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“I’m just teasing.” She offered him a tight smile, squeezing his hand for a second. “So, if you’re all partnered up now, does that mean you’re buying a house soon?”
“I haven’t found one yet, but once I do…” He saluted her with his glass. “Then I’ll buy my home.”
She wanted to dislike him for that.
For having himself together like that.
God, some weeks she was lucky if she had enough in her account for groceries. But the way he’d explained it, and the fact that he refused to live off his parents’ money, made her like him even more. “What do your parents do?”
“Dad’s a judge in a small town. Mom’s a doctor.” He finished off his champagne and set his empty glass aside. “There are whispers we’re descendants of Alexander Hamilton, but we can’t prove it through the family tree yet. Too much was lost in the civil war.”
“I…” She swallowed. “Wow.”
He pushed his hair back, watching her as she took a sip of her drink. “How about you? Are you related to Thomas Jefferson?”
She choked on her champagne, covering her mouth. When she managed to swallow it and not die in the process, she waved a hand in front of her face, gasping for breath. “Oh my God. That’s a good one.”
His lips quirked. “It wasn’t meant to be a joke.”
“Well, it was.” She set her drink down, half finished. “My parents aren’t even remotely like yours. They live in a small town in Tennessee, and they’re definitely not related to a past president. In fact, my Dad is new to the country. He came over from England during college and fell in love with my mom. He’s a professor at the University of Tennessee, and she’s the manager of a tiny bank that’s barely a blip on the radar of banks.”
“They sound nice,” he said.
And he meant it.
She could see the sincerity in his eyes.
“They are.”
“What brought you here to Atlanta, then?” he asked, leaning in, watching her like he actually cared about the answer. “Why not stay in Tennessee with your nice parents?”
“A guy brought me here,” she answered honestly, because why the heck not? There was no reason to hide her stupidity from him. “And then he promptly left me.”
He frowned. “Then he’s a fool.”
She shrugged. “The way I see it, I’m the fool, not him.”
“Then we’ll have to agree to disagree, because any man that has
you and lets you go is a damn idiot in my book.” He rested a hand on her knee. “Why not go home?”
“Because I refused to lose.” She lifted her chin. “I don’t like losing.”
“Neither do I.” He locked eyes with her. There was an energy, a bolt of something, between them, and it was terrifying and electrifying, all at once. “Shelby…”
She swallowed, saying nothing.
This date wasn’t going the way she planned. He was, indeed, showing her that he wasn’t the man she’d thought he was. And that wasn’t a good thing.
If she wasn’t careful, she’d start liking him…
And she’d forget to make him dislike her.
Chapter Five
Shelby squinted at the menu, pulling it closer to her face, and made a contemplating sound as she read it. She’d been doing this for five minutes now, after doing the same with her cocktail menu, and the beer menu, too, before finally asking for a peach martini with house vodka. All night long, she’d been slow to answer, slower to choose, and even slower to commit to anything.
If she were anyone else, it would have driven him fucking insane.
