Past Midnight

by Jasmine Haynes

  The small sign for Rudolpho’s blinked in neon blue. It was a bar, not a restaurant, but she’d snacked as she’d dressed—carrot sticks and apples—and wasn’t hungry. Dominic hadn’t come home. He’d worn jeans, tennis shoes, and a black button-down shirt to work. She wondered if he’d show up in that, or maybe he’d cruised the mall, though Dominic had never liked shopping.

  She opened the door, warm air rushing over her. The furnishings, and probably the prices, too, were high end, the servers well dressed in black and white, and the lighting dim. Monday night was a big night for whatever reason, many of the tables full; couples, groups, people coming in for a drink after work, even though it was eight o’clock. A young dark-haired man played the piano in the corner, a lilting jazz melody she didn’t recognize. Despite the number of people, the talk and laughter, the noise level wasn’t intrusive. You could hear yourself talk; even think. Erin removed her coat and slung it over the back of a seat at the end of the bar closest to the door, where she could survey the full room. The bar stools were comfortable, with a thick padded seat and a back to lean against. She left two empty seats between her and everyone else.

  Dominic had been sending her e-mail instructions all afternoon. He’d tell her to do this, then change his mind, and tell her to do that. She was sure it was part of his plan, to throw her off guard, so she couldn’t guess what he’d really do in the end. His basics were few; she was to wear sexy clothing, sexy heels, sit at the bar, and pretend she didn’t know him when he arrived. Other than that, all bets were off. Maybe he’d send a man to try to pick her up. Now that could be fun.

  “What can I get for you?” The bartender had finally made his way down to her.

  “Do you have ice wine?” Ice wine was made from grapes that were frozen on the vine. It was sweet, and she felt like something very sweet tonight, but it was only carried in classier places. Of course, it was very expensive, too, but tonight she was splurging.

  He grinned beneath his neatly trimmed mustache and beard. “Of course. Coming right up.” He bent to a small refrigerator under the bar, and she noticed the toned muscles of his butt and legs. She smiled to herself. Maybe Dominic would want her to pick up the bartender. He was older, midforties, a smattering of gray in his hair, mustache, and goatee. Very much like Winter except for the facial hair. The bar stool she sat on was high off the floor, but she estimated him to be over six feet.

  She twisted in her seat so she could cross her legs, the skirt falling open over her knee and thigh. Setting the wine in front of her, the bartender stood taller, looking over at her bared leg with a smile before he was called away by a waitress. Erin wasn’t one of those who considered an ogle disrespectful. If the way she’d reacted to Winter meant anything, she considered it a compliment. There were perhaps ten stools, most of them filled, all by men. She was the only woman seated at the bar, and the only one seated alone, which, if the glances her way meant anything, seemed to make her fair game.

  So, where was Dominic? And what did he want her to do?

  She sipped the delicious ice wine, savoring each tasting as she looked over the bar’s occupants. Having given her plenty of up, down, and sideways glances, a younger guy picked up his glass, swirled the ice cubes, then slid off his stool. He rounded the bar to her end, set his glass down right beside her. He wasn’t bad-looking, brown hair, brown eyes, an angular face, but thirty was a little young, especially when she had a preference for the over-forty set. Then he smiled—“Hi, there”—and dropped several notches. The guy desperately needed to see his hygienist.

  “Thank you, but I’m waiting for somebody.” She smiled to take the bite out of it.

  “I can keep you company until your friend gets here.” He sidled slightly closer.

  “That’s not necessary.” She didn’t smile, but blinked slowly, sending a message.

  He didn’t get it, and he didn’t leave. “Every lady needs company.”

  She drummed her fingers on the bar, a signal of her irritation. She decided politeness was no longer required. “I don’t. Go away.”

  The bartender approached. “Do I need to get your tab, sir?”

  Mr. Bad Teeth grimaced, picked up his drink, sloshing amber liquid over the lip, and returned to his seat.

  “Thanks.” She smiled her appreciation at her knight in shining armor.

  He mopped up the spilled drink. “Part of the service, helping out pretty ladies.”

