“Oh,” she said.
Right. I took a deep breath and tried to figure this out. It didn’t work. “So why are you trying to get rejected?”
“Because I’m a wuss. It’s, um, exposure therapy.”
I started to put the pieces together. “Exposure to being rejected.”
“Or, um, humiliated. Like if you’d laughed in my face or something. If I didn’t die from embarrassment—”
“It would be easier to get rejected the next time? That’s like saying you should bang your head against the wall because it will feel good when you stop.”
Her mouth tightened a bit as she processed that. Then she squared her shoulders. Uh-oh. Fighting stance. “Look, there’s no way you can understand this, but some of us struggle to be strong. To, you know, speak up and stuff. I’m trying to find my voice. And realizing that rejection doesn’t kill anyone is part of the process.”
“So you go around asking celebrities out, just so they’ll say no?”
She flushed and looked away. “That was Rachel’s idea.”
“Oh no.” I grabbed her chin lightly and tugged her gaze back to mine. “You did it, not her. Tell me why.”
“Because you were supposed to turn me down.” Her voice came out as a breathy whisper, and her eyes were huge, liquid pools. She was just so damn beautiful that it hurt a little to look straight at her. Sure, the media machine always had me with dramatic women. Flashy, sequined bodies with wild makeup and very short skirts. But that’s because those were the baseball babes who strutted around the media circus. They were easy, and they never wanted anything more than their picture in the paper and maybe a night of sexual antics. My fantasy women always had big, honest eyes and freckles on an apple-pie face. And a mouth that was plump and tasty.
And then…hell…I took a whiff. Jesus, could she get any more perfect?
“Are you wearing apple perfume?”
“What? No. Chanel or Burberry or something. Rachel had it.”
“I smell apples.”
Her mouth dropped open in shock. And there I was staring at that lush, wet center and thinking filthy thoughts.
“It’s my lip gloss,” she said. “Apple strudel.”
Of course it was. And I was supposed to treat this as a hands-off date? Who was she kidding?
“So this was an exercise in getting rejected, but I didn’t say no.”
“You were supposed to.”
“I didn’t.” I was waiting, trying to get her to say yes. To anything. I just wanted to hear the word on her lips. I wanted to remember it in my fantasies after this night ended in old-fashioned blue balls.
“No, you didn’t.”
Damn. Maybe it was time to take a different tack. “Well, your experiment failed. So maybe we can change the rules of this evening? Maybe—”
“No.”
Still not the word I was waiting for. “Why not? I said yes.”
She took a deep breath. It shuddered into her as if she was trying to settle her nerves. And then she gently—make that firmly—pushed me away from her. I hadn’t even realized I’d gotten that close, practically pressing her backward into the seat. But she put a single hand on my shoulder and nudged me. Any gentleman would slide away. Too bad I wasn’t a gentleman, even if I was with a good girl on an old-fashioned date.
I forced myself to draw back. But then I caught her hand and kept it on my shoulder. If I couldn’t smell that apple strudel from this distance, I sure as hell was going to keep hold of her slender fingers.
Meanwhile, she squared her shoulders, and I was distracted by cleavage again. Then she set down the rules.
“There will be no sex. No kissing. This experiment isn’t just about me getting rejected. It’s about me standing up for myself. For saying what I think, despite the consequences.”
“And you think we shouldn’t kiss?”
