Victoria Dahl - Lead Me On

“I will not be my mother,” she insisted to the computer screen. “I will not be my mother.” The computer stared her down. “Screw you,” she snapped, then glanced around guiltily. She did not use undignified language.

And she did not date men whose biceps were ringed with thick bands of stark black ink like some sort of brutal, ancient warrior.

Jane rolled her shoulders and stretched her neck. “I won’t be my mother,” she murmured one last time. “And I won’t be that girl again.” Then she erased the mess she’d made of her Excel spreadsheet and forcibly turned her mind back to work.

JANE’S MUSCLES WERE liquid with exhaustion as she stepped out of her car the next morning. She’d been too anxious and distracted to follow through with her plan the night before. Instead of heading home for a movie, she’d called up her trainer and spent an hour working the heavy bag at his private gym. Then she’d eaten a whole pizza, watched TV until midnight and overslept.

Jane unlocked the office door and rushed inside to drop into her chair. Fifteen minutes late. She was spiraling.

One night on her own and Jane Morgan was sinking low, her facade crumbling like mountains of melting snow in the parking lot.

It didn’t matter that she took care to dress professionally and maintained a manner more prickly than a librarian. It didn’t matter that she refused to show even a hint of friendliness to the dirty contractors and groping developers and sexist engineers, or that she made very, very sure to date only appropriate men…. She hadn’t changed at all.

Jane was still attracted to the same kind of guy she’d dated in high school: tattooed, rough and ready to ride.

“Crap,” she groaned. She’d had a very sexual dream about Chase the night before. And just that dream had gotten her off in a way that Greg hadn’t even approached.

Though, she reasoned to herself, he didn’t seem exactly like the kind of guy she’d once run around with. And he wasn’t exactly the type of man her mother had favored for years.

Despite the fact that his jeans had been creased with age and dingy with ancient dirt stains, he’d smelled of laundry detergent. His hair was cut short and neat, belying the dark curves of a tattoo that curled straight up the back of his neck and disappeared into his hairline. And most important, he couldn’t possibly be an ex-con. Extreme Excavations specialized in blasting. Even if Chase was low on the totem pole, permits for high explosives weren’t handed out to companies that employed criminals.

So, no, he wasn’t exactly like the guys from her past.

Jane snapped from her thoughtful daze and scowled at her reflection in the black computer screen. “Nice standards there, Jane Morgan. Clean underwear and no felony record.” Her reflection glared at her, stern and disapproving. Her neck was straight. Her shoulders rigid. Her nostrils flared with outrage. Until she suddenly slumped in defeat. “I’m a fraud.”

Fraud she might be, but she was damn good at maintaining the illusion. When a car door slammed in the parking lot, Jane snapped straight, banged on the keyboard to bring her computer out of sleep mode and jumped right into the report she’d been working on the day before.

The door opened and she expected to look up and see Mr. Jennings walking in. What she didn’t expect was the man who’d visited her dreams the night before.

But she was cool Jane now, the impenetrable fraud, so she merely raised an eyebrow. “Good morning, Mr. Chase.”

“Hello, Miss Jane,” he countered.

She almost laughed at his joke, and what a disaster that would have been. If he knew she found him charming, he might ask her out again. She didn’t allow her expression to budge. “What can I help you with?”

He held out the folder he’d tucked under his arm. “See? Safe and sound. I’m the soul of responsibility.”

“Mmm-hmm,” she murmured, trying to hide the way he was wreaking havoc on her concentration. His sleeve had inched up, revealing more of the tribal tattoo on his left arm. “Thank you.”

“So…” he said.

She jerked her eyes up from his arm.

“Have you thought any more about it?”

“About what?”

“Going out to dinner with me?”

“No,” she answered as if it were the honest truth. Actually, it was. Dinner hadn’t entered into her thoughts even once.

“Come on.” He smiled at her, his wide mouth curving into a very handsome grin. His dark blue eyes sparkled. “Just dinner.”

“No, thank you.”

“Why not?”

“You’re not my type.” The bald-faced lie fell smoothly from her tongue.

“You sure?” He glanced toward his arm, and Jane felt her pulse leap.

Oh, my God. Had he looked at his tattoo when he said that? She felt her face heat despite her best efforts to suppress the betraying flow of blood. He’d seen her looking.

But those could have been looks of horror, she told herself. They’d meant nothing. Nothing.

Her pulse wouldn’t listen to her. It gathered speed. Chase smiled and put one hand on her desk to lean closer. His gaze fell to her mouth, and she could feel herself breathing too fast.

Last night as she’d boxed, she’d imagined her trainer was Chase. She’d imagined him grabbing her, his hands sliding across her damp skin, his mouth descending with a growl….

Oh, God, her masquerade was crumbling around her. What if she let Chase—

Her cell phone rang, breaking the man-spell she’d fallen under. Jane looked down to the phone, and the display was a bucket of cold water dumped over her head. “Mom” it read, the backlight glowing red in warning.

She stared at it for a moment, skin cooling as each second ticked by. “Yes,” she finally answered him, “I’m sure.”

“Sure about what?”

“I’m sure you’re not my type, Mr. Chase, but thank you very much for the invitation.”

Though his face fell, Chase didn’t look the least bit angry. In fact he pulled a business card from his back pocket and handed it over. “All right, then. Call me if you change your mind. That’s my cell.”

“Thank you.” She meant to drop it in the trash. She really did. But as Chase turned and walked out, Jane tucked his card into her purse. Then she turned off her cell phone and stuck that in her purse, too.

She was working, and the world of rough men and burned-out cars and bad mothers could go to hell.

“I’M SO GLAD YOU DECIDED to meet me,” Lori Love said. “God only knows how long I’ll be sitting here.” She pushed one of her brown curls behind her ear and set her elbows on the bar.

Jane smiled. Lori and Mr. Jennings were very seriously involved, and Jane seemed to have gained a friend in the deal. Still, they weren’t really the type of friends to hit the town together, mainly because Jane didn’t hit the town. She glanced around the dark hotel bar. “I don’t know why you agreed to meet Mr. Jennings here.”

“Oh, I’m smarter than you think. Quinn’s at a business dinner at The Painted Horse. I refused to go, but I’d already agreed to that damn city council party at eight. So we’re meeting in the middle. I get to avoid the boring dinner but still participate in free drinks afterward.”

“Congratulations.” Jane raised her empty martini glass in salute.

“Why aren’t you coming to the party?”

“I wasn’t invited.” Jane looked up in surprise when the bartender put another drink in front of her. Apparently he’d noticed her waving the glass around. “Oh, thank you.”

“Please come with us,” Lori said. “It’s downstairs in the ballroom. You can keep me company while Quinn talks shop.”

Jane considered it for a moment. A party. Drinks. Eligible, appropriate men. Professional and educated. The party would be the perfect place to meet the kind of man she needed to meet, but the thought of doing that tonight, of being professional and conservative and reserved… Jane glanced down at her drink and found it empty.