After the Kiss Page 3

  “At least there’s some decent tail here,” Colin said, his eyes on the backside of a woman who couldn’t possibly have graduated from college yet.

  “Tail? What is this, a dockside brothel?”

  “Spoken like a man who’s been in a relationship since his balls dropped.”

  “Hyperbole doesn’t suit you.”

  Colin signaled the bartender for two more drinks. “Seriously, man, when was the last time you dated a girl just for the fun of it?”

  “Evelyn and I had fun.” Sort of.

  Colin snorted. “Yeah, I’m sure sipping Dom on her father’s yacht with your sweater tied around your shoulders was a real hoot.”

  Just two months ago Colin’s barbs would have rolled off Mitchell. He refused to be ashamed for conducting himself with dignity. He hadn’t indulged in drunken one-night stands in college, and he wasn’t about to start now, at age thirty-four.

  But two months ago Mitchell had been secure in the knowledge that his future was figured out. He’d propose to Evelyn, have a respectable-length engagement, get married at the Plaza, and start a family within a year of exchanging vows.

  He’d gotten as far as the jewelry store. He’d even carried the two-carat princess-cut engagement ring in his pocket for two weeks.

  And then he’d ended it. On a whim. Perhaps the first whim of his adult life. Evelyn hadn’t seen it coming. And the hell of it was, neither had Mitchell.

  One minute he was trying to decide whether to play it old-school and kneel or stay sitting and save himself the dry-cleaning bill for dirty slacks. The next minute he was sitting alone at the table, having just told Evelyn that she deserved something better than a husband who’d spend his life going through the motions instead of cherishing her.

  Cherishing her. He winced as the thought went through his mind. Good God. Maybe he should just chuck the New York Stock Exchange and go write romance novels.

  Mitchell heard his name and realized that Colin was still babbling at him.

  “Tell me, honestly, man, have you ever had a fling?” Colin asked. “A one-night stand? Anything?”

  Mitchell scowled and checked his watch. “What’s with the interrogation about my love life? Last time I checked, I wasn’t paying you for therapy.”

  “Maybe you should. You need to get laid.”

  Probably. Definitely.

  “Well, I’ll let you know when I meet a suitable woman.”

  Colin shook his head. “See, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. You analyze every woman as a candidate for the position of Mrs. Forbes. Have you ever touched a woman without first checking her pedigree?”

  “Yes. I actually prefer a more spontaneous approach to relationships,” Mitchell lied baldly. “The chemistry has to be there, absolutely.”

  Not. Chemistry was for chumps. Chemistry was what led to waking up in someone else’s dirty sheets, hep C, and eventual absence of a prenup.

  But the fact that a buffoon as dense and clueless as Colin could read him like a book was galling. Being predictable was fine. Being predictably boring was not.

  However, Colin was proving to be more aware than Mitchell gave him credit for. “Dude, you don’t give a crap about chemistry. If you did, you wouldn’t have dated Evelyn for two and a half years. The moldy onion in my refrigerator has more personality than that broad.”

  Mitchell took a drink. “Evelyn’s a lovely woman. She’d make an excellent wife.” For someone.

  Colin pounced. “That. That is why you’re so grumpy all the time. You approach women the way you do a new suit.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” I have plenty of suits. “And what exactly are you getting at? One-night stands are for frat boys and desperate losers.”

  “Who said anything about a one-night stand? Not that one would kill you, but I’m talking about a fling. Hook up with a woman who’s fun. Go on a few dates, have hot sex, and then part ways before you drag her home to meet your mother.”

  Mitchell tried to wrap his brain around Colin’s suggestion and failed. What was the point of doing all that if it wasn’t going anywhere? If he wanted to start a family before his hair went completely gray, he didn’t have time for flings.

  But he didn’t like the way Colin was shaking his head in dismay. As though he thought Mitchell couldn’t do it.

  “I’ve had plenty of flings,” Mitchell lied again.

  “Yeah, I can tell by the way the word just rolls off your tongue and you look ready to vomit.”

