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“The little woman could be waiting at home for you,” he suggests with a grin.

“Sure, she’d be waiting at home for me, then ask me for every detail so she can put them in one of her books. You got to know her. Do you honestly think the two of us can work when we are polar opposites?”

That, he can’t argue with. “Who am I to tell you what to do? It’s not like I have a successful track record with women.”

We fall into a miserable silence, broken only by the crackling of the flames behind him. “Aren’t you glad you called?” I ask, making him chuckle.

“Watch your back out there.” That’s as close to brotherly affection as we’re going to get, but I take it, then gladly end the call before he thinks of a new way to needle me.

After changing into slacks and a button-down, I head to the restaurant off the hotel lobby for a drink. One last desperate attempt to get out of my own head for a while.

I’m still replaying Theo’s unsolicited advice in my head by the time I reach the rectangular bar set in the center of the restaurant. Whatever it does to my expression must be pretty fucking alarming, since the girl currently pouring a glass of red wine looks at me like I’m the bogeyman.

“Lagavulin. Neat.” I take a seat, scanning the room. A few people sit alone. Business travelers, like me, though I doubt we’re in the same line of business. Mostly, though, there are couples seated together. Some invade the hell out of each other’s personal space, including one couple practically performing a tonsillectomy on each other in a corner booth.

“There is a line between romance and showing off, isn’t there?”

I turn my head at the soft female voice to my left. There’s humor in that voice, something wry and knowing.

She’s dressed in an outfit that brings the word corporate to mind, but she’s found a way to soften it with a silk scarf around her neck and a soft cashmere cardigan over her dress instead of a blazer. She has a warm smile and a coy wink. “Kind of wish I was that young again,” she jokes before her attention swings back to the couple searching their throats for any last bit of food.

“You don’t look all that old,” I offer.

“Isn’t that nice of you to say?” She bats her eyelashes and chuckles, tucking sleek chocolate-brown hair behind her ear. “In town for business?”

“How could you tell?”

“Sitting alone at a hotel bar. You aren’t obviously trying to pick up anybody, so you didn’t swing by hoping to get lucky tonight.” She has a wicked grin when she shines it on me now before sipping her white wine. “Am I wrong?”

She’s interesting. Beautiful, for sure, with gray eyes that almost look blue in the right light.

But not blue enough.

“You aren’t wrong,” I admit, making her chuckle. “I am in town on business. What about you?” Because conversation is better than sitting in a room so quiet, I can hear everything going on in the rooms to either side.

“Business,” she admits with a sigh. “Sales. All these hotels are starting to look the same.”

“I know what you mean.” When the bartender eyes my glass, lifting her brows, I shake my head. I know my limits.

“And he’s disciplined,” the stranger next to me murmurs approvingly. “You’re a very interesting person, Mr. . . .”

“Johnson,” I reply, giving her the name I registered under. “Ben.”

“A pleasure, Ben Johnson. Miranda Scott.” Her hand slides against mine in a quick shake. She has a firm, steady grip, not the grip of a woman doing her best to be seductive. Though, as it turns out, there’s something about that attitude that is seductive anyway. Different. She probably knows it, working in sales. If you want to outperform your opponent, you can’t operate the way they do. She’s found her niche the way I’ve found mine, probably practicing this routine in every hotel bar from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

Still, she’s interesting. Intelligent. Nice body. She could be the distraction I need tonight.

The idea leaves me feeling empty. Dissatisfied. Which is why instead of following her lead and suggesting we take this elsewhere, I drain what’s left in my glass, then offer her a brief smile before standing. “It was nice to meet you, Miranda, but I have a very early morning ahead of me. I hope the rest of your trip goes well.”

It’s clear she’s disappointed, eyes narrowing momentarily before she shrugs. “Have a good one.”

I’m probably the world’s biggest asshole for leaving a sure thing behind. Theo would laugh his ass off if he knew I turned her down. Hell, I would laugh at him if the roles were reversed.

She ruined me. End of story. I’ll never go back to being who I was in the moments before I boarded that plane, thinking I was coming back from a job as usual, that nothing would alter the familiar patterns my life had fallen into. I’ll never be that man again, and I have June to blame—or thank, depending on how I look at it.

She made me forget how much I used to love solitude, which might be the most unforgivable aspect of all this.

I’ll check her social media one more time tonight.