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“The trickling eyes?”
“You bet.”
His urge to tease faded, and he touched her hand. “I got a little carried away last night. You’re all right, aren’t you?”
“More than all right. But thanks for asking.”
He stroked her palm with his fingertips, urged himself to tell her the truth right now . . . right this minute . . .
Believe me, I know more about getting around journalists than you can imagine.
He visualized those beautiful blue eyes—as blue as the sky on an American flag—clouding over when they heard what he really did for a living.
He reached across the table and touched the very tip of her finger. “Tonight . . . if things start going too fast for you, I want you to say something.”
?
?So you can stop?”
“Are you kidding? I want to hear you beg.”
She laughed, then slipped her hand under his and stroked his palm. A rush of heat shot through his bloodstream. He reminded himself that it wasn’t as if he’d been keeping this a secret from her for weeks. He’d learned who she was less than forty-eight hours ago.
“I didn’t know it could be like this.” Her voice held a husky note that no news footage had ever captured. “Lusty and crazy, but still funny.”
“It can be whatever we want it to be.”
“Sex has always seemed so serious to me.” She withdrew her hand. “So . . . difficult.”
He didn’t want to hear about her relationship with Case, not when he hadn’t told her the truth. “You probably shouldn’t tell me too many secrets.”
She didn’t like that. “What are the rules here, Mat? I don’t have your depth of experience with casual affairs.” Like the skilled politician she was, she’d leaned on the words so he’d feel their sting. “Maybe you’d better spell out what you want to say.”
“This doesn’t have anything to do with rules. It’s . . .” His deception was eating away at him, and he tried to ease into the subject. “What if you were to confide in me about something? Something you don’t want the world to know. Like the fact that you’re thinking about running for office.” Like the fact that your husband was gay, but he didn’t say that. “How do you know you can trust me to keep your secrets?”
“Because you would. You have the most overdeveloped sense of responsibility of anyone I know.” She surprised him by smiling. “You charge through life like a bull, butting at people with your horns, intimidating everybody with your size. You paw the ground, and snort at the wind, and roar at everybody who displeases you. But you always do the right thing. And because of that, I trust you.”
She was ripping a hole right through him. He had to tell her.
Her patrician nose shot back up in the air. “Are you afraid I’m going to attach more importance to last night than I should? I’m not that naive. I understand that this is only about sex.”
She’d finally given him a target to deflect his guilt, and he lowered his voice to a furious whisper. “What kind of talk is that from a woman who’s supposed to be this country’s moral beacon?”
“It’s realistic talk.”
He should be grateful that she understood how this kind of relationship worked, but he snapped at her instead. “Well, that just goes to show what you know. Now I suggest you eat the rest of that fish before it gets cold.”
He was the one who hadn’t touched his dinner, not her, but she didn’t call him on it. He forced himself to pick up his knife and cut a bite of steak. Just as determinedly, he turned the conversation in a less personal direction. She went along with him, but he suspected she was just biding her time.
They finished their dinner and declined dessert but not coffee. Just as he was taking his first sip, he felt the toe of her shoe stroke his calf.
“Are you going to take all night to drink that?” Her mouth curled in a smile that managed to be both mischievous and provocative.
He leaned back and let his eyes glide over her breasts just to give her a hard time. “What’s the hurry?”
“The hurry, big guy, is that I’ve decided it’s time for you to strut your stuff.”
He nearly devoured her on the spot, but somehow they managed to make it as far as the car. Then his hands were all over her, right there in the front seat of the Explorer.
