Muscle for Hire(12)

“Here’s your fries.” A woman’s voice sounded to Aslin’s right. He started, snapping his stare up to the waitress leaning over their table. “And your ketchup.”

She placed a large basket of thin, hot chips between them, followed by a red plastic bottle. A disconnected part of Aslin’s unsettled mind told him it was tomato sauce, not ketchup the waitress was giving them, another part thanking bloody Christ she’d arrived when she had. His cock was threatening to burst free of his fly. He needed the distraction from his overwhelming response to Rowan.

Rowan smiled up at the woman, her cheeks flushed. “Thank you. These look delicious.”

Aslin bit back a growl. He’d never experienced such a predicament. The need to fuck Rowan so badly twisted through his overwhelming desire to do nothing but get to know all about her—her dreams, her hopes. It was…it was….fuck, he didn’t know what it was. Confusing?

Disorientating?

Scary.

A snort left him at the word. Since when had he been scared of anything?

“So.” Rowan’s low voice drew his attention back to her face. Her cheeks were still flushed, her lips moist, as if she’d licked them again. “Tell me more about Aslin Rhodes. Married? Girlfriend? Dog? Cat?”

He chuckled, forcing some semblance of calm through his wired muscles. “No. No. No and no. You pretty much know it all, I’m afraid. Ex-SAS commando for the United Kingdom Special Forces, followed by fifteen years as Nick Blackthorne’s bodyguard. And now advisor to the film Dead Even. That’s my story.”

“Wow. I don’t know what’s sadder? The fact that’s your story, or that you summed it up in one sentence.”

Aslin raised what was left of his soda water to his lips. “Two, actually.”

Rowan narrowed her eyes again. “There’s that lame humour again. I thought you British were meant to be funny.”

“No, that’s the Irish. And sometimes the Scots. Billy Connelly is bloody funny, don’t you think?” He snared a hot chip from the bowl between them and tossed it into his mouth. “Now,” he spoke around the deep-fried strip of potato, “your turn. Why can’t you be stunt co-ordinator on the film? I suspect you’d do a very impressive job.”

“I’m not a member of the union  . Film folk are very particular about their union  s.” She smiled, a hint of her dimple making Aslin’s gut clench. “And thank you. I think I would too. Next question?”

“Huntley? Hemsworth? Which is the real name?”

Rowan picked up the sauce bottle, squeezed a steady stream of the condiment onto half the chips and then plucked one from the bowl. “Hemsworth. But when Chris went to register his name with the Screen Actors Guild there already was a Chris Hemsworth.”

“The current Thor.”

She nodded, popped the chip into her mouth and selected another one. “The current Thor. So Chris went with Huntley, which was our mother’s maiden name.” A stillness fell over her and her gaze lost focus for a moment. A heartbeat. Long enough for Aslin to see a raw pain in her eyes.

And then she grinned, as if the shadow had never been there, and tossed another chip past her lips. “These fries are really good.”

“I’m glad you like them.”

“The perfect texture, the perfect length—” she plucked a long chip from the bowl, dipped its end into some tomato sauce and held it up for inspection, dimple denting her cheek. “—sweet but a little salty.”

As Aslin watched, she placed it—end first—into her mouth, and then sucked the salt from the tips of her fingers. A groan threatened to escape him. Low and deep in his chest. His balls tightened. Christ, why did he imagine it was his dick sinking past her lips, not the potato?

He jerked his stare from her mouth to her eyes, his jaw bunching.

Rowan stared back at him, unmoving. Motionless.

Fuck. He wanted her. Right at this sodding moment, he wanted her more than breath. On a carnal level. On a filthy level. He wanted to bury his cock in her pussy and fuck her until she screamed his name with release. He wanted—

“I don’t want to be attracted to you.” Her voice was steady. Direct.

Aslin sucked in a sharp breath, her abrupt statement like a punch to the guts.

“Being attracted to anyone isn’t part of my plans,” she continued as if discussing the weather. “I don’t have time for it. But…” She stopped, her teeth catching her bottom lip.

“You are,” Aslin finished for her, his groin a thick knot, his heart pounding. “You are attracted to me.”

Rowan nodded, her gaze holding his. “Yes. Very. I’ve tried to play it cool, but I’ve spent most of the night thinking about what it would be like to fuck you. To be fucked by you.”