She took a gulp of her wine, the cool, crisp liquid getting caught in her throat when Austin sat at the opposite end of the bar, hanging his hat on the stool’s wooden back. When he ordered a gin and tonic from the bartender, Polly heard his American accent and narrowed her eyes. Taunting her? But when he thanked the bartender, she heard notes of the South. And even though she knew it wasn’t authentic, the smoky tone of his voice enlivened the desire left over from that morning. No, it had never gone away; it had only quieted in his absence, hadn’t it? Why was he sitting on the other side of the bar?
Austin regarded her steadily, his attention unwavering as his fingers drummed in a hypnotic rhythm on the bar. Drum, drum, drum. Impatience had Polly squirming in her seat, but her attention refused to stray from his compelling masculinity. And after a moment, she realized her heartbeat had begun to match the drumming of his fingers. Her breathing followed shortly after. In, out, in, out. The volume in the bar lifted in pitch…or was that all in her mind? She couldn’t decide. The sounds his fingers made and her body’s corresponding reactions only got louder to compete with the music. The tip of his tongue skated along the inside of his top lip, slowly, so slowly, from one end to the other, and Polly’s thighs shot together.
“The gentleman sends you a drink,” said the bartender, jolting Polly out of her stupor. Look alive, Banks. She hadn’t even heard the girl approach. “Would you like to accept it?”
“Um. Yes,” Polly answered, cupping the back of her neck with a hand, hoping to cool her temperature enough to function like a normal human being. When she glanced back across the bar, Austin had stood, heading toward her with unhurried steps, that golden gaze still fastened on her, far hungrier this time, wreaking the worst kind of destruction on her concentration.
Austin stopped beside her, entirely too close for the stranger he was pretending to be. So close, his slow exhale moved the hair covering her ear. “Beg pardon.” He spoke just above a whisper, but his tone was laced with concrete. “But I’d like to know just what you’re looking at, ma’am.”
His bluntness piqued her temper, somehow elevating her awareness of him right along with it. “Excuse me?”
His hand gripped the chair supporting her back, making it creak. “I came in for a quiet drink and you’re staring. Is there something you want?”
It was a dare. An Austin-style dare. Are you going to back out, Banks? She could practically read his thoughts, knew damn well she was being goaded. And didn’t care. His challenge was working right when she needed to be pushed. Her middle was twisted in knots, had been for six months, and she wouldn’t let this opportunity to lessen her suffering slip away. Nor could she pass up the chance to learn more about herself. “Yes, there is something I want.”
She sensed his relief even though he didn’t move a muscle. “I’m going to need specifics, ma’am. I’m not terribly gifted in mind reading,” he drawled.
“What are you gifted in?”
Polly couldn’t believe the purr that had emerged from her throat, but once it was liberated into the dim bar, the moment changed, became shinier and more manageable. Her nerves calmed little by little, until it felt entirely natural to turn her head and meet Austin’s intensity head-on. It pulled her under like a swirling eddy, but her legs kicked, allowing her to tread water.
“I’m waiting for an answer. What are you gifted in?”
Austin dropped his attention to her lap where Polly knew a healthy amount of her thighs were exposed beneath a short, fitted gray skirt. “I’m gifted in ways that matter,” he murmured, that Southern accent staying perfectly in place. “But we won’t find that out for sure sitting here, will we?” His smooth index finger found the inside of her thigh, traced higher and higher, slipping beneath the hem of her skirt. “I can get you started, though, if you’ve a mind to finish that drink.”
Even as Polly breathed a denial, she struggled not to slide her legs wide on the leather seat. The thudding beat between her thighs hadn’t ceased since this morning, and having his finger there, touching and rubbing, would be divine. Could she allow it? Just for a moment? Before any poor decisions could be made, a loud couple blew into the bar, arms slung around each other’s shoulders, shattering the illusion of privacy within the establishment.
Austin didn’t pay them the slightest attention, his gaze roaming over her breasts, that maddening finger still stroking the skin of her upper thigh. “Where does that smell of lemonade come from? Lotion or a perfume bottle?”
She rolled her lips inward to moisten them. “Lotion.”