I moved toward the waiting area and paced a short distance, back and forth, back and forth, for a solid minute before a large figure started down the stairs. “I apologize for the delay,” he said, his head lowered to the file folder open in his hands. “Things around here have been a bit chaotic.”
As soon as Nathanial—or Nate, as Georgia had told me—rounded the base of the stairs and started in my direction, blood began to rush in my ears, muffling everything he was saying, because the man coming toward me, the one who’d yet to look up from the documents in his hands long enough to realize I was about to have a coronary right in the middle of his waiting area, was none other than the stranger from the bar all those weeks back. The very one who’d rocked my world so thoroughly, I’d felt him in every tiny twinge and pull between my thighs for three days after the fact.
This wasn’t supposed to happen. I was never supposed to see that dude again. He was just a one-night stand who was supposed to go back to his part of the world and remain nothing more than a fond memory. He was definitely not supposed to be the son of the two people I respected most in the whole wide world.
Son of a bitch!
Finally, when only a scant number of feet separated us, he looked up, those fog-colored eyes I remembered with perfect clarity widening at the sight of me. “It’s you,” he breathed, and I could have sworn one corner of his mouth trembled in a suppressed smile. “Wow. This is unexpected. Where did—I mean... This is crazy. How did you find me? You wouldn’t let me give you my name or anything.”
And for damn good reason!I thought to myself. Because this was precisely the situation I tried so desperately to avoid whenever I picked a man to have a casual, no-strings fling—or in Nate’s case, a one-night stand—with.
Closing my eyes, I reached up and massaged at my temples, trying to fight off the headache pulsing behind my eyeballs. “This can’t be happening,” I mumbled to myself. The smell of leather and cloves suddenly filled my senses, a smell I hadn’t been able to forget for weeks. A smell that made my knees weak and my core throb. A smell that was strong enough it could only mean he’d moved closer when I wasn’t paying attention. My eyelids popped open. Sure enough, he’d closed even more of that distance between us. “You aren’t supposed to be here,” I said accusingly. “I specifically asked if you were a local, and you said no.”
“You never asked me that.”
I let out a sarcastic laugh. “Oh, I absolutely did!” I knew that because it was the same thing I asked any and every man who caught my attention , because hooking up with a local was a huge, screaming N.O.
“No. You didn’t. I remember clearly, you asked: ‘Are you from here?’”
“Exactly!”
He arched a condescending brow as he continued. “And seeing as we were in a different town, I answered correctly. No, I wasn’t from that town. I’m from this one. Or, well, I was. Growing up. And I guess again, since I moved back.”
“From San Francisco,” I said, filling in the blanks in my mind, tiny little puzzle pieces suddenly clicking into place.
“That’s right. How did you—?” He broke off, realization finally dawning. “No,” he said on a long, drawn-out breath.
“Yep.”
“You’re Luna Copeland?”
“And you’re Nate. Georgia and Dezzy’s son.” Well, that’s just freaking perfect, I lamented silently.
He dropped one arm to his side, causing the stiff green file folder to smack against the side of his thigh as he raked his other hand through that thick, sandy hair that couldn’t decide if it wanted to be dark blond or light brown. It was the kind of hair that, given any time in the sun, would streak light all on its own.
“Jesus God,” he grunted as he moved to drop the folder on the desk that would—fingers crossed—soon be mine. “This is a fucking mess.”
I let out a small, uncertain laugh. “Yeah, well, it’ll definitely make working together a little awkward at first, but we’re both adults, right?”
The look on his face was one you’d expect to see if you’d suddenly sprouted a third eye out of the middle of your forehead or something. “Oh, that’s not going to happen.”
I rocked back on my affordable yet stylish heels that I’d picked up at Target a couple towns over. “What? Why not?”
He lifted his hands in a placating gesture. “I’m sorry, really, but I don’t think this is going to work.”
This couldn’t be happening. I wasn’t sure what I’d done to Karma in this life or a past one to piss her off so tremendously, but the vindictive bitch clearly had it out for me. My cheeks and neck heated with anger as my hands balled into fists at my side. “So, that’s it? You’re not even going to let me interview?”
“Look, I only agreed to the interview as a favor to my mom. It was never a guarantee.” Asshole, I thought bitterly. “I took a look at your résumé, and you aren’t exactly qualified. I mean, the last job you had was at that dive bar one town over.”
“Incorrect,” I seethed. “My last and current job is at Warren’s General Store. Obviously you didn’t look at my résumé close enough, or you would have seen that.” Okay, so maybe it wasn’t the strongest argument, but I was floundering, without a life raft in sight. I hadn’t realized until that very moment that I’d gotten my hopes up about this job. I needed it more than I was willing to admit to anyone, even myself.
“Well, work history aside, it’s pretty clear this situation would never work out.”
“Because we banged each other stupid for one night?” I asked incredulously, my voice rising higher with each word. “Are you kidding me?”
He went from cool and breezy to hard and caustic in a flash. “I’ve always considered it to be a good business practice not to dip one’s pen in the company ink, so to speak. And considering I know exactly what you feel like wrapped around my dick, I’d say we already crossed that bridge and burned it to the ground. You may not agree, but seeing as this is my business, my say is the only one that really matters. I’m sorry you wasted your time coming in here.”
I threw my head back with a sardonic “Oh my God. Were you this big of an egotistical asshole when we first met, or is it a new thing? Because there’s no way in hell I would have slept with you had I seen this side beforehand. Gotta say, Nate, it’s rather unattractive.”