Times Square(16)

"Apology accepted, but I've got my eye on you."

I roll my eyes and shrug, "Last one's yours," I tell him and slide the remaining cookie across the counter.

He opens the package and makes a big show of stuffing half the cookie in his mouth before reading the fortune. Then his brows draw and he nods to himself before stuffing the rest of the cookie into his mouth and the slip of paper into his pocket.

"You're not going to read it?" I question, confused.

"I read it."

"You're not going to read it to me?" I try again, a little hurt. Why do I feel like things just got weird?

"I'm saving it for later," he says and I wonder what the hell that means.

"Um, okay," I agree without looking at him and sweep up the mess of cookie crumbs onto my plate while wondering if all men are covert or just the ones I'm attracted to. "That's really cagey," I blurt out.

"Cagey? How am I cagey?" He looks so confused I second-guess my gut reaction to question him. Why am I so suspicious? "We're in my apartment and I gave you carte blanche to go through my stuff. You're the one who wouldn't let me walk you home," he points out as he gets up and drops our plates into the dishwasher. Bastard has a dishwasher too.

"Oh, that." Yeah, he has a point. "That's because I share a one-bedroom apartment with three other girls."

"How does that work exactly?" He looks genuinely curious, then grins. "Does it involve snuggling and pillow fights?"

"No, pervert. Bunk beds."

"Bunk beds," he repeats with a nod, but then a moment later he frowns, subtly, the skin on his forehead wrinkling for a fraction of a second, so quick I wonder if I imagined it. "Can I get you anything else to drink? Should I open a bottle?" He's not facing me, sticking leftovers in the fridge as he asks, and I wonder if it's a dismissal. I wasn't expecting to spend the night here. I wasn't expecting to be here at all, but then he showed up for my book club with his dimples and flowers and things got out of hand.

"Do you want me to leave? It's getting late." I should probably go before I fall for this guy. This has gone too far—time to shield myself.

"No, I definitely don't want you to leave." He pops his head around the fridge door and stares at me. "What's this talk of leaving?”

"Um, I don't know."

"You promised me a dirty bedtime story," he reminds me. "You're staying."

"Okay." I grin, the weirdness from before forgotten.

"I think I've got something you'll like," he says as he pulls a bottle from an under-counter wine fridge and sets it on the counter before peeling the seal off and grabbing a corkscrew. He's really adept with a corkscrew and I'm intoxicated watching the muscles in his arms flex as he grips the bottle and pops the cork. Adeptness is a turn-on, even for a simple task. "Where'd you say you were from, Lauren?"

"I didn't say."

He tilts his head as if to ask the question now.

"You don't think I'm a New Yorker born and raised?" I ask with a laugh.

"Not quite." He shakes his head as he pours the first glass.

"Iowa," I tell him.

"Iowa." He repeats it slowly for such a short word. "What brought you to New York?"

"A guy." I take the offered glass and bring it to my lips. "The stupid finance guy."

"The cheater," he says, focused on tilting the bottle, pouring a glass for himself.

"Yeah." I nod. "That he was." I pause for a moment, thinking. "Wait, when did I mention that he cheated on me?" I don't remember mentioning it. I find it sort of embarrassing so I'm usually careful about who I mention it to.

"This afternoon. When you tried to get out of having dinner with me." He flashes a smile at me while stowing the half-full bottle in the fridge.

"I did? Oh, that's weird. I try not to mention it. But yeah, he was a cheater. Is still a cheater, I assume. He's just cheating on someone else now, I suppose."

"He's an idiot," Max snaps. "You shouldn't blame yourself."

"That's true," I agree. "But it's hard not to. For a long time I felt stupid for not seeing it, you know? But hell, I was in Iowa most of the time it was going on." I shrug. "So now I blame his friends."

"Why's that?" Max asks, pausing.

"So I don't have to blame myself?" I joke. "Because he was a pretty nice guy in college. Then he came to New York and got a fancy job and a nice apartment and I don't know what happened to him. He changed. Started hanging out with a bunch of Wall Street types. No offense," I add when he raises a brow at that comment.