each more quickly than the last, letting the customer remove the match, but doing so much more silently and efficiently than she had with Max.
Care to light my fire? she’d asked. Trouble was, he’d done that a hell of a long time ago without even trying—simply by coming into her tiny wharfside restaurant one evening, ordering his beer with cool politeness and leaving a big tip—and then disappearing into the night. But he’d come back, nearly every weeknight. Never saying more than a few words, but speaking to her nonetheless—in sidelong glances, clandestine stares. Perhaps saying things she wasn’t ready to hear.
Until tonight.
Little by little, the crowd thinned. The dining rooms were emptied, vacuumed and reset for the final breakfast crowd. Uncle Stefano stuffed the night’s receipts into a vinyl bag then disappeared in the office to secure them in the safe so Ari could tally them later. In couples and trios, the customers went home. Waiters called good-night after scooping their tips from their pockets and tossing their aprons into the laundry basket by the kitchen.
But Max Forrester didn’t move.
Ariana stuffed dirty glasses in the dishwasher, replaced all the bottles she’d used, stacked the mixers in the small refrigerator and wiped down the bar—all the while aware that Max hadn’t left. Charlie had, sometime when Ariana hadn’t noticed, and he’d done so without saying goodbye or thanking her for her help with his rehearsal dinner, which she thought odd but not surprising. The man was getting married in the morning. She was more than likely the last thing he had on his mind.
But obviously she was of interest to Max. Never before had he stayed late. Why else but for her? She was flattered. Terrified. Excited. He’d never flirted with her in the past, never so much as attempted to strike up a conversation beyond the day’s specials. At the same time, he’d never been cold or dismissive. Just standoffish, controlled. As if he chose to ignore their mutual attraction just as she did.
And yet, he’d lagged behind tonight. That had to mean something.