Page 65 of Contention

He pauses as if thinking deeply. It’s stunning how the planes of his face remind her of statues carved in cold perfection. “Do you think he’ll fold on the case if my associates provide a written deal? Maybe I’ll suggest that to them. There’s a special place in hell for people who make false accusations.”

Kara’s mouth opens to make a catty reply, but the food arrives and all thought leaves her brain aside from consuming as much of it as humanely possible. Calais cordially thanks the server with the loveliest of manners as Kara dives into the food with barely contained glee.

“There’s real honeycomb on this ricotta toast,” she breathes out as the sweetness touches her tongue. “Holy wow, that’s heavenly.”

“I’m glad you approve,” he says, his thigh pressing against hers. Kara can feel his gaze heavy upon her, watching food disappear into her mouth. It makes her slightly self-conscious and she flushes under his careful scrutiny.

“I bet the dessert is even better,” Kara mumbles. “This honeycomb is practically dessert as it is.”

“Get whatever you want,” Calais replies with a certain calm that shows that he really doesn’t care what the bill ends up being. He orders another gin and tonic and asks for the top shelf gin while he’s at it.

It’s the oddest thing; all the guys Kara dated usually were somewhat money conscious, which is fine because she’s the same. It’s grotesque to her to even think of ordering expensive things on the menu when someone else is paying. To actually be out with someone who doesn’t give a flying care in the world what she orders? Wild.

The fact that he’s nice to look at is a plus, even though he certainly has that air about him that speaks to how much of an asshole he is. Trouble in human form. It’s in his smile and his eyes, a slight bit of cool and detachedness that can’t possibly bode well. Arrogant.

Kara bets he doesn’t even look at his credit card bills every month; he probably has them on autopay without a single worry. Must be nice. “So, what are you, some sort of trust fund baby?”

He smiles slightly, eyes going half-mast. “Guilty.”

Eyes widening, Kara stares at him in surprise, because she knows virtually nothing about him. Nothingreal, anyway. She’s never met an actual trust fund baby before. At least, not to her knowledge. She always imagined them to be strange, vapid creatures with no drive to do anything in life. “So, why are you working? Aren’t you loaded? You must be old enough to have gotten control of the money, yeah?”

Calais chuckles, a nice low sound. “My mother was a big shot attorney that became a judge and my father is in enterprise real estate, most of the giant properties handed down from his father and so on. Sure, I have the money, but I’d lose my mind if I didn’t work.” His face darkens a little, almost unnoticeably. “My mother wouldn’t have allowed that anyway.”

Kara reads between the lines and bites one of the bison meatballs. She cocks an eyebrow. “Controlling mumsy?”

His grin isn’t very friendly. “In a manner of speaking.”

He offers nothing else on the matter.

For a moment, he seems to fade from the present, no longer paying attention to her as he stares off aimlessly, taking a sip from his gin and tonic. Kara can smell it, clean and fresh even though she knows she hates the taste.

A strange, yet subtle mood falls over him, as if the recent conversation has turned his disposition. It’s odd; he keeps chatting with her, diverting the conversation away from anything personal. He doesn’t like to talk about himself, she gets that rather quickly.

“Did you grow up in the city?”

The question jars her, sending Kara back to a dark place in her mind. The fork in her hand pauses in midair, halfway to her mouth. “I didn’t,” she replies slowly, suddenly feeling a dose of uncomfortable herself. It’s like he knew neither of them likedpersonal. “I grew up eighty miles south of the city, well beyond the southern suburbs. You’d probably call it the country, city boy.”

Calais makes a noise that gets close to derision. “That’s like living on another planet. Dieter lives forty miles away from the downtown, out in the northwestern burbs and that’s country living to me.”

Finishing her martini, Kara wipes the back of her hand across her lips. “Oh, bull. That’s a really nice suburban area. Upscale. No comparison!”

“He gets up to polo on the weekends, it’s absurd.” Calais chuckles a bit now, polishing off their last plate of food. “The cocaine must keep him fueled, because I don’t know how he manages after working downtown all week. Boundless energy.”

Squinting, her mind going to strange places with men in water and goggles and caps on their heads. “Dietrich Bittinger plays polo? Like in the pool?”

This time, Calais bursts out laughing, his teeth showing with his genuine amusement. He dabs his mouth with his napkin politely after he gets ahold of himself. “No, not water polo. Polo. Like on horses.”

Kara finds herself staring at the empty plates in front of her as she daydreams about that quite a bit. Green eyes and a Hollywood smile flash into her thoughts. When her mind drifts to thinking of him in boots and tight breeches, she decides she’s focusing entirely too much on an asshole of another sort. Switching gears, she skeptically asks, “Speaking of, how’s your buddy doing tonight, considering you’re here with little old me? He must be lonely with no one to roam the streets with.”

A hand crawls up into her hair, almost a warning as that low rasp of his says carefully, “What have I told you about sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong, sweetpea?”

“What, you meaning whoring?” She says it quietly, so no one but him can hear. A dig, a nasty dig.

Kara almost forgot what their plansreallyare for this night.

When his eyes meet hers once more, Kara recognizes an unpleasant shift in him. He leans closer to her, so that his mouth is just hovering above her ear. The closer he gets, the more the world seems to shrink down to just the two of them.

His eyes drift downward, taking in her skirt and how it has slightly ridden up from her sitting awkwardly on the chair. When he looks at her face once more, Kara realizes he’s done playing nice with her; polite dinner and drinks seems to have concluded because the look in his eyes is decidedly nasty.

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