“Do you have a middle name?” she asked.
He tilted his head. “Why?”
“Um. Just wondering.” Seriously, her legs were trembling.
“Let’s sit.” Was he reading her mind now?
He led her to a table in a corner. And the only reason she took the seat he offered was because of Emmett. Really, it was. Emmett wanted to record this band, and, as his wife’s best friend, she felt an obligation to do whatever she could to help out. And if that meant making small talk with a young man who wore black glasses and smelled like leather and looked at her like she was the only woman in the room, so be it.
She stifled a shiver.
“You cold?”
“Nope. Uh-uh. Not at all.” In fact, she was burning up. Conversation. Make conversation. “So. You’re in a band.” Real clever.
“Yup. Sure am.” Why did he always seem to be holding back a smile?
She went on. “What do you play?”
“Everything. Piano, guitar. The Bazantar—”
“You play the Bazantar?” she said, her eyes wide.
“On occasion. You know what it is?”
“It’s a five-string double bass, invented by Mark Deutsch.”
He stared a second too long. “Wow. I’m impressed.”
“So am I. That you play it, I mean.” She cleared her throat. “Anyway, what else do you do?”
“I sing. I’m a bit of a control freak about performing, actually.”
She couldn’t help but find that interesting. Mark St. Crow was a control freak. He seemed the opposite of her, and yet she often referred to herself with that same exact phrase. Well, everyone referred to her that way, didn’t they? “What kind of music does your band play?” she asked.
“Rock and roll. Punk. Electronic. Everything.” Now he did smile before he tilted his beer bottle to his lips. She surmised that, by now, he must have realized she had no idea who his band was. It didn’t seem to bother him.
Which was even more interesting. But she shook the thoughts out of her head. She really should be checking in with the caterer, mingling. So she had no idea why she asked: “Didn’t we have a deal? Were you going to name forty songs with the name Ruby in the title?” So now she was asking him to serenade her. Niiiice. Not flirting at all.
“This might not be in chronological order; I’m a bit rusty.”
“I understand.”
He coughed into his hand, cleared his throat. Made a show of it. She bit her lip, trying not to laugh at his silliness. With all this charm, no doubt he had girls falling over him every night. The thought sobered her up, and she straightened in her seat.
Suddenly she had the distinct feeling that she was being watched and she looked up to find the woman Mark had arrived with staring at her. Tall, with a supermodel’s figure and sparkling green eyes, the redhead was stunning. And, judging from the intense expression on her face, she disapproved of Mark talking to Ruby.
“What’s up?” Mark asked.
Ruby tried to shrug indifferently. “Your girlfriend doesn’t look too happy.”
“That’s Yvette, my singer. She’s not my girlfriend.”
“Are you sure she knows that?”
“Yeah. I already ventured down that road, and it didn’t work out so well. Hit a dead end so, to speak.” He chuckled, his laugh was deep and husky and made her soften even more.
So, he’d been with Yvette. Who cared? Ruby had no idea why it mattered that Mark’s gorgeous, talented, soon-to-be-famous ex-girlfriend was staring at them like she would be perfectly happy if a hole opened up and swallowed Ruby alive.
“Don’t mind Yvette. She’s just overprotective. We go way back.”
“I don’t mind,” Ruby said as Yvette turned away. “Not at all. It’s great to have good friends. Anyway, I should be going. I have to check on… things.” As if she didn’t have every detail, down to the exact number of hand towels in the bathroom, under control.
His hand on her knee made her pause. “But I haven’t finished my side of the deal yet. So sit back and listen, my darling Ruby.”
She flicked his hand away. “I’m not your darling anything.”
“I know. It’s a song. By Mossa.”
“Oh.”
“House music.”
“I don’t listen to house.”
“Understood. It’s not nearly as good as the hair-band music you have going on here.”
She bristled. “Eighties rock is back.”
“Sadly.”
She agreed but didn’t say it. And she really wished he would stop smiling like that. It did funny things to her stomach.
He opened his mouth to speak, but she interrupted. “So you’re on. List every song with Ruby in the title. And, just for fun, how about you do it by genre?” She smiled innocently.