she could face the music.
Taking a deep breath, Avery slipped a hand into the crook of Claudia’s elbow and dragged her inside. Avery motioned to the host so that she could see her dining party and made a beeline for the table near the edge of the room, her heart beating so hard she could hear the swoosh of it behind her ears.
Luke saw her coming first, and gave her an honest-to-goodness smile that started in his mouth before landing in his lovely brown eyes. She might have forgiven him if not for the fact that she knew the moment his companion noticed it too. Jonah’s buff brown forearm with white shirtsleeves rolled to his elbows moved to slide across the back of his chair, as his head turned and his eyes found hers.
Nothing like a polite smile there. In fact, Jonah was scowling at her as if the fact that he’d trapped her into a kiss gave him some kind of right to be upset with her for making a date with another man.
Gripping her sparkly purse so he couldn’t see her trembling, Avery dragged her eyes from his and found Luke standing. Such a gentleman, unlike certain others who were giving her a once-over that made her feel as if her sophistication had been peeled all the way back to skin.
“Lovely to see you, Luke,” she said.
“Evening, Avery. Don’t you look stunning?”
“Thank you. As do you.”
Jonah coughed beside her.
With a smile she leant into Luke for a kiss. With a light hand on her hip, he pressed his lips to her cheek. Nice lips, she thought. Firm. The hand on her hip brief but sure. And he smelled great. When he pulled away she waited for that lovely feeling of bereftness that came when a lover was no longer close enough to touch.
And realised with a sense of impending doom she’d be waiting forever.
“Good evening, Avery,” said a deep voice to her left.
Avery looked into the deep grey eyes of Jonah North. He’d stood. Belatedly. And yet she had to knock her knees together to hold back the tide of heat that swept over her at the mere sight of him.
“Jonah,” she managed.
All she got for her effort was a flicker of an eyebrow, and a slow smile. She leant in for a perfunctory kiss, trying not to remember with quite so much clarity the other kiss. Failing spectacularly as his hand landed on her hip like a brand. The touch of his stubble against her cheek was a delicious rasp that she felt at the backs of her knees. And when he pulled away she felt not so much bereft as bulldozed.
She blinked. And when a smile finally reached his eyes, making them crinkle, making them gleam, she realised that she probably looked exactly like she felt.
“Claude,” said Luke, “looking just as lovely.”
Claudia stood behind her chair at that, her lips tightening as if she was waiting for the “but.” But when it didn’t come she gave Luke a quick nod. His eyes darkened, before, with a tilt of his lips, he returned the nod.
Then, Mr Oblivious proceeded to help Claudia into her chair. Meaning Avery had to put up with Jonah doing the same for her, leaving her feeling every inch of exposed skin in her shimmery strapless top.
Then Luke sat on one side of Avery looking intently at the menu, Jonah sat on the other staring her down, while Claudia’s eyes smiled in relief over the top of a cocktail she must have ordered before she’d ever arrived.
Oh, well. She’d admit romantic defeat where it came to the estimable Luke Hargreaves, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t have a very nice catch-up with the boy she’d once known.
And if that pissed off the man on the other side of the table, well, he could lump it.
* * *
An hour later, Avery was so exhausted from being charming she could barely sit up straight. Taking a breather, she let the fifties torch song in the background and the chatter of the three friends float over her.
“You okay, Ave?” Claudia asked, the second Avery closed her eyes.
“Shh,” she said, opening one eye, “I love this song.”
Claudia listened. Then hummed in agreement. “Don’t make ’em like they used to.”
When the men had nothing to say to that, Claude jabbed them both in the arm. “Talk about not making ’em like they used to... Come on. One of you please ask the poor woman to dance.”
“Claude—” Avery blushed. And blushed some more when Luke pushed his chair back and held out a hand. With a cock of his head towards the dance floor he invited her to join him.
She felt Jonah’s eyes on hers, but stopped herself from looking his way. With a smile she put her hand in Luke’s and lifted to her feet before following him to the dance floor to find they were the only ones there.
Without preamble he swung her out to the end of one arm before hauling her back. She grabbed him tight, breathless with laughter, her fingers gripping his upper arms. And then with a grace she couldn’t have hoped for he calmed them into a perfect sway.
She glanced over his shoulder to find Jonah watching her, his white shirt doing its best to cage all that well-earned muscle, the collar slightly askew as if he’d torn the top button open in a hurry, his eyes dark and shadowed in the low lighting. Her stomach sparked, her skin tightening. When he lifted his drink in salute, she knew she’d been staring.
Luke felt...nice, safe. He smelled...clean. He danced...really well. The tiki torches about the edges of her vision wavered and gleamed, catching on jewellery, on sparkles in women’s clothes. It would have been such a nice story to one day tell their grandchildren...if only she didn’t find it easier to wax lyrical about her surroundings than the man in her arms.
Luke started, and turned them both to find Jonah behind him, a finger raised to tap Luke’s shoulder. Yet the interloper’s deep grey eyes were only on Avery’s as he said, “May I cut in?”
Eyebrows raised, a not-so-surprised smile on his face, Luke turned back to Avery for an answer. “What do you think?” he asked. “Should I release you into the clutches of this ragamuffin?”
Should he? Avery felt as if her world were tipping on its axis. But when her eyes slid back to Jonah’s and she felt her entire body fill to the brim with sparks, she knew with a finality that tightened her stomach into a fist that nice and safe weren’t in her near future.
She must have nodded, or maybe she simply drifted into Jonah’s arms. Either way, she didn’t even feel Luke slip away, just that Jonah was there. She had one hand in his, his other hand burning a palm-print into her lower back—her whole body melted.
On the edge of her consciousness, the song came to an end. But they didn’t stop swaying. Her eyes didn’t leave Jonah’s. And his didn’t leave hers.
He pulled her closer still, till—without either of them breaking any indecency laws—every bit of her that could touch every bit of him did. When he lowered his hand so that his little finger dipped below the waistline of her pants, her breath hitched in her throat.
“Avery,” he said, his voice rough and low.
“I
