Page 6 of The Single Dad Project

“Here.” She tapped a fingertip to her temple. “I do recognize it. But here?” She lowered her arm, splaying her fingers wide over her chest. “Is a different story. I’m working on it, though.”

“And working on it—or workingthroughit—entails fucking me for the night?” he asked, almost nonchalantly.

The blunt, casual tone offucking meset the lust that had been simmering inside her to flash fire level.

“Yes,” she admitted, just as blunt but softer.

“Will it work?” He toyed with the tumbler, but that magnetic green-and-gold gaze fixed on her.

“I don’t know... But it’ll prevent me from obsessively thinking about it for the next few hours. It’ll help me forget for a little while.” It’d help her feel something other than anger, confusion and disillusionment. “For that, I’m willing to take a chance. Are you going to be my chance?”

He stared at her, and if her breath stilled in her lungs...if her whole body stilled in anticipation of his answer, well, she chalked it up to her sexual fast and the whole gluttonous meal of a man sitting next to her. Simple lust. Nothing more.

Although, while she didn’t make a habit of one-night stands—how could she in her Your Business is My Business small town—she’d indulged occasionally before. And never,neverhad she felt the need to confess her inner thoughts as foreplay.

“Depends.” He cocked his head. “What’re you going to be for me?”

Whatever you need me to be, danced on her tongue, and she nearly uttered the flippant, and corny, response. But a closer look into his golden eyes stopped her. That shuttered expression compelled her to give more of the honesty she’d delivered tonight.

“I’ll be the opposite of whatever drove you here to drink alone,” she finally said, unsure if that was the correct answer.

But the flare of heat in his gaze assured her it was.

And yet, he didn’t say anything. Pride kept her from asking him again.

Yet, even pride had its limits. Just one glance down—at his broad, solid chest, at those powerful thighs—and begging didn’t seem allthatbad. Not when she could have all of him pressed against her. Covering her.

She shivered.

God, she wanted him covering her. Filling her.

There had to be another time when she’d been this turned on. But for the life of her, she couldn’t remember it in this moment.

“No regrets,” he murmured.

“No regrets.”

He nodded, and turning to face the bar, held up a hand, signaling for Maddox. Seconds later the bar owner approached them.

“What can I do for you?” Maddox asked.

“I need to pay my tab. And hers.”

Flo shook her head. “That’s not nece—”

“I know it’s not. But I am,” he quietly interrupted her, and her lips snapped shut around the rest of her protest.

That low, bourbon-and-bad-decisions voice brooked no argument. And though part of her balked at the dominance humming in his tone, a larger part damn near purred.

Purred.

Who did that?

Her, apparently.

Flo dipped her chin and finished off the rest of her beer while he handed Maddox several bills. From the look of it, more than enough to cover their drinks and a healthy tip.

So he wasn’t stingy.

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