by Joan Hohl
The question mark stabbed at Eric’s mind as persistently as the memory of her encasing legs stabbed at his body.
* * *
“Ouch!”
“You okay, Tina?” Susan Grant poked her head around the doorway into the workroom.
“Yeah.” Tina’s self-disgust was evident, even with the tip of her finger stuck in her mouth. “I pricked my finger on a corsage pin,” she explained to her frowning assistant.
“You’ve been kind of not quite with it all morning,” Susan said, stepping through the doorway separating the workroom from the showroom. “Something bothering you?”
Not something, someone.
Keeping the thought where it belonged, inside her rattled mind, Tina shook her head. “No, I guess I’m just a little distracted today.”
Susan’s frown dissolved into a teasing smile. “Thinking about tonight...and Ted Saunders?”
“Well...perhaps.” Tina forced a light-sounding laugh and turned back to the worktable. Her answer had verged on an outright lie. No “perhaps” about it...she hadn’t given a single thought to the coming evening or her date with Ted. In fact, until Susan mentioned it, Tina had completely forgotten she had made a date for that evening. Why had she made a date with Ted for this evening?
Tina frowned. Oh, yeah, her car was in the shop. For that matter, she didn’t really consider it a real date...even though Ted had been after her to go out with him for some weeks now. She had consistently put him off.
She would have put him off again when he called late yesterday afternoon, but Ted hadn’t actually asked her for a date. Ted had asked her if she planned to join their group of mutual friends at their usual Friday-evening get-together at the tavern. Tina had told him she was. Knowing her car was in the shop for repairs, Ted had then offered to stop by her place and give her a lift to the tavern. Fully aware that he had his own agenda, that of convincing her to regard him in the role of prospective suitor, Tina had nevertheless accepted his offer with gratitude.
End of date business; she still had no intention of expanding their friendship into a more intimate relationship. She wasn’t interested in any kind of male-female relationship other than friendship. She’d been that route; it had a lot of potholes and detours.
No, thoughts of the coming evening were not the cause of her state of mind, Tina acknowledged, jabbing the long, pearl-tipped pin through a stem on the elegant corsage—this time correctly. The root cause of her distraction stood six foot four, and possessed a lean, mean sexiness that wouldn’t quit.
Wolfe.
Tina sighed.
What else?
* * *
Eric was bored. Bored and itchy. There wasn’t a damn thing happening in the house across the street.
Deserting his position behind the lacy curtain at the solitary window in the minuscule living room of the bachelor flat, Eric prowled to the even tinier kitchen and pulled open the door of the compact apartment-size refrigerator.
“And when he got there, the fridge was bare,” he paraphrased in a disgusted mutter.
Heaving a sigh, Eric inventoried the contents of the small unit. A quarter of a loaf of bread, a week past the sell-by date on the wrapper; one slice of lunch meat, curl dried around the edges because he hadn’t rewrapped it properly; a small jar containing two olives, sans pimentos; a carton of milk; and a package of butterscotch Tastykakes.
Hardly the ingredients of a well-balanced dinner, he allowed, sighing once more as he shut the door. He really should have stopped at the supermarket on his way back from the city this morning...but then, Eric conceded, he really hadn’t been concerned with his stomach this morning. His concern had centered on a lower portion of his anatomy.
Tooling a powerful bike through a city the size of Philly required concentration...plus the ability to sit comfortably in the saddle. And, with Tina’s thighs pressed to his rump, Eric had lacked both requirements.
Would she be going to the tavern tonight?
The question had skipped in and out of his mind all through that boring day. From the detailed information he had received on her, compliments of his older brother, Cameron, an FBI agent, Eric knew that Tina generally met her friends at a neighborhood tavern on Fridays, for an evening of fun and frivolity.
Eric likewise knew that the tavern served up a decent charbroiled steak with side orders of tossed salad and Texas fries. He had heard, as well, that the pizza was first-rate. He loved charbroiled steak and Texas fries. Good pizza, too, come to that.
Should he?
