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“Really?” I growled. “Do you even know what no means? What else do you ignore from women when they tell you no?”
“Mi reina,” he crooned with a leer, clutching his heart as he stopped about ten feet away. “You wound me. I don’t think I deserve such treatment.”
His act was so fake I rolled my eyes. “Well, you’ve been lying to me since the moment we met,” I countered. “Do you think I deserve that kind of treatment?”
“But you have the truth now. So…” He spread his arms wide and was back to smiling and causing half the petals on the daffodils to fall off their stems. “¿Te gusta?”
“No!” I cried. “I don’t like.”
“Only because you haven’t tried me on for size yet,” he challenged. Then his jaw hardened and eyes flared with angry resolve. “Then you’ll change your mind. I am a hell of a guy, I tell you.”
Setting my hands on my hips, I shook my head and sighed. How was I going to shake this man? His persistence might’ve been flattering if it weren’t for one—okay, three—small details: he was too full of himself for my taste, I knew all this wasn’t really because of me at all, and his attention was turning a little too scary for my taste.
“Fine,” I grumbled, arching him a severe glance. “You name one thing about me that you like, and I might consider a date with you.”
Might meaning no way in hell, but he didn’t have to know that.
His eyes lit with delight, and he heaved in a deep breath as if he had a whole list of things to babble on about. So I lifted a finger to stop him before he could even start. “Something not physical,” I added for good measure.
And just like that, his shoulders sagged as his face fell.
He looked good and truly stumped. Not a single thing came to mind.
Wow, was I that unremarkable personality-wise?
Always lovely to learn.
“Well, there you have it,” I told him, lifting a miserable hand as I proved my point. “This…” After motioning to the alleyway around us, I turned back to him. “Has nothing to do with me specifically. You have absolutely no regard for me as a person at all.”
He opened his mouth to argue, so I rushed to add, “It’s all about the chase to you. So please, go find a girl who actu
ally wants to be caught. It’ll end far better for you that way, I promise.”
Cocking his head to the side as if he didn’t understand my English, he frowned a moment before answering, “Unless you do want to be caught.”
I narrowed my eyes. “But I don’t.”
“Unless you do,” he repeated, grinning mischievously.
Oh, for the love of God.
“Except I really fucking don’t,” I declared, making him frown as if he were tempted to physically force me to change my mind.
I fisted my hands down at my sides, ready to brawl if he got physical, when I noticed someone pass the entryway to the alley behind him. The other person glanced toward us, only to pause, backtrack, and then start our way a second later.
I focused on the newcomer, only to start in surprise when I realized who was joining us.
“What?” I blurted.
At first, I merely blinked, certain I was seeing things, because what in the world would he be doing here? The stench of garbage must be messing with my head and making me see hallucinations, because there was no earthly reason for me to ever cross paths with this guy again.
But he just kept growing more visible and larger the closer he came. I definitely wasn’t seeing things. Squinting at him, I shook my head slowly. “What the hell?”
Diego glanced over. When he caught sight of the approaching man, he puffed out his chest noticeably as if he’d just sniffed competition. Then he scowled at me accusingly. “Do you know this man?”
I frowned at him, ready to tell him to butt out of my business, except the expression on his face told me how threatened he felt by the newcomer, which made me think, hmm.
As soon as the idea bloomed, I ran with it, acting before I could fully reason everything through.
