Love the One You're With (14 page)

“Well, I'm just worried that things might be getting out of hand. I mean, there was that first date when I made the mistake of thinking our connection was real.…”

It
was,
damn it. It was real
.

“And then there was the second date,” she continued, “where everyone knew where your mind was …”

He held up an objecting finger to that. “Because you played me, even though your mind was just as much in the gutter as mine—”

“The point is,” Grace interrupted, “we seem to be doing a lot of playing each other, and it seems to be less about the magazine and more about …”

She stopped short of saying us, but it was written all over her face.

He knew why she was trying to put a stop to it. There shouldn't be an
us
beyond the story. And yet that kiss … the chemistry …

“So what are you saying? You think we should stop all this after two dates? Because we agreed to five …”

“Someone else could take over,” she blurted out. “My friend Julie is a pro at this kind of stuff. In fact, up until a few months ago, this sort of dating how-to was her full-time gig.”

“I know Julie,” he said shortly. “And I have absolutely no interest in dating
her
.”

Her eyes went wide, and he realized what his emphasis had implied.

“For the magazine,” he amended quickly. God, this was fucking messy. “Look, Grace, it's just three more dates. We can keep them casual.”

Her eyes locked on his, and he saw her gaze go slightly soft. It was then that he registered what was different about her. Her hair was down around her shoulders. He'd only ever seen it pulled back in a no-nonsense style. This version of her was more gentle. More vulnerable.

He wanted to get to know this version.

“Have dinner with me,” he said. “Let's see this through.”

Their eyes held, neither one daring to question aloud what he meant by this.

“I don't know, Jake.…”

“Just one dinner, and if I don't behave myself, I'll concede the competition. I'll lie, and declare that I was so smitten by you that I couldn't think straight.”

Except it might not be a lie
.

“So if you
do
behave yourself and you write the article,” she said, “then what will you say? If date one was about first impressions and date two was about reading each other's physical attraction, what's date three going to be?”

He stood and went around to her side of the desk. “Come on. You write for
Stiletto
's
Relationships section. You must know how important the third date is.”

Doubt flitted across her classic features. “You do remember that I've spent the past eight years in a relationship with one guy? The last third date I went on involved a study group in the Cornell library.”

His eyes skimmed her face, feeling absurdly pleased that he wasn't one in a long string of guys, even though right now he sort of hated the bastard who'd been lucky enough to have her for so long, only to hurt her.

Jake reached out a hand to touch a strand of silky hair.

He wanted to kiss her. Damn it to hell. He wanted to bury his fingers in her hair. Hell, he wanted to lift her on to the desk and bury himself in her.

“I've already told you I'm not interested in dating anyone right now,” she said quietly. “And I know this thing between you and me is only for the story, but I'm having a hard time keeping everything sorted—”

“Have dinner with me, Grace.” His voice was husky and he didn't care. “I want to take you to dinner. Story be damned.”

There was a loud throat clearing from the door, and Jake jumped at the interruption.

He looked up and glared. “How long have you been standing there?”

Cole Sharpe gave him a knowing grin before entering the office and helping himself to Jake's coffee drink. “Long enough, my friend. Long enough.”

And that was how every single one of
Oxford
's and
Stiletto
's Twitter followers learned that Jake Malone had begged—
begged
—Grace Brighton to go to dinner with him. Straight from one of
Oxford
's own employees.

Grace wouldn't admit it out loud even if someone paid her, but she had no idea what made Jake Malone tick. Like, none.

The man had taken Cole's public pronouncement that Jake was hot and heavy for Grace with a fair amount of dignity, and Grace thought for
sure
she had the upper hand … for all of about two days.

Right up until the moment Jake climbed into the backseat of her cab following Alex Cassidy's birthday celebration at a trendy West Village gastropub.

She glared at him as he closed the door behind him, although the glare lacked heat. Jake's presence in her life was becoming both increasingly comfortable, in that they'd developed an easy rapport with each other, sometimes seeming to know what the other person was going to say before it was said.

But at the same time, there was nothing easy between them. Because she couldn't look at him without her fingers itching to tear at the buttons of his shirt. And from the way he always found ways to touch her when they were in the same room, she didn't think she was the only one who was finding their platonic “game” to be sexually frustrating.

“This cab-crashing habit of yours is going to get you into trouble. Someday you're going to jump into a cab with a woman who has pepper spray, and then you'll be sorry.”

“Where are we going?” he asked, ignoring her threat.

“
I'm
going to my place. I have no idea where you're going. But I'm happy to drop
you
off at the local dive bar. Someplace where I'm sure some classy broad won't mind you feeling her up uninvited.”

As she spoke, she halfheartedly removed his hand from her knee, when what she
really
wanted to do was curl into him.

Don't you dare
, 2.0 insisted.

Grace sighed, because 2.0 was becoming a serious,
serious
pain in her ass.

He didn't leave your side the entire time at the party
, 1.0 shot back.
He
likes
you
.

With a roll of her eyes, 2.0 replied,
It's his job to like you. Literally. As in, his boss is
paying him to court you and then tell the world about it
.

2.0 was right, of course. but 1.0 was also right. Jake
hadn't
left her side. And she hadn't left his as they mingled among mutual friends.

And in the two hours they'd been there, neither one of them had mentioned anything having to do with the website.

Which hadn't stopped anybody
else
from mentioning it. There'd been plenty of winks and elbowing and
Where's the hidden camera?
But she'd had the strange feeling of camaraderie with Jake all evening. For longer than that, really. As though they were on the same side. The
only
two on their side.

