Page 19 of Call My Bluff
“I mean no. You’re the one who got lost, and then you threatened to leave me behind! This feels like appropriate punishment.”
“Appropriate pun—”
“And,” he went on, raising his voice to talk over her, “you haven’t told me I look pretty tonight or anything! Terrible date behavior. I believe you owe me an apology.” He stuck his bottom lip out in an exaggerated pout.
Olivia gaped, torn between laughing and trying to hit him. “This is not a date!” she said instead, blurting out the only thing that came to mind.
“Okay, well, in that case, it won’t be bad form for me to leave you here,” he said, and he turned on his heel and started down the gloomy corridor.
Olivia waited for him to turn around, waited for the punch line to come, but then he turned a corner at the end of the aisle and disappeared from sight. She groaned and rubbed her free hand across her forehead. “Campbell,” she called, hardly believing she was giving in. “I’m sorry I said I’d leave you.”
A few seconds passed, and then she dimly saw the outline of his head and shoulders pop from beyond a bookshelf. “Is that all?” he asked.
Olivia rolled her lips together and tried not to smile. “And you look pretty tonight!” she shouted. “Now get back here and turn me loose!”
The rest of Noah’s body appeared in her line of sight, and he sauntered back to where she stood. He put the doll on a table before crossing his arms over his chest in a pose that made his muscles more prominent, even in the half-light. “Turn you loose, huh?” he drawled. He took another step, and his eyes sparkled with the kind of mischief that could get a girl into a lot of trouble.
Olivia nodded, refusing to back away as he moved even closer. He held her gaze without speaking, and she felt one warm hand slide down her arm and close around her bound wrist. Then he gently moved it behind her. Her confusion was immediately remedied when he held his free hand up and shook it, rattling the single, silver key that hung from a tiny ring.
Of course he would choose the most difficult way possible to do as she’d asked.
The hand holding the key settled on the curve of her waist before gliding back to join the first at the small of her back. His attention darted down toward her mouth, now only inches from his as he leaned closer.
“Don’t kiss me,” she warned, though the words were much softer than she’d intended. Something about his proximity made it hard to breathe.
“I wouldn’t dream of it, Pix,” he murmured, but the way his eyes darkened from gray to denim gave him away. He was, in fact, dreaming of it at that very moment, and Olivia struggled to remember why it was a bad idea.
Try as she might, all she could process was him: the unfairly long lashes that ringed his eyes, the afternoon stubble along the line of his jaw, the way his body heat radiated through the front of her sweater. For a second, he seemed to breathe her in, and then she felt his hands begin to move behind her—first spinning the handcuff around her wrist and then tracing the metal circle until he found the keyhole. Seconds later, there was a faint click, and the bracelet came free.
“Besides,” he said, his voice now impossibly breezy, “I don’t kiss on the first date.” All at once, he stepped away as if nothing at all had just passed between them, and Olivia felt every inch as an unexpected loss.
Her brain screeched to a halt before speeding up again, as if fast-forwarding to their current moment. “What?” she asked.
Noah bit his lip and looked down at her, and the impish look in his eyes said he knewexactlywhat he’d done. “I don’t kiss on the first date,” he repeated. “What kind of guy do you think I am?”
Olivia realized her mouth was half open, and she shut it with a snap. Her cheeks grew hot in a rare flush, and the delight on Noah’s face was obvious.
“You seem upset, Pix!” he crowed, doing a horrible job of concealing his glee—if he was even trying. “Have you changedyour mind?” Then he picked up the porcelain doll and started walking away without waiting for an answer.
Olivia took a deep breath and willed her heart to slow down. There wasno wayshe’d admit what she was really thinking, which actually wasn’t words at all but one long disappointed sound.
Disappointed?!
No. Absolutely not.Indignantwas more like it. Who did he think he was?
“No, I have not changed my mind!” she spluttered at last, finally putting her feet into motion. “The answer is, and always will be, no!” She caught up with him at the end of the hall, and he turned to face her again.
“Not even one? Just to get it out of your system?” he asked.
“You aren’tinmy system! You aren’t even my type!”
His quirked eyebrow only infuriated her further.
“You’renot!” she insisted.
Humor danced behind his eyes, and he stared down at her without speaking. Then, finally, he shrugged. “Alright.”
His sudden change of tune knocked Olivia a little off-balance. “Alright?” she repeated.
