She blinked. Had he called her Missy? “My name is Havana.”
His gaze made a round trip down her body and back up again, laying down trails of heat as it went. “Oh, I’m aware. It suits you.”
She rolled her eyes, hoping against hope that would prevent him from seeing that he had any effect on her whatsoever. Because he didn’t. Shouldn’t. Which wasn’t the same thing at all, and holy cow, why did he have to be so confounding? “Yeah, that’s original. I’ve never heard that one before. Havana is all about hot Cuban rhythms and spice, right? You wanna salsa, let’s salsa.”
“Actually I was going to say it’s ruled by a dictator.”
She stared at him, and he stared back, the corner of his mouth twitching, and for who knew what reason, she burst out laughing. Tension release. Or something. That was a new one, and she had to hand it to him. “Touché. Can we call a truce please?”
Peacemaking was a first for her, though she doubted he’d appreciate the significance of someone who lived on the front lines taking a step back. Holding her position had been an art form for so long that even she didn’t know what came next. But it was painfully obvious she couldn’t win this battle by staying crossways with everyone, least of all this man who seemed to have touched down in the middle of Superstition Springs without a how-de-do.
“Yeah.” He rubbed at the back of his neck, looking as baffled as she felt. “But only because a woman who can laugh at herself is a huge turn-on.”
Mayday ! That was not anywhere close to what she’d been aiming for, and she didn’t like the pleased little hum that had started up inside as she internalized his attraction to her. “I’m engaged.”
He snorted out a laugh of his own. “Relax. I meant that in the rhetorical sense.”
“That’s a fancy term. Do you always backpedal using twenty-dollar words?” she asked him sweetly, thrilled to have finally gained the upper hand.
“I never backpedal.” The balcony shrank down in size as he treated her to the full force of the heat he seemed capable of producing at the drop of a hat. “And I never misspeak. If I say you’ve turned me on, take that to the bank. Stop throwing your fiancé in my face like it’s some kind of barrier to a man finding you attractive. It’s not. All that means is I’m not going to act on it.”
Her mouth flapped a bit before she could figure out if she wanted to open it or close it. What was she supposed to do with him? The whole point of having a fiancé was to avoid this exact thing. Well… no, it wasn’t. Not at all. More to the point, she’d been angling to avoid Serenity’s prediction, and that factor was still in play. He’d said he’d respect that she had a fiancé, which meant she could take his advice and actually relax. Caleb wasn’t even flirting with her, not really, just stating facts so she knew where she stood.
That warmed her up faster than anything else he’d done. Who didn’t enjoy a man who told the truth and made his position completely transparent? That was one of her biggest turn-ons. But instead of flipping out about it, she let it ride. So what if she found him attractive back? She could keep that under wraps as she changed strategies. Again.
“Great,” she said with false cheer, determined to get on some kind of track that led to results. “Now that we’ve got all that established, as the first order of business under the new truce agreement, let me show you something that will help you understand the vision Damian and I have.”
His eyebrows lifted in mild curiosity as he spread his hands toward the street below. “Show away.”
“You have to come with me. It’s a little ways outside of town.”
“Sure your fiancé would be down with that?”
His lazy drawl curled through her as the trap sprang closed, and his meaning took shape in her gut. Caleb had admitted he was attracted to her, and any man worth his salt would not like the woman he intended to marry hanging out with a rival. But if she held fast to that premise, then she couldn’t continue her campaign to win Caleb over to her side, which seemed not to have materialized like she’d have hoped in the first place. Neither did she think Damian would be a good addition to the party, or she’d have to spend all her time faking like they were a couple instead of focusing.
Ugh. Why did everything have to be so complicated? Because that was her life, or more to the point, she seemed destined to make it that way.
“He trusts me,” she told him, which was so lame there was no way Caleb would let that go.
He didn’t. He didn’t move at all, but she felt his presence crowding her in a very non-hands-off kind of way. “It’s a matter of principle, not trust. If you were mine, I wouldn’t want you within ten feet of another man unless I was right there by your side.”
“Well, Damian is not a Neanderthal who thinks an engagement ring means he owns me,” she countered with a smirk. Thank goodness. He’d finally revealed something she could latch onto that decreased Caleb Hardy’s attractiveness quotient. Possessive, jealous men did not do it for her.
Shaking his head, he let a wicked smile spread across his face. “You’ve never been with a real man, I see. Otherwise, you’d understand that I’m not talking about staking a claim. If you were mine, I’d be by your side a
lways, reminding you how beautiful I think you are. Telling you what things I admire about you, holding your hand because I could never get enough of touching you and that’s the only publicly approved way to do it. Basically I’d be doing whatever it took so you never wanted to look at another man as long as you live.”
The rush of liquid warmth inside should not have been so strong. But holy cow. She shut her eyes for a moment, which did no good because his smile had emblazoned itself across her brain. Probably she’d be seeing it in her sleep tonight.
She had no experience with someone like Caleb Hardy. The last man she’d let into her life had run away from her as fast as he could.
She’d like to order him not to say stuff like that, but doing so would tip him off that it had affected her, which had probably been the whole reason he’d done it—not because he really was that romantic but strictly to mess with her.
“Since I’m not yours, we have nothing to worry about,” she informed him primly. “Damian and I have a great relationship, and it doesn’t require us to spend twenty-four/seven in each other’s company.”
That didn’t even sound like fun. She liked her space. A man hanging around all the time? No thanks.
But rationalizing it didn’t seem to stop a sudden ache inside that wouldn’t ease. What would it feel like to have a man want you that much? And what did she do with the sudden, unexpected,