  Mitchell’s strained patience snapped. This was a waste of time. “I’m heading out,” he said, setting his drink on the bar with a clink. “Go find someone else to annoy.”

  He was starting to walk away when Colin’s laughing voice called after him, “Five hundred bucks says you can’t do it.”

  Mitchell slowed and turned back toward Colin. “Can’t do what?”

  “Can’t start seeing a woman without getting halfway to the altar. Can’t use a woman for sex and companionship and then set her free before you start talking about babies and moving across the river to Jersey.”

  “You want me to make a bet that I can use a woman? Do I look like I left my morals at the door?”

  Colin snagged a mushroom crostini off a passing tray and munched thoughtfully. “It’s like I thought. You can’t do it.”

  “I can. I just don’t need your five hundred bucks.”

  “Fine, let’s sweeten the pot. Half of next year’s season tickets.”

  Mitchell froze.

  Of course, he already had season tickets to the Yankees. Not that he ever got to use them.

  But his seats on the first-base line weren’t like the seats Colin had. At work Colin might be as useful as a third nipple, but his cousin was tied up somehow with Yankee business. As a result, Colin always had access to tickets for seats that you couldn’t buy your way into.

  It was appallingly tempting to take the bet. Do not do this, Forbes. Do not sacrifice your dignity for the sake of a baseball team.

  And yet Mitchell stood frozen. Because the truth was, he wanted more than the tickets. Mitchell needed to know that Colin was wrong. That he was capable of a spontaneous fling.

  That he wasn’t turning into his father, stuck on a one-way street toward a McMansion in a gated community in the Connecticut suburbs just because it was expected.

  “Let’s say I do this,” Mitchell said slowly. “How will we determine who wins?”

  Colin’s eyes widened in surprise, but he recovered quickly, all but rubbing his hands together. Colin was one of those fools who fumbled his way through the routine aspects of life just waiting for a hiccup to add some excitement.

  Apparently Mitchell was to be his next hiccup.

  “Well,” Colin said, scrunching up his face, “it’ll be tricky. We need tangible, physical proof.”

  Mitchell rolled his eyes. “What do you want me to do, steal her thong?”

  Colin winced. “Jesus, no. And that wouldn’t do any good anyway. You could simply pick up a hooker and be done with it. The bet is that you actually date the woman. You just get out of it before you start ring shopping.”

  Again with the surge of irritation. “You act like I get engaged to every woman I kiss.”

  “No, I’m just saying that you plan to get engaged to every woman you kiss. You need to have a relationship that won’t end with you guys picking out wallpaper.”

  “So should I just hire a robot? All women want to pick out wallpaper. It’s what they do.”

  Colin shook his head. “You’re even worse off than I thought. How about this—we find a woman in this very building to be our test subject. You woo her with your hefty paycheck and preppy looks. Then you take her on at least five dates. What you do on those dates is up to you. But you can’t get attached.”

  “And how do we gauge that?”

  Colin thought for a second. “How about at Rob’s annual end-of-the-summer picnic, where dates are all but mandatory, you bring a different woman. Thus proving yo
u were able to let our test subject go.”

  Mitchell stared at him. “How’d you make it past the third grade? That’s the most ridiculous idea since the creation of reality TV.”

  Colin shrugged. “Half my season tickets says you can’t do it. That you can’t see this woman for five consecutive dates and then call it off. I absolutely guarantee you’ll find a way to convince yourself that she’s the one and bring her to the picnic.”

  Every fiber of his being rebelled at the idea. And yet …

  “You’re on.”

  Colin’s eyes bugged. “You’re doing this?”

  “I just said I was.”

  “Hold on, then—what do I get if you lose?”

  “You’re just thinking about that now?”

  “Well, I didn’t think you were going to accept,” Colin said with the innocence of the perpetually shortsighted.

  “Okay, fine. What do you want? Money? A trip to Vegas?”

  “Your office.”

  Mitchell stared at him. “What do you mean, my office?”

