“Business.” Her finger, tipped in bright red nail polish that matched her lips, attempted to straighten her curl. “Does Roger know you’re talking to me right now?”
“Should Roger know?”
Lana offered him a dry look through cold, calculating eyes laced in a light, dusty brown. “Here I had thought you weren’t interested in talking to me after how quickly you blew me off earlier.”
“I had other business to attend to, but I have time to chat now.”
Lana looked over her shoulder. So did Ken. Now, where had David Bachman gone? Gone already? Hopefully he wasn’t out cheating on that Simmons heiress… “Unchaperoned?”
“Oh, please. I’m the chaperone in that relationship.” Ken finished his drink. “David may be the owner’s son, but I control more than that boy will understand.” He looked into his empty glass. “Huh. How about that? Looks like I need a refill.” Lana’s empty martini glass clinked against his stouter one. “How about I get you that other martini after all?”
“Only if you let me buy you another highball.”
“I believe they cost the same here.”
“Well, how about that?” Lana waved to the bartender who responded with alacrity. “We’ll both have a refill on our separate tabs.”
The bartender picked up the empty glasses and disappeared to the other end of the bar. Ken reached into his inside jacket pocket and pulled out his favorite drinking activity. “Mind if I smoke, Ms. Losers?”
Her visage crashed into disgust. “Yes. That’s foul.” Oh. Well. Ken slowly put his pack of cigarettes back where they belonged. I am suddenly aware of the lack of nicotine in my system. Great. So much for not being addicted. “Besides, if you start smoking, Mr. Andrews, half the men in this bar will start smoking too. I would have to leave. You don’t want that, do you?”
He cleared his throat. “Certainly not.”
“Good. It should also sting you enough to know that you spoiled any chance you had of kissing me tonight. You should be ashamed.”
***
Lana lived for the abrupt shock hurled in her direction. I’m cackling on the inside.
She had known Ken Andrews was in the room before she stole a glimpse of him sitting with David Bachman. Since their first meeting, Lana hadn’t been able to think about much aside from that man’s presence. She felt it in the main conference room. Hell, she noted the moment Ken left to have dinner with some associates, for the room was suddenly devoid of that cool confidence that most men forced.
To think, she had come to this bar in the hopes of flirting with the bartender a little. Instead, she froze up like a popsicle the moment Ken entered the bar and emitted his powerful aura all over the place – and smacking Lana right between the thighs.
It irked her how handsome this man was. He removed his suit jacket and draped it across the barstool he did not care to sit on. That fitted vest was the kind of accessory Lana would love to run her hands across, admiring the hand stitching, feeling the luxurious materials, and then tearing it off a man’s torso. What good was a man wearing such fine things if she couldn’t destroy them with her sexual bravado?
Ken Andrews had no idea who he was flirting with. Lana wasn’t some squeaky mouse playing in the big cat’s pen. She knew how to hold her own with men like him. She had devoured half the guys who came by her all girls’ school. Taken them to task at college, strolling right into the nastiest frats and leaving dazed dudes devoid of shame and semen in her wake. Stormed through this office, that nightclub, dancing and flirting with anyone who struck her fancy. Lana wasn’t compensating for anything, either. Her father had loved and doted upon her growing up. She had decent boyfriends who spoiled her with their money and bodies. No, the only excuse Lana had was that she loved to indulge in as many sexual experiences as she could have. At the appropriate time, anyway. This conference had not been on her list of appropriate times.
She also doubted that Ken Andrews cared to know any of that. The older Lana got, the more men were turned off to know what a slut she was. Not to mention I’m getting to that point in my career where I have to watch my image. What bullshit. Maybe a woman wanted to have a threesome at the end of a stressful week. Two men were preferable, but there were always couples at those swinger joints…