Offside (8 page)

“That’s a great idea,” he agreed.
“Perfect.”

“It’s not that
complicated.”

“I know.”

“Okay, then I should get
going.”

“No.” The word somehow just popped
out.

She paused and gave him the side
eye.

“Let’s get some dinner,” he suggested.
Fuck! What was he doing? All he knew was, he didn’t want her to
leave.

“Oh, I don’t think…”

“I’m hungry,” he said. “You probably
are too. Unless…you have other plans.” Christ, what if she had a
date?

“Well, I…” Her hesitation told him
what he needed to know.

“Great. I’ll see if we can get a table
in the restaurant.” He shoved back his chair without giving her a
chance to make up some excuse, and charged over to the hostess
station. A few words with the hostess and they were on the list for
the restaurant. “They said about ten minutes,” he told Honey back
at the table.

“Oh.” She held her purse on her lap as
if she was ready to bolt. “Matt…”

He sighed and put an elbow on the
table then set his forehead to his fist. “I know. Believe me, I
know every single reason we shouldn’t do this.” Without lifting his
head, he met her eyes. “What would you be doing if we weren’t
having dinner? Going out with some friends? Hitting some Beverly
Hills clubs?”

“I don’t do the club scene anymore,”
she said quietly. “And I don’t have many friends left in L.A. After
being away at college for a few years, we haven’t really stayed in
touch. Well, the truth is, they were never that great of friends to
begin with. So. To answer your question, I’d be doing what I do
most Friday nights lately―eating dinner on my couch in front of my
TV, possibly giving my eleven-year old neighbor a manicure, or
knitting.”

He lifted his head. “What the fuck?
Knitting?”

“Yeah.” The corners of her mouth
lifted. “Knitting. I took it up as a hobby when I was in therapy. I
really like it. It’s very…soothing.”

He gave his head a shake. “What do you
knit?”

“Lots of things.”

The waitress returned with their
drinks and he gratefully reached for the cold beer and took a big
gulp.

“When I started, I made a lot of
scarves,” she said, switching out her empty wine glass for the full
one. “Some very crooked scarves. And afghans. Then I learned how to
make mitts.”

“Not much call for mitts in
California,” he muttered.

“True. I donate them all to charity,
though, so they go where they’re needed. I’ve knitted socks, and
baby clothes, and I’ve actually made a few sweaters.”

This was fucking with his mind―the
image of Honey Holbrook, former wild child and half-naked
Mustang Magazine
model knitting baby booties.

“It’s good to have a hobby,” she said.
“What about you? Don’t you have some hobby you do in your spare
time?”

He took another big swallow of beer.
“Huh. Not for a while. My favorite activities are all pretty
physical.”

Their eyes locked again. And shit, he
could tell that their minds had both gone the same
direction.

“You know,” he said quickly.
“Swimming, water skiing, lifting weights. Beach
volleyball.”

“You used to like video
games.”

“Yeah. I still do, I guess. I got sick
of that when I was in the hospital and there wasn’t much else to
do. I was anxious to get moving again.”

“That must have been a hard
time.”

He nodded. “Knitting.
Jesus.”

She grinned. And fuck, the way it
illuminated her whole face, brown eyes lighting up, white teeth
flashing, made him feel like all the air had been sucked out of the
room. “You’re having a hard time with that, aren’t you?”

He smiled too. “I guess. Just having a
hard time picturing you back when you were nineteen sitting around
knitting socks.”

“Nineteen-year-old me wouldn’t have
done that,” she admitted. “And back then I did a lot of things I
wouldn’t do now.”

And once again, he was ninety-two per
cent sure they were remembering the same things she’d done. The
things they’d done together. Heat crawled up his chest, into his
neck and his face. And once again they sat with their eyes fastened
on each other.

“Heller party?”

He looked up at the hostess standing
next to his chair holding menus and wearing a bright smile.
“Yeah.”

“Your table is ready, if you’d like to
follow me.”

He let Honey precede him into the
restaurant, not so he could admire the rear view in the
slim-fitting black pants she wore, but because he was a gentleman.
Or at least he pretended to be a gentleman, because damn, he
was
looking. Her ass was fine.

Once seated, they opened their menus
and conversation was limited to discussing menu items and debating
choices.

“I’m starving,” he said, eyeing the
options. “I like all these small plates because you can try a bunch
of different things.” He looked at her over the top of his menu.
“You up for sharing some things?”

“Sure.”

They ended up ordering steak tartare,
dumplings made with portabella mushrooms, meatballs, poutine and
empanadas. “And some onion rings,” Matt added, closing his
menu.

“We’re never going to eat all that,”
Honey said, handing over her menu to the server.

“Sure we will. Okay, so now that I’ve
dealt with the whole knitting thing, back to what you’d usually be
doing on a Friday night. What did you say about your
neighbor?”

Honey smiled and the genuine fondness
in her expression did something to his chest. “Mia. She’s eleven.
She and her mom live across the hall from me. Farrah’s a single mom
and works two jobs, so somehow I ended up looking after Mia a few
days. We call it girls’ nights, though, because she thinks she’s
too old for a babysitter.”

He smiled. “That’s nice.”

“Well, before I started my job it was
nice. Now I haven’t been around during the day. But tomorrow I’m
taking her to the aquarium.”

“Cool. That sounds like
fun.”

“I hope.”

“What are you knitting right
now?”

She tipped her head. “Baby
clothes.”

He blinked.

“My sister-in-law is pregnant. James’s
wife.”

“He’s married?”

“Both my brothers are married.
Jonathan has two kids, and this will be James and Kortney’s second
as well. So I’ve made a baby blanket and a few little things…a
little hat and matching sweater and booties.”