His stomach grumbled.
Eric’s smile was slow and feral.
Why the hell not?
Two
He stood out in the human crush like a fiery beacon on a fog-shrouded beach. The indirect amber lighting sparked bronze glints off his gold-streaked mane of tawny hair.
Tina spotted Eric Wolfe the instant she crossed the threshold into the dimly lit taproom. A frisson of shocked surprise rippled the length of her small frame; her step faltered; her thighs quivered with remembered warmth.
Appearing casual, as though her hesitation were deliberate, she studied him while making a show of glancing around the spacious room.
Eric stood propped against one end of the horseshoe-curved bar, his back to the wall. He was dressed casually, quite the same as that morning, but in newer tight jeans and a different, brown-and-white patterned sweater. His right hand was wrapped around a long-necked bottle of beer, which he intermittently sipped as he lazily surveyed the laughing, chattering patrons crowded into the noisy, smoky tavern.
“Do you see them?”
Tina’s body reacted with a slight jolt to the intrusive sound of Ted’s voice too close behind her. Them? She frowned. Oh, them! Reminded of her friends, Tina dragged her riveted gaze from the alluring form at the end of the bar and transferred it to the far corner of the room, where she and her friends usually congregated at two tables shoved together.
They were there, in force, all eight of them. Two of the women and one of the men had arms raised, hands waving, to catch her attention.
“Yes,” she finally answered. “There in the back, at the same old stand.”
“Here, let me go ahead,” he said, moving in front of her. “I’ll clear the way.”
Following in Ted’s footsteps, weaving in and out and around tables and the press of bodies standing by, reminded Tina of the ride that morning, and the man in command of the bike. She slid a sidelong glance at the bar, blinked when she saw the empty spot at the end of it, then crashed into a beefy man who had just shoved his chair away from a table and was half in, half out of his seat.
Yelping, the man stumbled backward. His shoulder collided with Tina’s chest, knocking the breath from her body and sending her reeling. Oblivious to the mishap behind him, Ted plowed on toward the corner and their friends. Backpedaling, Tina careered off another patron and emitted a muffled shriek as she felt herself begin to go down.
A hard arm snaked around her waist, breaking her fall, steadying her, shooting fingers of heat from her midsection to her thighs. She knew who her rescuer was an instant before his low voice caressed her ears.
“Don’t panic, thistle toes.” His voice was low; his arm was strong, firm. “You’re all right.”
Tina didn’t know if she felt insulted or amused by Eric’s drawled remark; she did know she felt suddenly overwarm within the circle of his arm—overwarm, yet strangely protected and completely safe.
“Thank...you,” she said, between restorative gulps of breath. “A person could get trampled in this herd.”
Eric’s smile stole her renewed breath. The laughter gleaming in his crystal blue eyes played hell with her still-wobbly equilibrium. A muscle in his arm flexed, sending rivulets of sensation dancing up her spine.
“You’re welcome.” Keeping his arm firmly in place around her waist, he turned his head to make a swift perusal of the room. When his glance came back to her, he arched his eyebrows promptingly. “Where were you heading?”
“What happened to your escort?” Eric’s voice conveyed censure for the man’s dereliction of duty in caring for her. “Did he desert you in this zoo?”
“He was clearing the way for me.” Tina’s smile was both faint and wry. Looking at the table, she saw that most of her friends were now on their feet, their conversation animated as they stared back at her. Ted stood next to the table, his expression a study in confusion and consternation.
“Looks to me like your native friends are getting restless,” Eric observed.
“Yes...er, I’d better join them.” Tina took a step, fully expecting him to remove his arm; it not only remained in place, it tightened, like a steel coil anchoring her to his side. He began to move, drawing her with him.
“This time, I’ll run interference.”
Turned out there was no interference to run; Eric’s intimidating size, coupled with his air of self-confidence and determination, had the patrons clogging the spaces between the tables in their haste to get out of his way.
“Tina, what happened?” Ted demanded, eying Eric warily when they reached the table.
