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“They’re trying to,” Sam said, his hand finding her elbow. “How about I give you a call later.”
“Oh, I can wait until you’re done here. I just have the teensiest favor to ask.”
Sam blanched. No doubt remembering the last favor she’d asked of him.
She gave him a look. You wish.
“I think we’ve got everything we need for the new labels,” Adam said, clamping a hand on Sam’s shoulder and moving away. “We won’t keep you from this pretty lady any longer.”
Riley let her eyelashes flutter. “You’re sweet, but don’t get the wrong idea. Sammy and I here are just old friends. He’s like my brother.”
She saw his eyebrows creep up.
“Oh yeah?” Rob asked, looking at Riley with fresh appreciation now that she was no longer the boss’s woman. “You know, I can wait a few minutes if you want someone to walk you?”
Sam snorted. “Trust me on this one, Rob. If Riley accompanies you to the subway stop, you’ll be the one needing an escort.”
Riley merely gave a demure smile. “Thanks for the offer, but I’ve made this trek a million times.”
“A million, huh?” Sam asked quietly in her ear. “Where was I the other nine hundred ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine times?”
She ignored him, brushing past him without actually making contact before ushering Rob and the other guys out the door with a promise that she’d absolutely make sure that Sam would eat, but no, she wasn’t at all sure that it would improve his disposition.
Then they were alone.
A month earlier, they would have been circling each other and trying to ignore the sexual tension in the room.
A week earlier they’d have been all over each other, embracing that sexual tension.
And this time … the sexual tension was behind them.
At least that’s what she was letting him believe.
“How’s your mom?” she asked, following him to his bar, where he’d retreated the minute the other men had left.
“Good. Better. I talked to Carl—that’s her boyfriend—yesterday, and she’s at home resting. All of her tests came back fine.”
“I’m glad.” His hands never stopped their cocktail making even as he studied her. He twisted the top off a jar of cherries, plucking one out with a toothpick and handing it to her before dropping one into each cocktail glass.
She let the silence last for several seconds before she forged ahead with the plan. “I came to apologize.”
Nothing. Not even a surprised blink.
“Aren’t you going to say anything?” she asked.
He held her gaze for several more seconds before shrugging. “Let’s just say that over the years, I’ve learned that any Riley McKenna ‘apology’ is best received with a helmet.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because I’m finding that as much as you like to pretend you’re a straight shooter, nothing’s simple when it comes to you and men.”
She leaned forward, helping herself to another cherry from the open jar. “Sounds to me like you’re calling me manipulative.”
“It does, doesn’t it?”
Riley shrugged. “Well, let’s just say hell’s frozen over and this apology is for real. Now that I’ve had some time to think about it, I’m mortified about the other night. Seriously.”
“By which part?” He poured the dark brown liquid into each glass. “The fact that you were going to sleep with a man for th
