Page 24 of Stirring Up Love
Instead, she felt ... seen. Cared for.
This wasn’t an act. This was Finn, raw and real. The knowledge hit her like a slap to the cheek, stunning her out of her trance.
She didn’t need Finn. Not his surprising kindness or his wide smile that made everything around her feel less heavy. There was no room in her life for a man, and she sure as heck didn’t need a shoulder to lean on. Especially not when that shoulder belonged to a slippery snake like Finn Rimes.
“Thanks for the assist,Mr.Rimes.” His fingers tensed around hers. “But this has me thinking ... out of all the times we’ve bumped into each other, I don’t think you’ve had a chance to sample my sauce yet.”
His eyes narrowed, just enough to darken from honeyed chestnut to the warm brown of a woodland creek. Sun dappled and inviting, but she wouldn’t dive in.
“You’re right,” he said. “Can’t say I’ve had the pleasure.”
“Here’s your chance.” Before she lost her nerve or questioned the ramifications, she crumpled the pocket square in her free hand, leaving her fingers in his. Then she raised their joined hands and extended her sauce-dipped pinky toward him. “Go ahead, have a taste.”
A hush fell over the room, the air so still she could hear the sizzle of her chances at a deal evaporating in the heat of the spotlights. His eyes flicked down to her fingers, and the tip of his tongue slid into the corner of his mouth. Her breath picked up, pulse hammering so loud in her ears she felt light headed, like she’d passed out at base camp and woke up on the peak of Everest.
A whole life of striving. Of working. Of pushing. And it all came down to this. Lucifer in a three-piece suit, an audience of millions, and two investors who held her future in their hands.
In one fluid motion, Finn caught her wrist, long fingers looped, gentle but firm. Now he held her with both hands. Encircled her. Engulfed her with his touch.
The brush of his fingertips whispered across her skin, and when she raised her gaze, she found his eyes searching hers, a question in their depths. She granted permission with a nod.
Yes.
Now, before we lose our nerve.
The thoughts dancing across his pupils settled like silt in a streambed, and he looked down at their joined hands, charcoal lashes skimming his cheeks.
She trembled, anticipating. Finn dipped his head and slowly, deliberately, licked the tip of her finger. A quick flick of his tongue proved her wrong again. She didn’t think he’d have the balls to take the bait. Didn’t expect herself to not hate it. Tolikeit. To enjoy the slide of his tongue on her skin, the quick brush of wet heat, gone at the moment she’d started tocraveit.
Jelly jointed, she trembled and felt his hands grip her tighter in support.
Finn’s chest heaved, shaky; then he raised his eyes. A grin spread across his cheeks, like spilled honey on a sunny windowsill. “Not bad, Simone.”
She tugged her hand out of his grasp, and his smile grew wings, launched into a full-bodied laugh. A declaration of war.
Moisture broke out on her hairline, and nuh-uh, no way would she sweat out her edges for this fool. Finger by finger she wiped his slobber and the rest of the sauce off her hand. Biding her time. Reconfiguring for a frontal attack.
She folded the pocket square and handed it back. “Think you can do better?”
He accepted the sodden scrap of fabric without looking at it, brown eyes sparking like the strike of flint on stone. Dangerous. “You tell me.”
And suddenly, like it was scripted—and for all she knew, itwasscripted, and she’d been kept in the dark for authenticity—a guy with a headset, dressed all in black, rolled out a chrome cart laden with bottles of sauce and smothered meat.
Finn tucked the dirtied handkerchief in his pocket. He swept an arm toward the cart, careless yet controlled, like he licked sauce off women’s bodies in front of live studio audiences every day.
“Care to sample Finn’s Secret Sauce? I’ll let you use a spoon, though.” He angled a grin toward the executives. Mr.Donovan let out a guffaw, but Ms.Rivera pursed her lips.
He held out the handle of a spoon, a challenge in his eyes. “Go ahead, have a taste,” he said, repeating her offer in that melodious coffee-and-cream voice that almost made her forget they were on live TV with an audience of millions and that this man was hernemesis.
He’d been an adversary before, but an upgrade—downgrade—seemed fitting. Especially because she was about to do the dang thing and try his sauce. She couldn’t afford to appear petty. Even though right now she felt petty AF.
She dipped the spoon into a jar of sauce at random and shoved it in her mouth like cough syrup. Her treacherous taste buds lit up like firecrackers. Hoo boy, that did not taste anything like medicine. In fact, it tasted like failure. Not a single person in the audience would choose her sauce over that perfection.
Tangy and sweet, with a hint of fire.Delicious.
“Told you,” he said, and she realized she’d admitted it aloud.
Beaming, he hoisted the tray off the cart and headed over toward the executives like a waiter in some ritzy restaurant. In the shadows, stagehands did the same and moved down the rows to hand out samples to the audience. But Simone was done hesitating, done being blinded by the force of his charm like a starry-eyed doe in the headlights.