And then there'd been that moment when he'd accidentally-on-purpose let his fingers play over her palm and she'd almost dragged him by his tie into the coat closet.

All because he'd touched her hand.

No wonder 2.0 kept hollering at her to watch her back.

“Don't worry, I'm not inviting myself over,” Jake said, resting his head against the back of the seat and closing his eyes. Grace watched his face in the shadows, grateful, for once in her life, for the traffic jam that was New York City. They were going nowhere fast, and for all her posturing about dropping him off, and her certainty that under no circumstances should she invite him up to her place, the pathetic truth was that she just liked spending time with this man.

However she could get it.

With his eyes closed and his features relaxed, Jake looked every bit as classically handsome as when he was smiling and vibrant, despite the purple shadows under his eyes. But there was something else there too.

There was a loneliness about him that made her ache. As though he held himself just a little apart from everyone else, but only revealed this solitude in repose.

“You look tired,” she heard herself say softly.

He smiled without opening his eyes. “A woman would slap you for such words.”

“One of those double standards, I'm afraid. I'm guessing you can handle it.”

“I haven't been sleeping much,” he said, opening his eyes briefly when their cabby honked futilely at the unmoving taillights in front of him.

“How come?” she asked, resisting the urge to touch him. To soothe.

“Got a woman on my mind,” he said, in a bad imitation of a cowboy voice.

“Just one?” she teased.

He turned his head to face her, his eyes locking on hers. The answer was written all over his face, and Grace's mouth went dry.

“Oh.”

His gaze dropped to her mouth. “If I kiss you, will you write about it?”

“Do you want me to write about it?”

“Do you want me to kiss you?”

The gauntlet had been thrown down. And Grace could either run from it and let her massive amount of man issues push him away, or she could …

And then there was no more thinking as they both reached for each other, their mouths meeting hungrily, her fingers tangling in his hair as his hands found her waist.

Dimly Grace thought of the cab driver and the free show he was getting, but for the first time in her life, she didn't care about being proper or appropriate. She didn't care that her mother would probably faint at the thought of her daughter indulging in a PDA, and she didn't care that kissing Jake
definitely
violated her no-man rule.

She only cared about the way his lips fit perfectly over hers, the way his tongue slid against hers in hot, lingering strokes. One of his arms pulled her closer, his fingers splaying over the small of her back, his hand hot through the thin fabric of her dress.

He broke away only long enough to nudge her chin to the side so he had access to her neck, and if they hadn't fogged up the windows before, they did now, because the hot, wet kisses against her neck were just about the best thing she'd felt in way too long.

Grace tugged at Jake's hair, bringing his mouth back to hers as the cab started moving again. She poured herself into the kiss, and had his hands not held her waist steady, she would have crawled on top of him to get closer, dignity be damned.

It was Jake who came to his senses first, gently pulling her back, although his heavy breathing told her he didn't set her aside easily. “We're here.”

“What?” she asked, already loathing the separation.

He smiled. “We're at your apartment.”

Oh.
Oh
. Mortified to realize that they were parked outside her building—had possibly been parked for quite some time—Grace adjusted her skirt even as she fumbled for her wallet.

And she absolutely
refused
to glance at the rearview mirror. No way could she meet this
cab driver's eyes.

Jake put a warm hand over hers. “I've got this. I'll pay him after he takes me back to my place.”

Grace was both relieved and disappointed that he didn't even make a token effort to prolong their evening. What would she have said if he'd asked to come up?

Then she pictured Jake peeling her dress over her head. His hand finding her bra clasp, his lips finding her—

“Grace?”

“Right,”
she breathed. “Right.”

She reached for the door handle. “Goodnight.”

His eyes roamed her face, his expression more serious than she would have expected. He opened his mouth, and for a second she thought he was going to ask to come up after all. She held her breath.

Then the cabbie made some impatient muttering noise, and the moment slid away, Jake's soft expression disappearing behind his usual easy smile. “Night, Brighton.”

That wasn't her heart sinking at his flippant tone. Really, it wasn't.

“Malone,” she said, keeping her voice cheeky rather than longing. At that, 2.0 breathed a sigh of relief. “You should work on your kissing technique.
Stiletto
has a few articles you could read. I'll email you.”

She heard his chuckle even as she got out of the cab and closed the door with a saucy wink as her farewell.

Grace refused to turn around and stare after the cab, but when she felt her phone vibrate, she let herself get her hopes up that it would be a text message from Jake.

She wasn't disappointed.

You seemed to like my technique just fine
.

She rolled her eyes as she typed her response.
Cocky
.

He wrote back immediately.
Maybe. Horny? Definitely
.

Grace was smiling as she started to slide her phone back into her purse, but then it buzzed again and she wasn't smiling so much as swooning at his next message.

I can't stop thinking about you
.

She stopped walking altogether, not caring that she was blocking the entrance into her
building, causing the man behind her to shoot an annoyed glance her way.

She bit her lip, debating prudence over honesty. The latter won.
I can't stop thinking about you either
.

Again, his lightning-fast response.
We're in trouble, huh?

Grace didn't need 2.0 to confirm. They were
definitely
in trouble.

Neither wrote about the kiss.

But that didn't stop the whole HeSaidSheSaid battle from escalating to full-on combat.
Public
combat.

It started when both
Stiletto
's and
Oxford
's online teams put links to the new website on their respective home pages.

Harmless enough. Until a couple of the local newspapers picked up the back-and-forth of HeSaidSheSaid as well, touting it as a battle of the sexes, blog-style.