“It was nothing,” she replied, trying to make light of the embarrassing incident.
“She could have been injured.”
Tina shivered at the hard condemnation in Eric’s tone, and saw Ted visibly flinch in reaction to the piercing stare from the taller man’s laser-bright eyes. “But I wasn’t,” she quickly inserted. “So let’s forget it.” Forcing a carefree-sounding laugh, she swept her friends with an encompassing look and rushed on, changing the subject. “I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m starving.”
“Relief’s on the way.” The assurance came from one of the men. “The pizza’s been ordered and should be coming any minute now.”
“Good.” Smile in place, Tina turned back to Eric. “Thank you again. I...” she began, intending to gently but decisively dismiss him.
“We ordered plenty,” a female voice piped in. “Would you care to join us, Mr.—?”
“Eric Wolfe,” he supplied, extending a smile and his right hand to the man closest to him.
“Bill Devine.” Bill grasped Eric’s hand and jerked his head to indicate the woman next to him, the one who had initiated the introductions. “This is Nancy Wagner.”
Nancy...supposedly her best friend! Tina fumed in silent frustration as the round-robin continued.
“Wayne Fritz.”
“Georgine Cutler.”
“Mike Konopelski.”
“Vincent Forlini.”
“Helen Elliot.”
“Louise Parsons.”
“Ted Saunders.”
Eric’s smile vanished as the circle was completed with Ted. His voice took on a hint of disdain; his handshake was insultingly brief. “Saunders.”
A strained silence descended on the group around the table. A red tide rose from Ted’s neck to his cheeks. Tina felt a stab of compassion at his obvious abashment, and a sense of astonishment at Eric’s powerful effect on her friends. Eric had merely repeated Ted’s name, and yet his tone, the look of him, had held the force of a hard body blow.
Tina’s sense of compassion, and her underlying unease, lasted a moment, then dissolved into impatience and annoyance. With his attitude, by his very presence, Eric had thrown a pall over the congenial atmosphere, stifling the fun of the group’s weekly get-together. Growing angry, determined to send him on his way, she opened her mouth to issue polite but pointed marching orders to him. The first word never cleared her lips.
“Heads up, folks!” The warning came from the waiter, who was bearing down on their combined tables, a large tray balanced on the fingertips of both upraised hands. “Pizza!”
The aroma wafting from the steam rising from the pies brought a wash of water into Tina’s mouth. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that she had skipped lunch. Tilting her head to look directly at Eric, she managed a parody of a smile, and attempted once more to send him packing.
“Ah...thanks again, I...” And once again she found herself unable to accomplish her goal.
“What do you say, Eric?” Mike—the rat—called from the far end of the table. “There’s plenty of room, and pizza. Wanna join us?”
Apparently the moment of embarrassed silence was over.... Of course, Tina knew too well that her friends were never silenced for very long. They were too exuberant, bursting with youth and the joy of life. Staring into Eric’s alert, watchful eyes, she narrowed her own in a bid to convey her reluctance to have him invade their clannish circle. Her empty stomach lurched at the smile that began in the depths of his eyes an instant before it was reflected in his lazy smile.
“Sure. Why not?” Eric shrugged, setting the muscles in his shoulders and chest into an impressive rippling motion beneath his sweater. “Thanks.”
Ted moved forward to hold a chair for Tina.
Eric moved faster. With a casual-looking, smooth turn of his body, he blocked Ted’s movement. Pulling one chair aside, he kept a firm hold on it while sliding another one out for Tina. The moment she was seated, he dropped into the one he was holding and drew it into the table next to hers. Ted was relegated to the only remaining chair...between Mike and Helen, at the far end of the other table.
“Hope you like your pizza loaded, Eric,” Bill said, grinning. “We ordered the works on both.”
“I like it any way I can get it,” Eric drawled, slanting a hooded, sultry look at Tina that implied something other and much more intimate than pizza. “But I like it best spicy and sizzling hot.”
Denying the flare of response that leapt to life deep inside her, Tina glared a warning at him before turning away.
