“Guess I’m not the man I thought I was.” She scoffed at that response and gave him a pointed once-over.
“Mr. Super Soldier slash Underwear Model slash Bodyguard to the Stars not the man he thought he was,” she mused, and he grimaced.
“How the hell do you know all that about me?” he asked, clearly astonished.
“You’re joking, right? The town has a website dedicated to your accomplishments,” she said, taking a casual sip of her wine to swallow down her laughter at the appalled look on his face.
“What?”
“Oh, you didn’t know?” she asked. “It’s plastered with pictures of you in those tight boxer briefs. And in uniform, of course, and there are a few of you in a tux, hulking behind that princess at the Cannes Film Festival last year.”
“I . . .” He seemed at a loss for words, and even in the dimly lit pub she could tell that his face had gone bright red. “That’s . . .”
She covered her mouth and doubled over as she finally allowed her laughter to escape.
“Oh my God, the look on your face!”
“It’s not true?” he asked, looking half relieved and half annoyed at her.
“No, of course not,” she said between unladylike snorts. Her eyes were streaming, and he sat back, folding his arms across his impressive chest as he eyed her with an inscrutable look on his face. When her laughter finally died down, he handed her a napkin.
“Your cheeks are wet,” he explained when she looked up at him questioningly. “From your tears of laughter at my expense.”
His delivery was so deadpan that she sniggered again and grabbed the napkin to dab at her flushed, damp cheeks.
“I’m glad I amuse you,” he said, quirking an eyebrow.
“I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist. You looked so horrified.”
“How did you know all that stuff about me?”
“Come on, it’s a small town . . . everybody knows everything about everybody, and the Carlisle brothers were always fodder for gossips anyway.” She winced and then shook her head. “I’m sorry, that didn’t come out right.”
“No worries. I know what you mean. After all, the McGregor sisters were the talk of the town on occasion too. All the guys wanted to date”—his voice petered out as he realized what he was about to say, and he stumbled over the last words—“you girls.”
The delivery was so lame and unconvincing that Daisy laughed.
“You mean my sisters?”
“Uh . . .” He seemed at a loss for words, and she grinned.
“Don’t worry, I haven’t spent all these years under any illusion that the men in this town see me as anything but the other one. The pretty one, the cute one, and the other one, right? That’s what they call us?”
He kept his own counsel, taking another almost desperate gulp from his drink while remaining stubbornly silent.
“I don’t mind.” She leaned over and patted his arm, unable to believe that she was initiating contact with him, but she couldn’t resist it. “It’s better than being called the ugly one.” His arm tensed beneath her hand, and his eyes snapped up to meet hers. He looked so pissed off that she lifted her hand abruptly.
“Has anybody ever called you that?” he growled, and she understood—hopelessly charmed—that he was seriously offended on her behalf.
“Well, no. Not that I know of,” she said, and he gave her another long, penetrating look before dropping his gaze down to his beer bottle. He had looked so dangerous in that split second that Daisy had no doubt that if she’d said yes, he would have found whomever had insulted her and done something very nasty to them. A notion that was both ridiculous and flattering.
“So what have you been doing since leaving the glam bodyguard job?” she asked, and he shook his head.
“It wasn’t that glam,” he said, gracing her with a gorgeous smile. “Most of the time I had to do stuff like hold a certain pop princess’s hair out of her face while she puked, or stand around for ages while a very well-known actor got fitted for hairpieces . . . or pick up the shit of a spoilt starlet’s pampered pooch. And for the most part, it was mind-numbingly boring.”
“I don’t suppose you can name names?” she asked, dropping her chin into the palm of her hand as she watched him.
“Nondisclosure agreements,” came his succinct response, and she thrust her lip out in a pout and then immediately sucked it back in as she wondered what the hell had prompted the reaction in the first place. Daisy didn’t pout, preen, or primp for a man. It wasn’t her style, and—according to her mirror—it looked ridiculous on her. Was she flirting with this guy? With Mason Carlisle? She didn’t even know how to flirt. Was it just instinctive after all?
Who knew?
“What’s going on in that head of yours?” he suddenly asked, looking genuinely interested.
“Why’d you come over here to talk with me?” she deflected, lifting her gaze to his and surprising a flash of something—was that guilt?—in his eyes.
“I was just curious,” he said. “Wondered why you weren’t out there dancing with your friends.”
“I don’t dance,” she confessed.
“Everybody can dance.”
“Well, I didn’t say I couldn’t dance. I said I don’t dance.”
“Why not?”
“Because the only dance I truly excel at is the chicken dance. Every time I attempt to dance like an adult, I always bust out some stupid chicken dance moves and wind up embarrassing my dance partners.”
“You’re shitting me again, right?” he asked after a beat, looking honestly uncertain.