  Oh. He was hitting on her. It amused her. What did Dominic expect her to do? Wait until the guy got off work and follow him home? Or maybe Dominic was going to show up, sit across the room, and see if she could get the guy to ask her to follow him home as a test of her sexual prowess.

  An elbow on the bar, she brushed her fingers along her throat. The position gave him a view of her cleavage. “You’re good at coming to the rescue of damsels in distress.”

  “You looked like you were handling him fine.” He shined a clean glass with a cloth, staying to talk as if he didn’t notice the waitress beckoning him from the other end of the counter. She shot Erin an exasperated look.

  Erin pointed. “Someone’s waiting on you down there.”

  He tipped his head, smiled slightly. “Yeah. Duty calls.” Then he turned back to her. “Are you expecting a fictitious friend or a real one?”

  She laughed. It was an odd way to put it. And her real answer would have been just as odd, because she didn’t know who or what she was supposed to be waiting for, so she anticipated what her husband would have wanted her to say. “Fictitious.”

  His eyes gleamed. “Don’t go away then. Things will slow down in about an hour.”

  Without giving an answer, she watched him. He had a nice rear. She could have him. It felt powerful, as if it were something she hadn’t thought herself capable of. She was forty years old, and yet she’d still turned a head. Two heads. Even more. That was what Dominic wanted, for her to see she was still attractive, to Winter, to other men, younger men, to Dominic. Maybe he thought she’d somehow lost confidence in herself. She just hadn’t noticed other men or bothered to see if they noticed her. Yet it was a nice feeling now that he’d opened her eyes.

  But how far did he expect her to take it? She tipped her wrist to look at her watch. Eight thirty. She surveyed the room, her eyes finally landing on a single man seated at a small round table tucked in the back by the piano. Black suit, white shirt, red tie. Dominic. When had he put on the suit? She wondered how long he’d been observing her and why she hadn’t noticed him.

  Picking up his glass, he rose, wended through the tables, and took a seat at the bar, leaving one empty chair between them. “Your glass is almost empty. Can I buy you another?”

  The bartender watched her from the middle of the counter as he poured two highball glasses. She studied the dregs of her ice wine. “I don’t let men I don’t know buy me drinks.” She eyed Dominic. “But I’ll pay for my own, and you can move over to this stool.” She patted the stool right beside her.

  “Why thank you, ma’am.” And Dominic moved in.

  She signaled the bartender.

  She felt good, powerful, alive. The heat on the inside was all for the game Dominic was making her play.

  HE’D WATCHED HER FOR HALF AN HOUR, SITTING BACK AS SHE ATTRACTED men like a Venus flytrap, gathering them to her, making them salivate for her in that black skirt with the amazing slit up her thigh and a formfitting top that outlined the sweetness of her nipples. She smiled and made her admirers hard. She leaned forward, and they drooled.

  They’d driven separately to work, always had. Erin liked the quiet before everyone else arrived. He’d nipped home in the afternoon to fetch his rarely used suit—he figured it would add a nice touch to the evening—then changed after she left for the day. He’d gotten to Rudolpho’s before she did so he could choose an out-of-the-way table. Cheesy as it sounded, he’d held up an appetizer menu to cover his face when she’d first taken a seat at the bar. He’d gotten hard watching her antics, flirti
ng with the bartender, crossing her legs to show off her thighs.

  The bartender brought her a fresh glass of wine, pushed it across the bar with two fingertips on its base. He watched her with dark, assessing eyes, his glance flashing to Dominic, then back. “Shall I run you a tab?” he asked.

  “That would be wonderful.” She graced him with a slow, sultry smile. “Thank you.”

  The guy backed off when a man four seats down tapped the counter to get his attention.

  “Are you waiting for someone?” Dominic asked.

  Her gaze followed the bartender’s backside. He was older, reminded Dominic of Winter, maybe it was the approximate age, the sprinkling of gray, or simply the way he looked at Erin.

  “I’m waiting for him,” she said, indicating the bartender with a jut of her chin.