“So what are we waiting for?” Helen wailed from the end of the table. “Serve it up!”
In between bursts of conversation and laughter, the pies were parceled out and demolished. When it became clear that appetites were still unsatisfied, more pizza and fresh drinks were ordered. It was a normal Friday night.
Not quite normal, Tina mused, squirming in the allotted space afforded her between Eric on one side and Vincent on the other. On a normal Friday night, she could relax away the tensions of the workday, not have the tension increased by the sensations instilled by a hard thigh pressing against her leg, a muscled shoulder nudging her arm, a pair of crystalline blue eyes probing into her thoughts.
Tina’s appetite for pizza deserted her, replaced by a different, sharper hunger below her stomach. Forcing herself to chew and swallow the food she no longer desired, and refusing to acknowledge the sensual craving, Tina managed to consume two slices of the pie without choking.
Next to her, Wolfe wolfed down half a dozen slices between pulls on another beer. Nothing wrong with his appetite, she thought, sliding a wry look at him.
Correctly interpreting her expression, Eric grinned, and once again set his shoulder and chest muscles into action with a careless shrug.
Tina shot an arched look back at him.
“I was hungry,” he said, pressing his hard thigh more firmly against hers. “Still am,” he went on, in a lower, breathy murmur. “But not for pizza.”
Shock—or something—zigzagged through Tina. She went cold, stiff as a board, outside—and hot, soft as warmed satin, inside. The sensation of craving deep within her contracted into a tight mass of need, expanding the sense of shock to the farthest reaches of her body and mind.
What was happening to her? she marveled in confused silence. What kind of sensual power did Eric Wolfe possess to so effortlessly affect her in this manner? She hadn’t experienced such a compelling carnal compulsion since—
Tina’s mental process stalled, then raced forward, blurting the truth into her disbelieving consciousness. Never before in her life had she experienced such a depth of carnal compulsion. Not even with her husband. Not on his most potent night, or day, had Glen ever managed to arouse her in body or mind to the degree
that Eric Wolfe had accomplished with smoldering glances, murmured innuendos and the relatively minor pressure of his thigh and shoulder against her own.
It was weird. It was scary. It was not to be tolerated, Tina decided, edging closer to Vincent. She didn’t appreciate this hot-and-cold, hard-and-soft reaction to what, in fact, were the blandest of advances.
“Another drink?”
Tina’s thoughts fractured. Blinking, she turned to face Eric, certain her expression was every bit as blank as her mind. “Ah...what?”
“Would you like another seltzer?” He inclined his head, indicating the tall glass in front of her, empty except for a wedge of lime and three half-melted ice cubes.
Feeling dull witted, Tina stared at the glass in bemusement, wondering when she had drunk the fizzy water...and why her throat still felt so dry.
“The waiter’s waiting.” Eric’s droll drawl snagged her attention. “Would you like another?”
“No. Thank you.” Tina shook her head. She felt suddenly tired, drained by the interior havoc created by this too-attractive, too-sexy, too-close man. “It’s been a long day.” Beginning with a short, wild ride, she added to herself. “I’d like to go home.”
“I’ll take you.”
On that silver-and-black monster? Tina stifled the question, and shook her head again. “No, you won’t,” she said with tight asperity. “I came with Ted, I’ll go home with him.”
“Yes, but when?” Eric sent a pointed glance at Ted, then back to her.
Leaning forward, she gazed down the length of the tables to where Ted was engaged in a heated political discussion with Helen, Mike and Louise. At that moment, the waiter set a full mug of beer in front of him. Obviously Ted hadn’t given a thought to leaving yet; it was still early, after all.
“Whenever.” Tina lifted her shoulders in what she hoped conveyed an attitude of indifference she was far from feeling. “I think I will have another seltzer, after all.”
* * *
Cool. Christina Kranas was one cool cookie.
Interesting, Eric mused, how the so-very-cool cookie called Tina could activate his personal heat button. Concealing a sardonic smile, he turned away and raised a hand to attract the waiter’s attention.
