Page 59 of To Have and to Stalk
His gaze sharpened into something intense. “If you’ll excuse me.”
He stood up, placing the soft black napkin on the table. I watched him walk away, until he disappeared into the shadows of the restaurant.
It wasn’t that my job didn’t pay well, but I had a bunch of student loans, and academia wasn’t exactly known for being lucrative.
And this would severely eat into my book budget.
I wrung my hands, pressing my thumb into my palm over and over again. Grateful I could hide the nervous habit under the table.
I felt like I needed to have questions prepared for when he returned.How did you get into accounting? What are your hobbies? Why are you looking for random sex with a stranger?
Less than two minutes later, he sat back down.
“Sorry about that.” The stone in his countenance had vanished, replaced again by that jock-like unseriousness. He picked up the black napkin, eyes sparkling with something playful.
Thatdamneye contact.
“So…no strings attached, strictly casual?” He repeated my profile like a question, and I nodded. “Why?”
I wasn’t sure of the proper way to answer that question. Telling him my last relationship was so bad I didn’t trust myself in another seemed like a bit much for night one.
I shrugged. “Just what works for my life right now.”
He nodded, like that was a perfectly acceptable answer.
“Tell me exactly what you want to happen tonight,” he said—no, commanded. It galvanized my spine, and some deep core part of me sparked online, urging me to give in to the authority in his voice.
At the same time, another part of me refused to give in so easily.
“You read my profile,” I said. “You know what I want.”
My response seemed to embolden him. He leaned forward. Smiling. That dimple popping again. Eyes blade sharp.Hungry.
“What you want requires trust. We haven’t even received our appetizers.”
I took a drink. “I’m not some shrinking violet.”
Calder laughed, adjusting the napkin in his lap. When he spoke, it was under his breath. “Yeah. I know.” Before I could speak on that, his blue gaze flashed back to mine, guarded. “You need to be careful, Shay.”
I ignored the way he said my name, all rough-edged. The promise in it. Instead, I reached for my water, bringing the cool glass to my lips.
“It’s a bit early to be ordering me around,” I said. “Like you said, we haven’t even received our appetizers.”
That earned me another dimple-popping smile. I set my drink down, insides incandescent.
Then the appetizers arrived.
Two waiters set down plates and plates of food. It barely fit on the round table. Crisp bread with burrata, balsamic vinegar, and basil. Pears stuffed with cheese and crumbled walnuts. Something golden fried, with cream and greens on top. What appeared to be some kind of beet dish.
It smelleddivine.
“Do you like spanking?” he asked, slicing the fried golden thing in half.
I coughed up the sip of water I’d taken. “What?”
He balanced the half on his fork, placing it on my plate.
“If you won’t tell me what you want,” he said, doing the same with one of the pears. “Tell me what you don’t. What are your boundaries?”