  “Your boyfriend?”

  She shook her head, smiling.

  “Your brother?”

  She laughed, and Christ, he hadn’t felt her laugh quite that way for years, visceral. The first time he’d heard her laugh, he’d wanted her. And he’d never stopped.

  “He’ll be less busy in an hour,” she said of the bartender and shrugged. “I guess he wants to talk to me some more.”

  Dominic had outlined a list of things for her; how to dress, where to go, and when to arrive. But there was only one rule that mattered; she was to pretend she didn’t know him.

  His job was to hit on her. Not that he’d told her.

  There’d never been anything about what the outcome was supposed to be. So she’d upped the stakes, pitting him against the bartender.

  “Did you let him buy your first drink?”

  “No. I paid for my own wine.”

  “Well, that makes me feel better.” He moved his knee so that it brushed her thigh. “What’s a beautiful woman like you doing out all by herself?” He glanced at her finger. She hadn’t removed the wedding ring.

  “Christmas shopping,” she said, sipping her wine. Her lipstick was a deep plum. It wasn’t her usual shade.

  “What did you buy?”

  “A bustier, garters, stockings.”

  His heart skipped a beat imagining her in the getup, but he played out the moment. “Who’d you buy it for?” After all, she’d said she’d been Christmas shopping.

  She put her fingers to the swell of her breasts above the lowcut neckline, drawing his gaze, drawing the bartender’s. “My husband.”

  “Your husband wears women’s lingerie?”

  She shot him a cheeky smile. “I’m going to model it for him. That’s the present.” She fluttered her eyelashes. “The next present is what he’ll get after I model.”

  “And that is?”

  “S-E-X,” she spelled for him.

  The bartender read her lips, too, drifting closer to grab a couple of glasses off a shelf, absorbing every word.

  “That’s an extremely nice Christmas present,” Dominic said.

  “It’s the appetizer. His real present is much better.”

  Dominic quirked one eyebrow, urging her on.

  She laid a hand on his knee, raised her voice just enough to include the bartender. “I’m going to give him his biggest fantasy.”

  His biggest fantasy was right here; his wife’s hand on his thigh, that sexy skirt and fuck-me heels, and letting the bartender think she was flirting with a complete stranger. “Are you going to make me ask or just tell me?” he drawled.

  “Ask.” She puckered her lips at him.

  The bartender took extra time mixing a Bloody Mary and a cocktail with too much bourbon. “I’m dying to hear what your husband’s biggest fantasy is.”

  “A threesome,” she said with barely a sound, but exaggerated pronunciation that left neither him nor the bartender in doubt.

  Christ, she was maniacal. He loved it. “Isn’t that every man’s fantasy? Two gorgeous women to fulfill his desires.”

  She playfully slapped his hand and shook her head. “Don’t be silly. Two men to fulfill all my desires.”

  The bartender sloshed tomato juice down the glass.

  “I’ve always wanted two men,” she said sweetly. “And as my husband says, my biggest fantasy is his biggest wish.” She gave him a tinkling laugh, not her real laugh, but he felt it in his belly just the same.

  A flash of heat surged through his body. Christ. His wife was amazing. He came up with a plan. She did him one better, one hundred, even one million better. The bartender couldn’t have moved if someone pulled out a gun and said, “Stick ’em up.” Erin had him in thrall.

  “So that’s what I’m really shopping for tonight.”

  “A third?”

  She blinked a yes, then pointedly looked at the bartender. “I just haven’t made up my mind who.” She smiled, glancing between the two of them. “Convince me it should be you.”

  Holy hell. He’d created a monster. But what a way to go.

  11

  SHE WAS A COCK TEASE. MEAN AND CRUEL. THE POOR BARTENDER. But God, it was fun.

  The bartender cleared his throat, then spoke, his voice cracking like a teenage boy. “Maybe you should consider bringing home two men and letting your husband watch.”

  Dominic narrowed his eyes. “Don’t you have a drink to serve? The waitress is snapping her fingers at you.”

