“More likely five years. Although I eat whole grains from time to time.”
“Didn’t you have nachos at the game?”
“No, you had nachos at the game. I had peanuts.”
“Ugh, you’re so virtuous. All that protein. Anyway, you can pick the chicken off and eat it, if you’re not afraid it’s been tainted by the crust. You might get bread cooties from it.”
“I’m not afraid of bread, I simply avoid simple carbohydrates because—”
“Let me guess, gluten is evil? Or you read something once about belly fat?”
“Neither. My body runs more efficiently on lean protein and vegetables. It’s helpful in building muscle and maintaining optimal health.”
“You sound like a vitamin commercial,” Paige said flatly and finished her second slice. “I’m sure your body’s a temple and all that, but fish and kale—not much fun.”
“There are other things I enjoy more than food. Food is just fuel.”
“Right. Delicious fuel. So, you’d rather play squash and lift weights with the trainer than eat yummy pizza? Or you’d rather just make people think you’re that disciplined?”
“I’m very disciplined. Most of the time. Tonight, or anytime I’m with you I seem to slip up. Lose my focus or my willpower.”
“It’s the black dress,” she joked.
“It’s what’s in the black dress. It’s you,” Luke said. His voice was so warm and rough that it made her bite her lip. She could feel the scrape of lace against her sensitive nipples, was aware of the hard-wooden chair beneath her thighs and the distance across the small table between his hands and hers. Everything was so vivid to her, the rush of wanting that she felt and the way she could pick up traces of his spicy cologne even in this crowded room full of the scent of food cooking.
It was like her whole body was attuned to his looks, his smell, his movements. The timber of his voice seemed to vibrate right up her spine when he spoke. She felt oddly like a violin, like she was somehow his instrument tonight, that his every move or touch would ripple through her like music.
Paige found she couldn’t eat anymore. She could barely swallow her rootbeer. She was aware of her dress hitching up her thigh when she crossed her legs. She wanted Luke’s hand high on her leg, wanted him leaning over to kiss her. It was distracting. She let him talk about work, barely able to nod in response because she was so wired, so turned on by him. There was nothing simple about this second date, this one last time she’d go out with him. They were work friends, she tried to remind herself. But sitting here in long earrings and black eyeliner and about half a tight dress it didn’t feel like friendship. It felt like something infinitely more dangerous instead.
Chapter 17
AFTER LUKE FINISHED his salad and paid the bill, he took Paige into a large back room full of frenetic beeping and dinging, the cheers and groans of young adults playing arcade games—skeeball and air hockey, and a free throw game that was being monopolized by a group of teen boys who were trash talking each other loudly.
She looked around, not knowing what to think. Luke pressed a cup of tokens into her hand and led her to a racecar simulator. They strapped in side by side and took the steering wheels. Paige started off in the lead, but Luke’s silver racecar quickly rammed hers into the wall and won the race. She stuck her tongue out at him and demanded a rematch. About four dollars’ worth of tokens later, she finally beat him, whooping with victory and waving her arms in the air.
Luke beat her at skee ball and again at the bowling lane as he threw strike after strike. Paige grumbled and blamed her high heels for throwing off her balance, but he really was disconcertingly good at almost everything. She played a couple of rounds of Ms. Pac-Man and even got on the top-20 scoreboard on the machine. Luke told her that he had no respect for screen-based console games. He offered to play her at pinball.
“Pinball? Like the one with the flappy things?”
“Flippers, yes,” Luke said patiently.
“Fine, I can play that,” she said and stepped up to the machine.
Paige plugged in a token and poised her fingers on the side buttons to flick the ball away from the hole. She managed to flip it up a couple of times and score some points off a bumper, but soon enough the ball slipped between the flippers. “Crap,” she said, “It’s harder than it looks.”
“No, here, let me show you. It’s about rhythm and timing. You can’t just jackhammer the flippers constantly. You watch the ball, see where it’s headed, respond to its movements to make it hold off.”
Luke was behind her at the machine, his arms on either side of her, his hands covering hers on the buttons. He pulled back the plunger, and a ball sprang into action on the board. He leaned his chin on her shoulder, making her catch her breath.
“Wait for it. Don’t rush. Wait...now!” he pressed one button, his hand over hers, and flicked the ball back into motion.
Paige felt his chest against her back, legs behind hers, his hips pressing into her. It was difficult to concentrate on the ball, on the game, on anything but the thrust of his hips as he jolted the buttons to operate the flippers on the pinball machine. The nudge of his hard length against her bottom took her breath away. She felt a spark of lust every time he moved against her.
A bead of sweat started at her hairline and rolled down her neck. She felt the dampness between her legs that an
swered his casual movements. Everything he whispered to her as an instruction sounded filthy to her—it all seemed to be about building a rhythm, drawing something out, making someone wait on the brink, on the edge like a climax.
When the ball finally rolled between the poised flippers and the game was over, she sagged back against him momentarily. It was easily the dirtiest arcade game she’d ever played. It was all she could do not to rock her hips back against his shaft wantonly and grind against him.