She looked around the place, and he knew what she saw. A bar filled with roughneck bikers and their babes. It wasn't like she could be surprised though, because he followed her in here. It wasn't the other way around.
"This isn't a great place to come looking for women or conversation." She tried again as she watched him, and he looked around like she did.
"Really?" he questioned as he returned to look at her. "I think I did a pretty good job finding a beautiful woman, and I can only imagine how great the conversation is going to be."
"You didn't say where you were from," she replied. He could see his stunning looks were only going to get him so far and thought up a tale to spin for his back story, like he always did.
"I'm a construction worker from a small town in Nevada looking for work in the city." He watched her face to see how his tale was being received. Aidan could tell when people thought he was lying because that's what he'd done all his life. It was a good skill learning who he could dupe and who he couldn't.
"What kind of construction do you do?" She wore an expression of disbelief, and he was shocked at how much he liked that. Most women took what he said at face value and kept it moving.
"I do a bit of everything … brick mason, carpentry, general construction." He liked to keep his descriptions pretty basic and as close to the truth as he could. Did he do construction? Not unless you count taking someone's face apart with his fists which he would classify as more of destruction.
"You came all the way here from Nevada to look for construction work?" She moved her gaze to her glass and swirled her drink. It was a move to make him feel more comfortable and less interrogated. He knew that move too.
"What can I say? I wanted to move to a big city, and since I'm looking for work, why not move here?" The story seemed plausible, and he didn't know what she found questionable about it. He'd told tales about who he was and where he'd come from all his life because anything was better than the truth. He'd come from nowhere, and he was an unwanted nobody. That was his real truth; who could blame him for choosing to share a better one?
She turned toward him again, and he thought she was going to try another tactic. When she picked up his hand and placed it on her neck moving it down toward her breast, he was surprised but liked where this was leading. This was his kind of woman. Maybe she was a prostitute. Who else would have him feeling her up in front of everyone in the seats? This woman did not give a fuck about her surroundings, and she was making him forget where he was as well. He hadn't even had to work hard, and he was practically squeezing her tit before he'd received his first drink. She took his hand away right when he was about to feel that hard nipple he'd noticed under her green ‘Masonville Lemonade – Suck it and See' tee shirt.
"You have great hands," she said turning his large dark one in her small soft one, "but they don't do construction."
"And you know this because?" He looked down the bar for the man who was supposed to be bringing his drink and wanted to ask for a glass of ice water as well. This woman turned him on and turned the tables faster than he'd seen anyone do before.
The bartender came back with his drink, and he was glad that the man had such perfect timing. The man's appearance gave him a minute to get his hand out of the ones he wanted to wrap around his cock, collect himself while he pulled out a few bills for his tab, and think about how he could work out his story for his way to observant friend here.
When he turned back, she had one eyebrow raised, and he wondered who was playing whom.
"I love men's hands, and I've made a life of studying them. You can learn a lot about a man from his hands." She put her hand out like she wanted him to put his hand back into hers, but this time she seemed to be asking permission. He wasn't sure he wanted to be figured out, but there was no way he was going to be able to get around this. If he wanted to keep this whole thing going he was going to have to play the game. He placed his hand in hers and waited to see if she was any good at this hand studying she thought she'd been doing.
"Well, what do you see?" he asked as she turned his hand this way and that looking harder at his hands than he ever had. Now that he was looking at them there was a lot of marks and dings on them but he wondered what she'd get out of it.
"You're a fighter," she said cautiously.
It took everything Aidan had to remain relaxed in her grip. The urge to ball his hands into a fist and pull them away from her was strong, but he resisted it.
" … but you take care of yourself. Your hands are strong." She looked up at him. "I know that from the way your fill out your shirt more than your hands, but your hands are strong too. They are also very clean- no dirt around your fingernails or overly large calluses. It appears that your knuckles have been busted a few times, and you have scars that probably should have had stitches. Your hands are a product of a full and busy life. You're smart, but you don't mind playing it down, and you're very observant."
He could only nod and wait for more.
"You hide behind your sexy green eyes and wicked smile, but you don't want to … you feel like you have to." She looked at him like he was going to admit or deny what she was saying but he thought it would be easier to just let her think what she wanted. The truth was flowing from her mouth, but she didn't know that, and she wouldn't hear it from him.
He sat there calmly but only because he'd learned early if someone knew they had the drop on you, they would use it to their advantage. This woman was good. She'd turned it all around on him and made him leery.
"So what do you think?" Her eyes sparkled with mirth, and it made him wonder if she was just guessing or if she really had the study of hands down to a science.
"You should do that at carnivals," he answered. For whatever reason, he didn't want to tell her she was right, but he also didn't want to tell her she was wrong. No one had ever bothered to look that closely at him in the first place, and that revved up his body to want her more than her beautiful body did.
"Did you still want a bite of my quiche?" She was playful now, and although he liked it, he knew she was dangerous.
"If you're offering, I'll eat it." He put a little seduction in his tone. This woman was good, but he knew his strengths. His looks and sex appeal had gotten him out of many of tight situations, and this woman and her wit and skills was one of the tightest.
"Are we still talking about food?" She looked him up and down, and that should have made him feel more at ease. This is what he was used to … the sexy comments and the sly remarks women made when they wanted a good fuck but didn't want to have to go all the way out and ask for it. He liked a woman who was secure in what she wanted and didn't make herself feel like a slut because she saw a good time and wanted to take it.
"I don't know … are we?" He sipped on his drink and waited for her to make the next move. The way they were going, he was unsure of the game, but the woman didn't seem like she was trying to slow down.
"Since you are new to the area, I feel it's my duty to help you find a good meal and maybe later we can get you something to eat." She stood up from her stool and waited for him to down his drink. He liked that she offered sexy fun in with her offer to take him around the area. At least now he knew where they were, and it was something he found he was very good at.
"Lead the way," he said as he escorted her toward the door. The looks he received from the men in the establishment ranged from impressed to jealous. It was a good thing he wasn't going to be coming back here any time soon, but he couldn't help but wonder if these men knew something about this woman that he didn't.
CHAPTER TWO
Many things happened to Lorna Giovanni on her many trips out to the seediest bars in the city, but running into a beautiful man with the body of a Greek god wasn't one of them. Being the oldest daughter of the biggest Mafia family in the city, she had to pick the places that would keep her away from her large Italian family and all the things that are associated with them.
She walked alongside the man who'd dared to sit next to her and strike up a conversation, and she had to admit she was impressed. No one had ever known who she was when she went out to have a drink, but most of them just felt the ugly that wafted off her person and stayed away from her. Being raised around drugs, death, and destruction could make the stench of it all just permeate out of your pores and warn away people without them really knowing why. It wasn't a tale that she'd made a study of hands because that was true, but she wanted to get him off his game before he asked anything about her. She wouldn't have known half of what she'd told him about himself if she didn't feel like she was looking into a mirror when he started talking. Not physically. They didn't look anything alike, but she could feel the need to hide who she was as soon as he opened his mouth. She was used to asking for what she wanted, and the men around her usually gave in; why wouldn't they? A woman asking for a good time and practically telling them there were no strings was a commodity any single man would want; she tried to stay away from the married ones, but a lot of them took off their symbols of marriage before they came in the bar.