Beauty Dates the Beast(5)

“It was very uncomfortable for me,” I said coolly. “I believed I was being stood up.”

He took my hand in his and lifted it to his mouth for a kiss. His lips brushed against my skin, sending a shiver through me. “I apologize,” he said, looking serious. “That was thoughtless of me.”

I tried pulling my hand out of his.

He didn’t budge.

I raised an eyebrow. “Mr. Russell, you know that humans aren’t allowed to date in the Alliance. On behalf of my company, I didn’t want to leave you stranded tonight—but I could lose my job over this. So if I stay, Giselle must never know about it.”

His thumb rubbed against the back of my hand. “Of course not. The last thing I want is for you to get in trouble at my expense. Please stay—I ordered the tasting menu,” he coaxed.

I’d never been to a tasting dinner, with its multiple courses of fancy tidbits, all designed to show off the chef’s culinary skills and imagination. It would be fun—and he seemed sincere. I pulled my hand away and nodded. “Fine. I’ll stay.”

“Thank you.” At the table, he pulled my chair out as the waiter hovered nearby, then he sat down across from me and flicked his napkin into his lap with a flourish.

The waiter opened a bottle of expensive wine and, as we each took a sip, I said, “I feel that I should point out my first rule of dating, Mr. Russell. Just because you wine and dine me doesn’t mean I’m obligated to have sex with you. So going to the Worthington after dinner is not happening.”

He smiled, clearly not offended in the slightest. “I wouldn’t dream of it, Miss Bathsheba. If I pay for dinner, the only pleasure I expect is your company.”

I stared at the six and a half feet of masculinity on the other side of the table. He looked amused, as if he liked a challenge. This could end up being very, very dangerous in a way I hadn’t expected.

I changed topics, trying to put a wall up between us. “So why did you want to watch me at the bar, Mr. Russell? Just in case I had warts and a hunched back, so you could make a hasty escape?”

“I wanted to see if the voice and name matched the body.”

“And? Do I look like a Bathsheba to you?”

“You do,” he said. “Soft. Delicious. Warm. Curvy.” His eyes glinted as he leaned across the table. “I bet you’d taste the same.”

Oh. My. An instant flush crossed my cheeks. “That’s a first,” I said, recovering swiftly. “Usually I’m told that the name Bathsheba reminds them of an old lady clutching her knitting.”

“They’d be wrong.”

Red alert. Red alert. All hormones on deck. “Mr. Russell—”

“Beau,” he said, interrupting me. “Short for Beauregard.” He gave me a sheepish look. “Old Southern family.”

I finally smiled. “I’m not about to give you a hard time about your name. You’re speaking to a woman named after one of the greatest adulteresses in the Bible. My sister’s lucky she wasn’t named Whore of Babylon.”

He laughed, his silvery eyes warm and crinkling at the corners. He lifted his wineglass and raised it to me. “Two very unusual names for two very normal people. We’re a match made in heaven, Bathsheba Ward.”

I wasn’t sure how normal he was, but I clinked my glass against his anyhow. I wasn’t used to hearing my full name all the time, so when we set our glasses down, I said, “My friends call me Bath.”

He clasped my hand between his warm ones. “But I don’t want to be your friend.”

His skin against mine was incredibly distracting. I felt the calluses on his palms, felt the strong grip of his warm, large hands, his nails lightly scratching at the back of my hand in an absent, comforting gesture.

Oh, dear. I liked that far, far too much for my own good. Licking my lips nervously, I asked. “So what’s on the tasting menu tonight?”

He grinned. “I have no idea. I just asked the maître d’ what was good and that’s what he recommended.”

The waiter arrived and we pulled apart, though Beau’s hand seemed to linger on mine.

“An amuse-bouche for the monsieur and the mademoiselle,” the waiter said, a hint of a Texas drawl coloring his French. He set down two tiny plates. “A patisserie with caviar and crème fraiche,” he said, then left.

Beau popped the amuse-bouche into his mouth. After a moment his expression changed and his chewing slowed.

I eyed the concoction on my plate. “How is it?”

He chewed for a moment more, then swallowed hard. “Interesting.”

Well, that was a ringing endorsement. I eyed mine, and nodded that I was done when the waiter arrived to take the plates away. He returned a moment later with two bowls of bright orangey-yellow soup.

My eyes widened at the brown thing floating in my soup.

“Butternut bisque,” the waiter announced, “with quail egg in nest.”

Oh, dear. The waiter left and I looked at my bowl, then at Beau. He was staring at his food with an odd expression on his face.

“Is that a real bird’s nest?” I asked him. “Are we supposed to eat it?”

“I don’t know,” he admitted, then tapped his spoon against the egg. “I know I’m a were-cat, but this is ridiculous.”

I giggled and took a large swallow of wine, no more eager to eat mine than he was. “Maybe I’m not as adventurous as I should be when it comes to eating,” I admitted. “What’s next on the menu?”

“Cheese,” he said, looking down at the piece of paper.

“Why the face? That doesn’t sound so bad.”

“A savory mixture of goat and … yak cheeses,” he said, continuing to read.

“Er … oh.” I took another swig of my wine. “The wine is very good, at least.”

Beau looked chagrined. “I’m sorry you’re not enjoying the meal.”

“We haven’t even started the meal,” I quipped. “The entree will probably be some unfortunate exotic animal served on a bed of seaweed. French seaweed.”

He laughed, then glanced at me. “There’s a sports bar next door. Want to go grab a burger?”

“And leave my bird’s nest behind?” I pretended to protect my plate, resisting the urge to break into laughter. At his grin, I put down my wineglass and stood. “Let’s go.”

He threw a wad of bills on the table.


In the sports bar, we grabbed a comfortable booth and ordered. As we waited for our burgers, an uncomfortable silence fell. Sitting across from him in a cozy booth in a dark corner felt far more intimate than sitting stiffly across from him at a fancy French restaurant had.



I clasped my hands together, trying to think of something to break the silence, but nothing came to mind. Crap. I hadn’t dated in so long that I didn’t know what to talk about. Football? I didn’t know if he was a big sports fan. The weather? No, that was just stupid—

“Do I make you uncomfortable?” he asked, misinterpreting my awkwardness.

“I’m just not very good at small talk. Or dating. I don’t date.”

He looked fascinated. “I can’t imagine why not. Tell me about yourself then.”

I froze. Talking about me meant talking about Sara, and I couldn’t talk about Sara. “There’s not much to tell,” I said in a stiff voice. Was this a probe for information? Was he going to sell it to the wolf packs? “I’m a very boring girl.”

He shook his head, that beautiful smile flashing across his face. “I sincerely doubt that anyone with a name like yours could be boring.”

I remained quiet.

“You really aren’t good with small talk,” he teased.

Shoot, what could I talk about that wouldn’t alert him to our secret? “I … like to read.”

He smiled at me over the plate of cheese fries the waiter set down in front of us. “Who doesn’t?”

Well, how could you not like a man who said that? “That’s about it, really. Now, your turn. Tell me something you like.”

I caught a flash of white teeth. “I like women. Soft, curvy women.”

I rolled my eyes. “That doesn’t count.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s a given—like if I said I liked men with large packages.” I reached over for a cheese fry. “That’s like saying that you like breathing, or eating.”

“Sounds like we’re a match made in heaven,” he said lazily. “I like to eat, love to breathe”—he leaned over the table—“and I have a very large package.”

I choked on my cheese fry. “Not nice,” I coughed, trying to catch my breath. “You play dirty, sir.”

He picked up a fry and gestured at me with it before popping it into his mouth. “Your turn.”