So, deep down, why did Murphy yearn to be that way, too?
Strains of a Chinese rock ballad tore through the room, ripping into Murphy and exacerbating his physical need with every vibration. Scenes from a Jet Li movie flashed over the TV screens hovering in the corners, the images stylized with vengeance and blood.
Murphy’s pulse pushed through him, awakening him. He missed being with people. Missed the friction of nearby bodies, the murmur of voices, the scent of a woman’s shampoo as she brushed by him.
He headed for the bar, the crowd around it as thick as collected moss, their bodies emanating heat. Impatient for a drink, Murphy looked around, deciding to get his social poison from a waitress instead.
And that’s when he saw her.
At a distant table, a woman waited, clutching a fan in one fist. The first personal feature Murphy noticed was her hair—a wild Bohemian bunch of light-brown curls that spilled down to her shoulders. Her fan, her hair, even the way she leaned on the table with her chin in her palm while playing with a corkscrewed strand, added up to a certain dramatic quirkiness.
Just as he was about to admit that she wasn’t anywhere near his type—a female who carried ambition in the disciplined cut of her hair and the steel of her posture suited him much better—he noticed this woman’s eyes. They were a startling blue, widened with such emotion—anxiety?—that he couldn’t look away. Eyes flashing with intelligent awareness, drawing Murphy in.
It was only when she blinked, then glanced at the door, that he noticed the off-kilter black clothing, the long boots hugging her legs, which were crossed, one ankle bobbing in time to the slow, revving guitar licks of the stereo.
Lust blindsided him, twisting in his belly, heating downward until his gut tightened.
Those boots. In spite of everything else about her, they made her into one of those bad girls Kyle had been tempting him with, a woman who’d do anything—with her mouth, with her hands and with her body.
Murphy craved a woman with such boots.
For a long second he allowed himself to wallow in the thought of her, to bathe himself in the mist of wicked longing.
He imagined slipping those boots off her legs or…damn, even keeping them on as he ran his thumbs over the inside of her thighs…. Somehow, with the deftness only a fantasy would allow, he could keep those boots on while working off her pants and underwear—which would be black lace, of course—and then parting those legs so he could see all of her.
She’d give him a naughty smile, her mouth lush with that shiny pink gloss she was wearing, then crook her finger at him.
Come on. What’re you waiting for?
He’d go to her, using his fingers to spread her apart. Her sex would be a deep pink, swollen, already wet. When he tasted her, she’d be warm, his tongue playing around the hood of her clit, teasing it, dipping inside her, kissing her until she moved against his mouth, asking for more, needing it, wanting it…
Asking him to punish this bad, bad girl with the pain of pleasure.
A loud laugh from behind Murphy shook him back to the moment.
He realized he was in a bar, in a crowd, and his cock was aching with fierce, stiff electricity.
Hell, the fantasy had been good while it’d lasted.
He glanced back at the woman, who was now stirring her drink, looking into its depths as if she could read the ice like tea leaves. He wanted to fixate on those boots again, but he couldn’t. Not this time.
Because in this second glance he saw something else about her—a sadness? Something almost hidden under the unruly hair, something that made her hold his attention for a few seconds longer than a girl would who was so obviously not his style.
But his body wasn’t about to let him get away with that. His penis was nudging against his jeans, still awake.
Great. In the middle of a crowd—the perfect place for an emerging hard-on.
It was at that well-timed moment of frustration that she glanced up, meeting the intensity of his gaze.
She sat up in her chair, smiled, the gesture full of cheer and hope, and the room’s temperature rose about fifty degrees.
He couldn’t explain why, but his pulse jerked, and it wasn’t from animal need this time. Seeing her all alone like this and smiling at him jiggered some kind of switch, merging desire and emotion into a confusing brew.
As he stood there, body raging, keening, his cell phone rang. It vibrated against a region that really didn’t require any more encouragement.
Blood pounding, he calmed himself and broke eye contact with the woman, answering the call.
But he couldn’t hear anything, so he headed for the door, managing to get there even with the state of his union rubbing against his jeans.
Kyle was waiting for him outside. Murphy knew his cousin too well—this wasn’t a good sign for the blind date.
“You can hang up. It’s just me.” Kyle tucked his own phone into his pocket, pulling Murphy away from the building and down the street.
“Hold up,” Murphy said, shoving his own phone away. He grabbed his cousin’s arm and stopped him from walking any farther. “Tell me you’re not ditching your date.”
Kyle guided Murphy near the entrance of a closed bakery, the enclosure partially hiding them. “I don’t need to be a fortuneteller to see that there’s nothing there.”
“You didn’t even have time to talk to her, so how could you know that? Isn’t she enough of a babe for you, Kyle?”
Murphy didn’t even know why he was firing away with these questions when the answers were so obvious. This was how Kyle operated; the process was no surprise.
Kyle flinched at Murphy’s tone, telling Murphy that he’d hit every target.
“She didn’t live up to what I pictured,” Kyle said. “The reality killed the fantasy, that’s all.”
“Perfect. Good from far, but far from good.”
“Cut it out, Murphy, I’ll call her right now to say I’ve got an urgent situation and can’t make it. That way neither of us will waste our time by pretending something’ll come of this. No harm done.” Kyle socked Murphy in the arm. “Then we’ll be on our way to better things, because my guy Murphy needs some distraction.”
Adding to his roguish act, Kyle offered a grin, but Murphy was immune.
“What?” Kyle asked, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He leaned against the building, watching a group of suntanned girls in light dresses walk by. Oddly enough, he didn’t even smile as they said hi to him. Instead he gave a slight nod, then fixed a lowered, tentative gaze on his cousin.
“Hell,” Murphy said, “at least you’ve got standards. At least you won’t screw anything that walks, right?”
Kyle exhaled, clearly relieved that Murphy had gotten his point. “Exactly. Why even make her think there’s a possibility of—”
“You’re a real hero, saving her feelings like this.” Murphy grunted. “You’re so damned shallow that you make a trickle of water look deep.”
“Well, shit, you want to go back in there and go on this mercy date instead? Be my guest. Tamara Clarkson’s the one with the frizzed-out hair, sitting in the corner with a weird fan. Go for it.”
Murphy’s head almost crashed in on itself. His still-awakened groin stirred. “A fan?”
“Yeah,