  “I want to trade offices.”

  “Why? They’re exactly the same. Same size, same floor …”

  Colin shook his head. “You can see the Statue of Liberty from yours. I have that building in my way.”

  “Trust me, the statue is a tiny little dot from my office. Why don’t you just take the ferry if you want to see it?”

  But Colin had a stubborn set to his mouth, and Mitchell relented. He didn’t give a rat’s ass about the view from his office. Not that it mattered one way or the other—Mitchell had no intention of losing.

  “Okay, fine,” Mitchell said. “I date a girl and dump her, I get Yankee tickets. If I lose my mind and try to shackle her to my side forever and ever, you get my office.”

  Colin extended a hand, looking ridiculously excited. “Don’t forget—if you win, you get the tickets and your balls back.”

  Yeah. There’s that.

  “I still have no idea why you’re doing this. My office isn’t that great.”

  Colin shrugged. “What can I say? I’m easily bored.”

  No argument there. “So who’s the lucky lady?”

  Colin held up a finger and chomped on the ice from his drink. “I’ve already got this figured out.” He pointed across the room.

  Mitchell followed his gesture. “Grace Brighton? Isn’t she dating Greg?”

  He felt a little surge of excitement. He’d never hit on a taken woman, but if Grace and Greg had broken up, that was another thing. He’d always liked Grace. She was lovely, refined.… Mitchell frowned. And not at all fling material. Maybe Colin was playing hardball—fixing him up with a woman who had the same long-term relationship goals as himself.

  “No, not Grace, moron. Julie. In the pink dress.”

  Mitchell’s gaze raked over the unfamiliar blonde. “Who is she?”

  “Julie Greene? One of the Stiletto girls?”

  “Stiletto? As in the shoe?”

  “God, you need to get out more. Not the shoe. The magazine. Julie Greene, Grace Brighton, and Riley McKenna are practically the faces of the publication. The society pages call them Dating, Love, and Sex. Privately, I think of them as Kiss, Cuddle, and Fuck.”

  Mitchell winced. “You’re disgusting.”

  “True. But this girl is still perfect for our purposes. Julie lives for carefree dating. She’s got a different guy every other week. I know a couple of her exes, and neither has said a bad word about her other than that she kicked them to the curb after a few dates. No drama, no expectation of jewelry …”

  Mitchell looked at her more closely. She was attractive in a predictable, manufactured sort of way. She looked like California chic had collided with East Coast reserve and gotten it all wrong. Her pink dress fell respectably to her knees, but clung just a touch too tightly in the hips to be subtle. And her hair was a mess of light brown and yellow streaks. He hated hair like that. Women should either stick with their natural color (which was probably mouse brown in Ms. Greene’s case) or dye it and embrace their bottle-blonde status. Those colored strips—what did women call them? Highlights—were just so damned obvious.

  Julie threw back her head and laughed, not caring that several people turned and stared. Mitchell’s lips tightened with disapproval. No subtlety. Not his type at all.

  Which meant there was no danger of him getting too involved.

  He handed Colin his glass and adjusted his glasses slightly, resisting the urge to smile. The bet was too easy—and he could practically taste the beer at Yankee Stadium.

  Chapter Four

  Julie was ready to approach Mitchell Forbes.

  Totally ready.

  Excited, even.

  She just needed to make a wee detour first.

  To the bar.

  “Never underestimate the power of liquid courage,” she said as she shooed Grace away.

  “Why can’t I watch?” Grace whined.

  “I never do my best work with an audience,” Julie said loftily.

  “Since when? You love an audience.”

  Julie pursed her lips. Not right now I don’t. Julie didn’t have the faintest clue about her next step. She usually went with her gut, and in this case nothing felt right. Her standard flirtatious approaches seemed too forward. A man like Mitchell Forbes would need coaxing and finesse, not cleavage and fluttering eyelashes.

  When Grace had reluctantly wandered away after giving her strict instructions to call and spill once she’d talked to Mitchell, Julie got in line at the bar. Hmm, martini or wine, martini or wine, martini or—

  “May I buy you a drink?”

