Playing Dirty (Risky Business, #2)(31)

Oh, please. “Will you take the hint,” I said, exasperated as I tried to shove him off me. I was through being polite. “I’m done dancing with you.”

Ryker gave me a look of long suffering and sighed. “I just got off work,” he said. “I really didn’t want to get into a bar fight tonight.”

“Then don’t,” I snapped. “I can handle this on my own.”

“I can see that,” he said, nodding to where Lucas was clasping my hand and tugging me backward.

“Dude, I saw her first,” Lucas said, having spotted Ryker. “Go find another girl.”

Ryker smiled, but it had an edge that made a shiver crawl up my spine. “But I like that one,” he said.

“Tough shit.”

Okay, yeah, I could see where this was going. A quick trip to Nowhere Good.

“Lucas, I’m done,” I said to him. “Now let me go. Look over there,” I pointed. “That little blonde is watching you. I’d bet she’d love a dance.”

Like a kid shown another pretty toy, Lucas headed that way. I breathed a sigh of relief.

“See?” I said to Ryker. “Told you I could handle it.”

“Why are you dancing with some tool like that anyway?” he asked, pulling me into his arms. It felt much better to have his arms around me than Lucas’s and I melted against him like warm butter as he moved us to the music.

I shrugged. “Because he asked. He seemed nice enough. Just a bit … persistent.”

“Guys like that come here looking for one thing.”

I’d had enough booze to loosen my tongue. “Then I guess you found me at the right place,” I snapped, “since that’s obviously all you’re looking for, too.”

Ryker’s eyes narrowed and he stopped dancing. “What?”

My brain had caught up with my mouth and now I wanted to take back what I’d said. Sort of.

“The only time we see each other anymore is at night. Specifically, when you come by my apartment to get laid.” Jeez, Drunk Sage, why don’t you tell him what you really think?

“You think that’s why I come?” he asked.

In for a penny … “Isn’t it? You barely talk to me about your job, you work all the time but I never know what you’re doing, and any dates we talk about going on usually get cancelled. But somehow you find time to fit me in for—”

“A f*ck,” he interrupted, finishing my sentence.

My anger and bitterness had washed away now that I’d said what I’d been thinking, and I just looked at him. “Am I wrong?” I asked. “Because from my perspective, that’s what it looks like.”

“I just told you last night that I’m in love with you,” he said. “Did you not believe me?”

“Yes … No … I don’t know … Maybe.” I heaved a sigh. “It’s just so hard to believe, that’s all.”

“Hard to believe what?”

“You and me,” I said, looking at him as though hello? Wasn’t it obvious? “A guy like you and a girl like me. You’re the bad boy all the girls swoon over and I’m just … well, I’m just me.”

“So that’s why you’re so quick to think I’m using you for an easy lay?” he asked.

I shrugged. His reaction—or non-reaction—was making me feel stupid.

“You and I are … incredible together,” he said, his hands moving to my ass and pulling me closer. “But frankly, sex is easy to find. It’s the rest of it … the laughs, the fun we have … well that, not so much. And honestly, I wouldn’t have stuck around this long if you weren’t you.”

His words made me smile and that hard little knot inside my chest melted away.

He put his lips by my ear. “Though that dress is worth fantasizing about taking off you.”

A thrill of desire shot through me as another song came on with a grinding beat. “That depends on how good of a dancer you are,” I teased.

“Oh, I can dance.”

And boy, could he. Not the swing-me-around, spin-me-around kind of dancing. But the kind of up-close stylized dirty dancing I’d watched Patrick Swayze do with Jennifer Grey in one of my favorite movies of all time. I’d had dance lessons for years as a kid, but rarely had run across a man who could not only dance, but lead. Ryker was amazing and I wasn’t surprised that we fit as well together on the dance floor as we fit in bed.

A sudden commotion off to my right made both of us turn. It looked like there was a fight going on. I squinted.

“It’s that Lucas guy,” I said.

It looked like the blonde had a boyfriend who had a big problem with Lucas hitting on his girl.

Oops.

Even though the fight started with just two guys, others were gleefully joining the melee. In seconds, we were engulfed in a crowd pressing against us. Some were trying to get out of the way, others trying to join. It took only a moment for me to be separated from Ryker.

The crowd swept me away and I lost sight of him. Things were getting crazy and I looked frantically for Megan, Maggie, or Kelly, but saw none of them.

It maybe wouldn’t have been so bad if I’d been moved in the direction of the doors, but instead I was forced farther inside, closer to the fight. Someone pushed hard against my back and I in turn got shoved into someone else. I was unsteady on my feet and when someone pushed again, I tripped and went down.