“Dance on top of a table in a Mexican tavern with six men salivating at your feet,” Troy interjected.
Sin smiled. “You think they were interested in my feet?”
Troy sighed. “I think they were interested in every inch of you.”
“Some inches more than others.”
“Are you trying to provoke me?”
“Yes. It’s one of my little hobbies.”
“Thought of another benefit to insanity, Sin.”
She turned her head toward him, admiring his strong profile. “Oh, yeah?”
He nodded, a mock warning glint in his eye. “People use it to get away with murder.”
Chapter Eleven
Sin slept on the drive home, and Troy expected he would carry her inside. Instead she woke just as he cut the engine. Yawning, she stretched, then blinked her eyes. She looked at Troy and smiled. “Thanks for the ride. Coming in?”
He nodded, unwilling to quibble with her casual invitation. Earlier in the evening, he’d wondered if she would speak to him again, let alone invite him back into her home.
They walked up the walk and inside the house. She dropped her purse on a table in the living room. “Bet you’re tired, aren’t you?”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “A little.”
“Have a seat,” she said. “I’ll get us something to drink.”
Shrugging, he sank onto the sofa and turned his head from side to side to relieve the tension in his neck. She returned with wine for him and water for her. She was eating an apple. Slipping past him, she put a CD in her stereo, then joined him on the sofa.
She ate a few more bites of the apple and, feeling his gaze on her, stopped. She looked at the apple, then at him. “Want a bite?”
Troy felt his stomach tighten. The woman didn’t have a clue. He wanted whatever she offered him and more. “Yeah, I do,” he said, and lifted the hand she used to hold the apple to his mouth. The fruit was juicy and sweet with just a hint of tartness. Like Sin. Troy kept his thoughts to himself.
“How did you find me?” she asked.
Troy thought back to the number of bars he’d gone through and took a drink of his wine.
“Lists,” he said.
“Lists?” she echoed, her eyes mirroring her confusion.
“Your father said you’d probably gone over the border, and I asked him for a list of possible places.”
“Oh,” she said in a small voice. “How, uh, long was this list?”
“He gave me the name of a dozen places.”
Senada winced.
Troy took another drink. “I only went to eleven.”
“Oh,” she said again, clearly unsure how to respond.
He was starting to enjoy this. “At the eleventh place, I ran into a guy who had seen you. He’d overheard you say you wanted to dance. He gave me the second list.”
Senada’s face fell. “The second list?”
“Yeah. This one was for the most popular places people go to dance. You were at the third one.”
She stared at him in disbelief. “You went to fourteen different places looking for me.”
Troy nodded and chuckled. “I’m a persistent sonovabitch.”
Her eyes were filled with wonder. “No one has ever gone to that much trouble for me.
Ever.”
Troy felt his grin fade. He’d never loved a woman the way he loved Sin either, but he wasn’t ready to say the words aloud. She wasn’t ready to hear them either, he thought. The moment wrapped around them like a tight rubber band, binding them together.
Senada leaned closer, her gaze searching his. “Wanna dance?”
Dance? Troy heard the warm huskiness in her tone and wondered if he’d ever make sense of her. “It’s 2:00 a.m.”
She gave a slow smile. “Early.”
“You have to work tomorrow.”
Sin stood. “This is your offer for a private dance. Are you going to shut up and dance with me or not?”
Troy, who had a retort for nearly everything, clamped his mouth shut and joined her.
He hadn’t paid any attention to the music until now. A female singer with a plaintive, ethereal voice wove a little magic inside him, making his protected, buried feelings rise to the surface. The music made him feel vulnerable. He was unaccustomed to the sensation and might have fought it, but the woman who had stolen his heart was in his arms.
She led him. He led her. She put her hand on his chest where his heart beat, and with her gaze meeting his, she brushed away his shirt.
Unable to wait any longer, he kissed her long with naked emotion. She kindled his need with her response.
“Do you want me?” he asked.
“Yes.” She opened her mouth against his neck and pulled him closer.
“Show me,” he whispered.