Hunter ordered their drinks, glancing only momentarily at the waitress.
When she walked away, Jana said, “She was gorgeous.”
“I didn’t notice.” Hunter opened the menu and handed it to Jana.
Jana had the urge to roll her eyes and call him on laying it on too thick, but she bit her tongue, realizing that she’d looked at the waitress longer than he had. Everything about Hunter was different tonight. His shoulders weren’t raised with tension, and his facial features weren’t tight.
He was still holding her hand, and as he lifted his eyes, he caught her staring and smiled. “What?”
She lowered her eyes, suddenly feeling nervous again.
“What is it? You were looking at me funny.”
“It’s just…I don’t know what to make of this.” Honesty came easy with Hunter, even if she felt funny admitting the truth to him.
His brows knitted. “Our date?”
“Our date. You. This. Being here with you.” She leaned closer and lowered her voice. “You’re different tonight. Like, totally different.”
Worry snuck into his eyes. “I’m trying not to be my typical asshole self.”
“Oh my God, Hunter. You’re not an asshole.” Is that what he thought she thought of him?
“Yeah, I can be.” He tried to pull his hand from hers, but she held on tight.
“Maybe we both can, but I don’t think of you as one.” She crooked her finger, and he leaned in closer, eyes on their hands. “To be honest, I like the person you are.” She waited for him to lift his eyes, then said, “A lot.”
That earned her a heart-melting smile.
“I like this, too,” she assured him. “But you don’t have to be someone else to try to impress me.” Did that sound self-centered? Like he thought he had to impress her? She quickly added, “Not that I think you’re trying to—”
He lifted his finger to her lips, gently silencing her. “I’m glad about all of that, but I like this. It feels good to treat you like the beautiful woman you are.”
His eyes dropped for a moment, and when he met her gaze again, the wicked glint that she knew oh so well was back. “It feels almost as good as when we’re not on a proper date and I get to ravage you.”
He leaned back, and she tried to remember how to breathe.
***
THEY SHARED AN appetizer of steamed mussels and enjoyed their dinners and a few glasses of wine. Hunter had wanted to kiss Jana at least a hundred times as they talked, but he fought the urge, wanting this date to be different from what they usually did. But while conversation came easily with Jana, he caught himself getting lost in her smile, or the joy in her eyes as she talked about a musical she was in two summers earlier, before they’d even met.
“I wish I could have seen you perform.” He imagined her up onstage and knew that she’d outshine everyone. If she could act and sing half as well as she danced, she’d blow anyone away.
Hunter paid the bill, and they headed outside into the cool night air.
“Did you know that this restaurant used to be located on Billingsgate Island?” Billingsgate Island was an island off of Cape Cod. A storm had divided the island in half in 1855, and the island had continued to erode away in the following years, until it was lost to coastal erosion in the late 1930s and early 1940s. He settled his hand on her lower back as they walked across the parking lot.
“No, but that’s fascinating.”
“This and many of the houses from Billingsgate were floated across the harbor to Wellfleet on rafts. Can you imagine how different everything must have looked back then? How different it was without the Internet, without cell phones, without everything at our fingertips?”
“Without midnight FaceTime sex?”
They both laughed. The lower Cape was less technology driven, but Wellfleet in particular was a sleepy little town that relied more on family outings than online entertainment. It was one of the things Hunter enjoyed most about the area. Although, as he gazed into Jana’s eyes, he had to admit that he loved his iPhone now more than ever.
“I for one am very glad for technology.” He couldn’t help pulling her in tight against his side as they came to the truck.
“Thank you for dinner, Hunter. This was so nice.” Jana put her hand on her stomach. “I’m so full, though. I don’t think I can go dancing.”
Hunter wasn’t ready for the night to end, but he wondered if she was blowing him off. Maybe while he was falling for her one sentence at a time, she was wishing she were somewhere else. The thought killed him.
