Barefoot with a Stranger (Barefoot Bay Undercover #2)(2)
“Nope, you had it first.” Chessie smiled up at him. “Giving your seat away would be a breach of airport protocol.”
“What about gentleman’s protocol?”
Oh, a gentleman. A big, hot, sexy, lickable gentleman. “You would set dangerous precedent,” she agreed. “Every man in this place would have to get up and let the ladies sit.”
“It could start a riot.” He added a smile that was purely unfair.
“But you’d be a national hero.”
The smile faded, and he shrugged a little, as if hero status held no appeal for him. Well, he certainly held appeal for her.
Easy, girl. You’re nursing a heartbreak, remember? But one look at thick black hair that curled over his collar and framed chiseled features and a slash of black brows…and she pretty much forgot good ol’ Matt Whatshisname.
The seat-stealer cleared his throat without looking up from his iPad. “Do us all a favor and go flirt with each other in the bar.”
The man standing in front of her flinched ever so slightly, his eyes flicking to the right but not actually shooting the chair hog a proper dirty look. Instead, he gave Chessie a slow, conspiratorial grin that took him straight to an eleven. And a half.
For one, two, maybe the span of three insane heartbeats, they looked at each other, and at least one X in every female chromosome in her body climbed out of their breakup funk to momentarily consider what else was out there.
He openly checked her out for a few seconds, his gaze practically feasting on her face, then the faintest shrug gave her the impression he’d lost some kind of inner battle.
He nodded toward the concourse. “Can I buy you a drink?”
Chessie opened her mouth to say no. She hadn’t planned on a drink. But she hadn’t planned on a three-hour delay between Boston and Barefoot Bay, either. Gabe hadn’t said she couldn’t talk to anyone, just not share why she was on her way to Florida.
For once, she should go with the flow because this particular flow was so fine. “Sure, thanks.”
The man leaned over to grab a duffel bag, then turned and got in the seat-stealer’s face. “I owe you one, dickhead,” he whispered.
As they walked away, a woman watching the whole exchange gave a loud, slow clap, and a few others joined her.
Well, what do you know? A drink with a smokin’ hot stranger. That was an interesting change in plan.
* * *
Mal knew they’d be watching him from the minute he walked out of Allenwood Federal Correctional Institution and started his journey. But he honestly didn’t think they’d be so damn obvious about it, throwing a tag team at him, using the tired cliché of a sexy woman being mistreated by a smartass stranger.
They must truly believe he didn’t know how to spot or shake a tail. Maybe they’d forgotten who he really was. Maybe they figured four years on the wrong side of a cell door had destroyed his finely trained skills along with his spirit. Maybe they were all a pack of idiots with no imagination.
For his part, Mal had taken and dumped two different cars, then boarded a train, followed by a Greyhound to Atlanta, and now he just wanted to fly to his final destination, for God’s sake. But he mustn’t have been clever or deceptive enough, because the babe and her buddy nailed him like a wanted poster on a tree.
Mal hung back as the hostess led them to a table, taking the opportunity to check out the woman they’d sent to soften him up.
Well, nothing about him would be soft around this woman, and they’d know that. She had that thick, inky black hair he’d always liked, though sloppily braided and hanging down to the middle of her back. It wasn’t her hair that got his attention, though. Or her ass, though it was perfection, round and high and youthful in faded jeans. It swayed side to side, powered by boots with just enough heel to tap a drumbeat on his stretched-to-the-limits libido.
All very nice. But it was her smile that drew him closer, and proved the CIA knew him all too well. Somewhere in a file in Langley, it probably said “sucker for a smile that lights up a face.” And hers looked like someone had struck a match in her heart.
So he followed and played their game. Because he wanted to know how far they’d go. And he wanted to look at that smile. Shit, he wanted to eat it.
When they sat down, she ordered an Amstel Light but said no to a frosty mug. Beer from the bottle. Okay, that was hot.
Of course, he was a man six days out of federal prison, and she was the first female he’d talked to in three and a half years who wasn’t washing his clothes or shoveling chow onto a plate. So she could have ordered piss in a bucket and he’d have probably sprung a boner.
“Thanks for the rescue,” she said after the waitress left, crossing her arms to settle her elbows on the table and lean in enough to treat him to a glimpse of skin thanks to the open top button of an expensive-looking sweater. “I think we shamed him effectively.”
Yeah, sweet thing. Like you two didn’t plan that since you followed my ass to the gate.
“He should be ashamed,” Mal agreed. And so should Mal if he let a little cleavage make him forget how not unplanned this meeting was.
He’d noticed this woman on the tram, then spotted her again in a bookstore. Hartsfield was a big airport, and a double sighting of anyone was unusual, but when she just missed the empty seat five feet from his face and looked right at him for help? They might as well have put it on the loudspeaker.