“Baby clothes. Huh.”

“Don’t laugh at my hobby.”

“Was I laughing?” He held up his
hands. “No, I was not.”

“I get the feeling you want to. But
that’s okay.” She tossed her hair back and sat up straight. “I
enjoy it and that’s what matters.”

“I’m not…judging you. Christ. There’s
nothing wrong with knitting. I’m just surprised.”

“I’m getting that. Maybe I should knit
you a scarf.”

“I dare you.”

She tilted her head and the curve of
her lips made his heart rate speed up. “I dare you to wear
it.”

“I totally will wear it.”

And once more they both shifted into
that state of awareness, a hot haze settling around them as they
stared into each other’s eyes. Then his gaze dropped to her mouth,
that full lower lip and perfectly curved upper lip, and as he
watched, her lips parted. So fucking sexy. And he couldn’t stop
from lifting his hand and reaching across the table to brush his
fingertips beneath her chin and graze his thumb over her bottom
lip.

Her eyelids lowered as he rubbed her
mouth. His thumb pressed into the corner of her lips, then slid
back to the center of her lip and the tip of her tongue touched the
pad of his thumb.

His dick lengthened and thickened,
once more back to a nearly painful erection. His entire body
vibrated with sexual need. “Honey,” he whispered.

Her long eyelashes drifted up again
and she slowly drew back. He lowered his hand to the table. Once
again they sat mesmerized with each other, saying nothing for long,
heated moments.

“This is crazy,” she said, a
breathless quality to her voice.

“Fuck, yeah.”

“I haven’t felt this for a long time,”
she confessed.

He swallowed. “Me either.”

She gave a wry smile. “As if you
expect me to believe that. I know you’ve been with so many
girls.”

“You do, huh?” How did she know that?
Sure, stuff had been in the news and blogs, but he wasn’t that big
a superstar. You’d have to be
looking
for that kind of news.
He tipped his head to one side and studied her. “I’m not gonna deny
I’ve dated. A lot. Even had a couple of relationships. But what I
said is true, Honey. I haven’t felt like this for a long
time.”

Her eyes darkened to nearly
black.

“And I could say the same about you,”
he said quietly. “You’ve had a lot of guys in your
life.”

She slowly moved her head from side to
side. “Not for a long time.”

He stretched his hand out and found
hers resting on the table. “What are we going to do about
this?”

“I don’t know. Honestly, Matt.
I’m…confused. Conflicted.”

“Yeah. I know. Christ, me
too.”

“I’ve made so many mistakes. With
guys. I don’t want to do that again.”

“You think I’m a mistake?”

“Last time…I thought you were, yeah,”
she confessed.

Shit. He knew he’d screwed up
then.

“At this point in my life, I think any
guy is a mistake. There’s so much I’m still working on, not the
least of which is my new job.”

“I get that.” His fingers moved over
hers. “I’ve got shit going on too. I need to get back playing. I
want to prove I can do it. I was playing great before I got injured
and I want to get back to that. So. Let’s just…have some
fun.”

She regarded him cautiously. “I think
I’ve made mistakes having fun too.”

He nodded in acknowledgment of that
astounding understatement. “But you have to have
some
fun.”

“I do have fun.”

Was she afraid to live now? He rubbed
a hand across his mouth. “What time are you going to the
aquarium?”

Her eyes widened. “Um. Mia’s mom is
dropping her off at one o’clock. Why?”

“That’s such a coincidence,” he said,
releasing her hand and leaning back in his seat. “I was planning to
go to the aquarium tomorrow at one o’clock.”

Chapter Six

Honey and Mia approached the aquarium
at the Santa Monica Pier Saturday afternoon. The day was lovely,
bright but with a cool breeze that tugged at the big scarf Honey’d
wound around her neck with a fitted black Lululemon jacket and
T-shirt that she wore over jeans.

A man pushed away from the railing
that edged the walk to the doors and moved toward them.
Matt.

Was she really going to let this
happen?

Judging from the way her heart bumped
in her chest and her insides went all soft at seeing him, the
answer was yes.

When he’d made that comment last night
over dinner about planning to go to the aquarium, she’d known what
he was doing. She hadn’t protested or argued. Maybe she should
have. Maybe she should have changed her plans with Mia, except
she’d already promised the girl they were going and she couldn’t
bring herself to disappoint Mia.

After dinner last night, Matt had
walked her to her car and said good night to her. They’d stood
there for a pulsing moment in the dark, looking at each other,
every nerve ending in her body screaming with the need for his
touch. But neither of them made a move toward each other, not even
a kiss or peck on the cheek.

It left her feeling…unsettled.
Grateful. Relieved. Disappointed. A whole skein of tangled emotions
that she had trouble picking apart and had thought a lot about,
lying in her bed in the dark that night.

He hadn’t asked her out on a date or
anything. He hadn’t given her a chance to say no. He hadn’t put any
moves on her other than touching her face and her hand. Sexual
awareness had shimmered between them all evening though. They were
both aware of it.

You have to have some fun.

She hadn’t had fun for a long time.
For her, having fun was synonymous with getting into trouble,
getting unwanted media attention and getting in trouble with her
parents. She’d been a serious student at college, rarely
socializing. Most of the other students were younger than her
anyway.

But there were definitely times she
felt lonely. Could she go out with Matt (and Mia) and just have
fun?

Now he stood in front of her wearing
jeans, like her and Mia, and a thick Condors hoodie that made him
look even more boyish. But the way the faded jeans clung to his
hips and the bulge at his groin, and the shadow of stubble on his
cheeks and jaw were all man. His smile was wide and engaging. “Hey,
Honey. Imagine meeting you here.”