“Do you want me to take you home?” He tried to hide his disappointment by sounding casual, but he couldn’t deny the tension in his voice.
“No.” She wrinkled her brow. “Oh, wait. Do you want to take me home? Because if you do, then—”
He lowered his lips to hers and kissed her with all the adoration he’d been holding back over dinner. The kiss started so differently from the firestorm they usually battled. It was a kiss of confirmation, of their two worlds colliding. He couldn’t resist deepening the kiss. She went up on her toes, hands fisted in his shirt. As he drew away to catch his breath, she tried to get nearer.
He’d promised himself that he was not, under any circumstances, going to land in bed with Jana tonight. After talking with Grayson, he realized that he already felt possessive of Jana in ways that made it feel like she was his even though she clearly wasn’t. And by the time he’d picked her up for their date, he’d realized not only how much he wanted to make her his—but how badly he wanted to be hers. The thought should have made him run, but he’d had the opposite reaction. He wanted to try harder, to make her feel so special that she couldn’t possibly want any other man.
Once he’d made up his mind, letting go of the tension he wore like armor had been surprisingly easy. Like he’d just been waiting for the okay from his stubborn brain to strip away the shield and bring Jana into his world.
Now he battled the desires coursing through him, the urge to take her home and show her how much he wanted her.
“Jana.” He touched his forehead to hers, trying to regain control. “The last thing I want is for our date to end.”
“Me either.”
Her words shot straight to his heart, reminding him that taking her home was not his endgame. He had bigger hopes.
“How about a walk?” he suggested.
She nodded, and he reached for her hand, then thought better of it and tucked an arm around her waist, wanting to feel her close to him. He might not take her to bed, but being near Jana was becoming not only familiar, but something he craved.
Chapter Fourteen
“DO YOU LIKE to read?” Jana asked as they followed Main Street toward town, passing Herridge Books, which was closing for the evening. The town was reminiscent of days gone by, from the old-fashioned storefronts to the books residents read—paperback or hardback, not e-readers. The world of e-readers and smartphones belonged more to tourists than residents.
“Yes. How about you?”
“I do. I don’t have much time to read these days, but I love a good science fiction or fantasy novel.”
Hunter laughed. “No way.”
“Way. Big way, actually. I love them. Harper makes fun of me for it, because I’m a total closet Trekky, and don’t even get me started on Doctor Who.”
“Jana Garner, I think you just made me like you a little more.” Hunter had been a Doctor Who fan forever, but he’d never met a woman who liked it.
She leaned her head against him as they walked, and she felt so good, so right, Hunter was sure she belonged there.
They talked about their favorite episodes and how they both kept their love of science fiction quiet, for fear of being teased. He loved discovering that they had much more in common than just great sexual chemistry.
They passed the Wellfleet Market and the consignment shop, where a family was gathered out front eating ice cream cones.
“Tell me about this studio you want to open. I had no idea you were even contemplating doing something like that.”
“I wouldn’t say that I was contemplating it.” She pulled him toward the street. “Want to get ice cream?”
He laughed as she hurried across the street with a bounce in her step. “I thought you were too full to dance.”
“I was, but I can never pass up ice cream, especially not here, where they have my favorite flavor, Chunk O’ Funk.” They followed the stone path around to the back of the A Nice Cream Shop, where the line to order was at least ten couples deep.
“We don’t have to wait.” Jana looked up at Hunter, and he wondered how, in just a handful of days, she’d gone from the hot chick he wanted to fuck to the only woman he wanted to be with.
He shrugged. “I’ve got time to wait if you do.”
“Really?” She scrunched her nose, looking impossibly cute.
“You’re my only plan for tonight.” He leaned in for a quick kiss. “But only if you tell me about this dance studio you want to open.”
“It’s still a little unbelievable to me. I’m trying to come to grips with it all, so it’s hard to talk about.” She hooked her finger in the front of his pants, and he could see the excitement in her eyes, tempered by worry.