Faking It (Losing It, #2)(16)

In less than a minute, he charmed her the same way he charmed my parents. She was giggling and touching his arm, falling into him, all while curling her hair around her finger. I waited for him to move in for the kill, but he didn’t. They just kept talking and talking. She was clearly giving him the green light, and he was still chatting her up like an old lady in church.

Why wasn’t he taking what she was so clearly offering?

He started talking to his friend, ignoring the blonde. She gave the kind of pout that was obnoxious on anyone above the age of five.

I smiled.

Some of the tension in my shoulders loosened, and I danced a little easier. I told myself that the relief I felt was a by-product of those earlier shots kicking in and had nothing to do with the blond girl he was blowing off.

Then the girl reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone. She was smug as she entered what I assumed was her number into his contacts, and I wanted to rip her stupid blond hair out. He looked over his of my longest relationshipS drink shoulder and raised an eyebrow at his friend. The girl left, looking disappointed, and he didn’t even give her a second glance.

He was saying something to his friend when he paused. His eyes were cast in my direction, and I could almost feel the weight of his gaze as it trailed up my body. His face was stretched wide in a smile when our eyes met. He froze, and my movement faltered. I should have looked away, but something about his expression held me. It wasn’t lust. I knew that expression well. He looked at me . . . in awe.

He took a step in my direction, and my heart jumped in my chest. I was attracted to him . . . to a guy who was in a whole other playing field. And if I was honest, there was more than just desire thrumming through my chest.

There was fear.

I forced my eyes back toward the ceiling, and made myself concentrate on dancing. If I didn’t look at him, maybe he wouldn’t try to talk to me.

I closed my eyes, and the swing of my hips felt like I’d been set to sea. The shots had definitely kicked in. I was affected by them just enough that I felt warm and my head light. My skin tingled, and I wondered if he was looking at me. My muscles had loosened, and the more I twisted and rolled my body to the music, the better I felt. I imagined the look in his eyes, and it made my blood pump faster.

Trestle had a retro theme, so I didn’t have to dance to any brain-liquefying pop music. With my eyes closed like this, the smell of smoke wafting in from outside, and the undercurrent of desire thrumming beneath my skin, I could almost pretend that it was the 1960s, and I was working here in the go-go bar’s prime.

I opened my eyes and found Cade.

It felt natural, like the pull of gravity.

Normally, looking at someone from up here felt too awkward and intimate. Meeting his gaze was intimate, but it wasn’t awkward. It was exhilarating.

Despite how much he scared me, I felt comfortable with him. It was complicated. Looking at him, I knew this wasn’t the kind of fear that sent you running for the hills. It was the kind of fear that made people jump off cliffs and climb mountains—the kind of fear that told you something miraculous was waiting at the end of it, if you could only get there.

Getting there was the problem though. I wasn’t the climbing mountains kind of girl. As appealing as the summit seemed now, I knew myself well enough to know I’d give up halfway there, and then I’d be left with only the pain of the journey, and none of the reward.

I preferred my life to be as uncomplicated as possible. There was nothing to learn about guys like Mace, and no journey needed to land him. What you saw was what you got. I understood him. And more importantly, he was the kind of guy who couldn’t break my heart, because I would never let him have it and he would never care enough to want it.

But Cade . . .

For the life of me, I couldn’t understand what Cade could possibly want with me. I couldn’t understand why his eyes were burning through the layers of my skin while a pretty blonde sat pouting a few tables away.

I tore my eyes away and threw myself into the music.

Music wasn’t complicated. It was math. Patterns. Highs and lows.

Music made sense to me in a way that life and people didn’t. It was predictable. My hips knew instinctively when to move. The riffs and changes untangled my mind. Time folded in on itself1">

I imagined I was singing up on this platform, too, instead of just dancing. The tension in me ebbed, and I floated away on a melody. I ran my hands across my sweat-slicked stomach, since I didn’t have my guitar. My body was my only instrument. I let the music flow through me, and I danced for what could have been minutes or hours or lifetimes.

Eventually I started to feel the strain in my legs. The hair that lay against my neck was damp with sweat. My throat went dry.

The song changed, and in the few seconds of silence, the world came back to me. The bar intruded on my mind once again. I wasn’t singing, and I wasn’t alone.

Cade’s eyes appeared black in the dim bar, and I could see the rise and fall of his chest from here. I turned and twisted my hips while he watched me. A tickle ran up my spine, the kind that made my whole body shiver in a good way. I must have really lost track of time dancing because there were half-eaten plates of food in front of him and his friend.

I made eye contact with Shelly, one of the bartenders, and asked her what time it was.

“Eleven!” she yelled up at me.

Shit. I should have taken my break fifteen minutes ago. Now it was time for my bartender shift. Katie, who I was taking over for, waved me off and said, “Don’t worry about it. Go take your break!”