  Julie tore her eyes away from the tray of olives three people in front of her and spun toward the unfamiliar voice.

  “I—oh!”

  As in Oh, shit.

  Maybe approaching Mitchell Forbes wouldn’t be such a challenge after all.

  He’d already found her.

  “The drinks are free,” she blurted out.

  He looked away. “I know. It was meant to be a joke.”

  Julie blanched. A joke? That had been a joke? No way could she suffer through a pseudo-relationship with this guy. He had the sense of humor of a pretzel. Still …

  “Oh! Funny,” she said with a wide grin and a bright laugh.

  He gave a wan smile. “It wasn’t.”

  And then she melted just a little, because damned if Mitchell Forbes didn’t have the sweetest little dimples in each cheek. It softened his otherwise buttoned-up appearance.

  Although, to be fair, he was a good deal more interesting up close than he’d been from across the room. Sure, the pinstripes were on the wrong side of dowdy, but the suit itself was tailored perfectly to surprisingly broad shoulders. He was just a touch too muscled to be wiry. There was an energy about him, as though he always wanted to be moving and it was only through rigid self-restraint that he managed to remain still.

  The glasses, too, were a pleasant surprise. Julie was surprised to see that the eyes behind the thin-rimmed rectangular frames were deep blue. With his dark hair, she would have assumed he’d have brown eyes, but these were a startling navy.

  Well, whaddaya know. He’s kind of cute.

  By this time, there was just one person in front of them in line at the bar, and Julie acted on a whim. “Hey, do you want to get out of here?”

  He blinked in surprise. “You don’t even know my name.”

  Oh, honey, you only wish I didn’t.

  “So tell me then,” she said coyly, playing dumb and linking her arm through his.

  For a second she thought she caught something that looked like disdain flicker behind his glasses, but the expression passed and he gave a slow smile. “Mitchell Forbes.”

  “Mitchell? Not Mitch?”

  “No. Not Mitch.”

  Of course not. Nicknames are soooo plebian.

  “I’m Julie Greene.”

  “Yes, I’m aware.”

  She wasn’t surprised. Half the p
eople at the fund-raiser knew who she was. Julie paused, bringing them both to a stop. “You know, Mitchell Forbes, for someone who knows my name and sought me out of the crowd to buy me a free drink, you certainly don’t seem all that interested in conversation.” Or being charming.

  He flushed slightly and ran a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry. It’s been a while since I’ve done this.”

  “Talking?”

  His dimples flickered. “Talking to women. I just came out of a two-year relationship. My flirtation skills are rusty.”

  “Lucky for you, mine are not.”

  “I can see that.”

  Julie’s brow furrowed. She was used to men who were more … well, admiring. And despite the fact that he’d found her across a crowded room, he didn’t seem all that enamored. It had been a while since she’d dealt with a man who wasn’t nearly as well versed in the dating game as she was.

  Say the right things, damn it, she silently ordered him.

  She tried again to strike the right chord. “We don’t have to leave if you’re not ready. There’s an exhibit on the fifth floor that I absolutely love.”

  His lip gave the tiniest curl of horror. No surprise there. She’d yet to meet a man who could tolerate modern art for more than thirty minutes.

  “Actually, I’m sort of over the crowds and I haven’t eaten yet,” he replied. “Can I put the drink money toward buying you dinner?”

  Finally.

  “I’d love that.” She curled her fingers just slightly around the forearm she was still touching, but he merely pulled his arm away.

  She almost laughed. They were like two kids pushed together by the prom chaperones with absolutely no feel for each other. Always a step out of sync.

  Neither spoke as they fetched her coat and headed out the door.

  “You like Guinness?” he asked gruffly as they walked into the late spring air.

  “Love it,” she lied. She wasn’t really a beer girl unless she was on a boat in a bikini on the hottest days of summer. But she knew how this worked. Playing the high-maintenance card this early in the game would never get her a second date.