  “Don’t be rude,” Erin said, liking that the bartender was trying to find a compromise that worked for all three of them. “What’s your name?” she asked.

  “Shane.”

  She liked his brown eyes, but she loved the hot gleam in Dominic’s. “Nice to meet you, Shane. I’m”—she allowed herself only the slightest hesitation—“Laura.” Because Laura from the 1940s was one of her favorite movies, and the title character was elegant and sophisticated and all the men were in love with her. She tipped her head at Dominic. “What’s your name?”

  Dominic smiled. It was a game. She didn’t know him so she didn’t know his name. “Nick.”

  She traced his wedding ring, wondering if Shane noticed the match to the one on her finger. “Does your wife call you Nickie?”

  Dominic’s grin threaded through his voice. “At the right moment, yeah.”

  “Then I’ll call you Nickie, too.”

  “Shane,” the waitress hissed. She’d moved down the bar, her face tarnished by tense lines, her hair a darker, unenhanced shade of blond. “I need drinks here.”

  Shane shot Dominic with a finger pistol. “Don’t take advantage while I’m gone.”

  Dominic merely snorted.

  “He’s very protective,” she explained after Shane strolled to the other end of the bar.

  “Proprietary is more like it. You must come here often.”

  She shook her head, her hair feeling like silk as it caressed her bare nape. “My first time. How about you?”

  He swirled the contents of his glass. He hadn’t drunk much of it. “I’ve entertained clients here.”

  “Are you a lawyer or something?”

  He shook his head. “An engineer.”

  “Interesting.”

  He propped an elbow on the bar, leaning his temple on his fist as he faced her, giving her his total concentration. “What about you? What’s your line of work?”

  She thought of all the exotic careers she could pretend she had. And decided she was happy with what she was. “COO of a manufacturing company.” Chief operating officer. Dominic was president. The titles were meaningless, but they sounded good. “So, no more sex talk after our audience has walked away?”

  It was a strange sensation talking to him as if she knew nothing about him, as if they were brand-new to each other. Even his aftershave smelled different, more tantalizing. Or maybe it had just been so long since she’d taken the time to notice. Her body reacted as if this weren’t a role-play, heating, getting wet and ready for the conquest of a new male. The way he smiled was like a caress, setting a tingle loose along her skin. She actually felt breathless.

  “Oh yeah,” he drawled, “we’re going to h
ave more sex talk. I just wanted to know more about who I’m talking to. How long have you been married?”

  “Fifteen years.”

  “You’ve got one very understanding husband.”

  “He’s got one very understanding wife.”

  “Touché. Not many men would be so lucky.” He didn’t touch her, but his look, his voice, everything about him was almost physical. “Can you test out the goods before the big date?”

  “Of course. What if I found out my choice wasn’t properly equipped?” She winked. “Or didn’t know how to utilize his equipment effectively.”

  “That could be disastrous,” he agreed, unbuttoning his suit jacket so she could assess his package through his pants.

  She glanced down. “On the face of it, you don’t seem to have any equipment problems.” Obviously hard beneath the material, she didn’t have to touch to gauge how big he was.

  Shane made his way back down to them. “What did I miss?”

  Dominic tipped his head without moving his fist from his temple. “Equipment assessment. I passed.”

  Shane guffawed, glancing over his shoulder when he realized he’d attracted attention. The piano player played louder—unless that was her imagination—and the only man still paying attention after that was the one who’d tried to buy her a drink. Shane stepped back then, legs slightly spread, hands at his hips, pelvis jutted.

  “Oh my,” she murmured.

  He beamed, shooting Dominic a triumphant smile.

  “But size isn’t everything,” she said.

  Dominic and Shane snorted simultaneously.

  “Men.” She sneered gently. “It’s not the size; it’s what you do with it. And not just it.” She arched one brow. “But all the other stuff that goes along with it.”

  Shane leaned in to brace both hands on the bar and dropped his voice. “I think she’s talking about foreplay.”

  She leaned closer, too. “The term was invented by men. As if it’s before the real play. To a woman, it can be everything.”