He was pretending to read a price tag, too. She knew he was pretending because, at the exact moment she glanced his way, he sent a sideways look in her direction and one corner of that sinfully sexy mouth of his quirked up in a teasing smile.
Maybe he was flirting with someone behind her.
She turned her head enough that she could see over her shoulder.
Nope. Nobody there. Just more cookware racks brimming with All-Clad stainless-steel pots and pans, Le Creuset enameled cast-iron casseroles and complete sets of Calphalon nonstick cookware—which, she firmly reminded herself, were what she should be looking at. She put all her attention on the business at hand and banished the implausibly flirty, impossibly smooth-looking man from her mind.
Yet another coworker was getting married, a paralegal, Calista Dwyer. Calista hadn’t bothered to set up a bridal registry anywhere. The wedding was something of an impromptu affair. Tomorrow, Calista was running off with her boyfriend to some tropical island for a quickie wedding and a two-week honeymoon in paradise.
Sydney had left the office before lunch to choose a wedding gift. It was a task she had come to dislike. It happened so often and always reminded her that other people were getting married all the time. She really should do what a man in her situation would do, just have her assistant buy the wedding gifts—especially in a case like this, where she had no clue what Calista might be wanting or needing.
But no. She was still her grandmother’s granddaughter at heart. Ellen O’Shea had always taken pride in personally selecting any gift she gave. Sydney continued the family tradition, even if she sometimes found the job annoying and a little bit depressing.
“Cookware. Necessary. But not especially interesting,” a voice as warm and tempting as melted caramel teased in her ear. “Unless you love to cook?”
Good gravy. Mr. Hot and Hunky was right behind her. And there could be no doubt about it now. He was talking to her—and he had been giving her the eye.
Slowly, as if in a dream, Sydney turned to him.
Breathtaking. Seriously. There was no other word for this guy. Jet-black eyes, sculpted cheekbones, a perfect, square jaw, a nose like a blade. Broad, broad shoulders. And the way he was dressed … casual, but expensive. In light-colored trousers and a beautifully made navy jacket over a checked shirt.
He arched an ebony brow. “Do you?”
She forced herself to suck in a breath and then asked warily, “Excuse me?”
“Do you love to cook?” He gazed at her as though he couldn’t tear his eyes away.
This could not be happening.
But wait. A gigolo? Maybe she looked like gigolo bait. Well-dressed and driven. Maybe it was the new black, to go trolling for a sugar mama in housewares.
And then again, well, he did look somehow familiar. She probably knew him from somewhere. “Have we met before?”
He gave her a slow once-over, followed by another speaking glance from those black-velvet eyes. That glance seemed to say that he wouldn’t mind gobbling her up on the spot. And then he laughed, a low, sexy laugh as smooth and exciting as that wonderful voice of his. “I prefer to think that if we’d met in the past, you wouldn’t have forgotten me so easily.”
Excellent point. “I, um …” Good Lord. Speechless. She was totally speechless. And that wasn’t like her at all. Enough with the stumbling all over herself. She stuck out her hand. “Sydney O’Shea.”
“Rule Bravo-Calabretti.” He wrapped his elegant, warm fingers around hers. She stifled a gasp as heat flowed up her arm.
The heat didn’t stop at her shoulder. Arrows of what she could only categorize as burning excitement zipped downward into her midsection. She eased her hand from his grip and fell back a step, coming up short against the steel display shelves behind her. “Rule, you said?”
“Yes.”
“Let me guess, Rule. You’re not from Dallas.”
He put those long, graceful fingers to his heart. “How did you know?”
“Well, the designer clothes, the two last names. You speak English fluently, but with a certain formality and no regional accent that I can detect. I’m thinking that not only are you not from Dallas, you’re not from Texas. You’re not even from the good old U.S. of A.”
He laughed again. “You’re an expert on accents?”
“No. I’m smart, that’s all. And observant.”
“Smart and observant. I like that.”
She wished she could stand there by the cast-iron casserole display, just looking at him, listening to him talk and hearing his melted-caramel laugh for the next, oh, say, half century or so.
But there was still Calista’s wedding gift to buy. And a quick lunch to grab before rushing back to the office for that strategy meeting on the Binnelab case at one.
Before she could start making gotta-go noises, he spoke again. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“Ahem. Your question?”
“Sydney, do you love to cook?”
The way he said her name, with such impossible passionate intent, well, she liked it. She liked it way, way too much. She fell back a step. “Cook? Me? Only when I have no other choice.”
“Then why have I found you here in the cookware department?”
“Found me?” Her suspicions rose again. Really, what was this guy up to? “Were you looking for me?”
He gave an elegant shrug of those fine wide shoulders. “I confess. I saw you enter the store from the parking garage at the south breezeway entrance. You were so … determined.”
“You followed me because I looked determined?”
“I followed you because you intrigued me.”
“You’re intrigued by determination?”
He chuckled again. “Yes. I suppose I am. My mother is a very determined woman.”
“And you love your mother.” She put a definite edge in her tone. Was she calling him a mama’s boy? Maybe. A little. She tended toward sarcasm when she was nervous or unsure—and he did make her nervous. There was just something about him. Something much too good to be true.
Mr. Bravo-Calabretti either didn’t get her sarcasm—or ignored it. “I do love my mother, yes. Very much. And I admire her, as well.” He studied Sydney for a moment, a direct, assessing kind of glance. “You’re a prickly one, aren’t you?” He seemed amused.
So he had picked up on her sarcasm. She felt petty and a little bit mean. And that made her speak frankly. “Yes, I am a prickly one. Some men don’t find that terribly attractive.”
“Some men are fools.” He said it softly. And then he asked again,
