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MGM’s eyes widen, and he seems to have trouble swallowing his bubbly.
“I take it you told him about our previous encounter.” I can’t suppress the evil little smirk curling the corner of my mouth. “Only good things, I hope?”
“Of course. By the way, I need to thank you for the other day…”
“Oh, and for what?”
MGM unleashes a smile on me that’s sinfully charming. I should turn on my heels and run. Run as far away from him as possible. But my stilettos, for as little surface they have in contact with the floor, seem glued to the spot.
“For introducing me to the best pizza New York has to offer,” he says.
So the man has a sense of humor and can take a joke. This new tidbit of info is more alarming than reassuring. As is the silly smile now pulling at my lips.
“Go figure, a pretty face and possessed with self-irony.”
He places a hand over his chest. “Only pretty? I’m deeply wounded.”
Ignoring the comment, I raise my glass to him. “You’re welcome, Mr. Mercer.”
“You can call me Gabriel.”
Nuh-uh, even his name is too darn sexy. “I’ll stick with formal titles.”
“Why?”
“Less risk of confusion. If you’ll excuse me.” I point with my glass to the main room. “I have some friends I’d like to say hello to.” A total lie. I barely know anyone at this party. But it’s a self-preserving move to get away from the six-foot-four wall of testosterone in a tux.
MGM has other ideas. He gently grabs my wrist, causing a wave of molten lava to flow through my spinal cord from my nape to my tailbone. “Leaving me already? I was looking forward to having a more even conversation with you.”
“Even how?”
“One where we know each other’s names.”
I regain control of my hand, not without consequences. The brush of his fingertips on my skin as I pull away makes both my arms break into goosebumps. “Ah, Mr. Mercer, I’m sure you’re used to having women fall at your feet, but I’m not interested in furthering our acquaintance. I wish you a wonderful evening.”
I clink my glass into his and make my way down the hall, leaving him standing behind me like a lump.
9
GABRIEL
After Blake oh-so-politely brushes me off, the night becomes point-a-revolver-to-my-temple-and-pull-the-trigger boring.
I don’t know what’s worse: that she’s avoiding me or that she’s having fun in the meantime. She has a warm smile for everyone she speaks with, while I’m banished behind a wall of wariness. And can I blame her after the stunt I pulled the other day?
Despite my best efforts, she’s as hard to track across the museum as a rogue snowflake in a storm. Everywhere I go, she seems to be there at a different moment.
So I do what I do best.
I watch.
And I wait.
And try to avoid all the ancient chatterboxes who all seem more than eager to share with me their hip-replacement horror stories. I retreat to a less crowded room—hide would be a more appropriate word—to be left alone with my thoughts. Relentless, they revolve around the woman who’s been on my mind since I first laid eyes on her the other day. Not the girl I thought I’d met in her father’s office. But the grown woman with killer blue eyes and an attitude problem.
I’m considering whether I should just give up and leave when I catch a streak of silver pass before the door. I follow it like a hound with the scent of prey in his nostrils and find Blake confabulating with a security guard who, after they’re done talking, nods and blares instructions into his radio—probably alerting the valet to bring her car around.
Miss Avery is trying to sneak off early. Suits me just fine.
