Hidden Pleasures - Brenda Jackson [39]
“There are a couple I’d like to interject.”
He took the armchair across from her. “Go ahead.”
He was sitting right in her line of vision and a part of her wished he wasn’t. Her reaction to him today wasn’t good. She had handled it pretty well at her mother’s house, because her mind had been filled with so many other things. But at the restaurant, she had been filled with images of him. So much so that her nipples pressing against her blouse had throbbed through most of the meal. And now there were these nerve endings inside her that seemed pricked, painfully stretched, whenever those laser green eyes lit on her.
He was leaning back in the chair, his legs crossed at the knees in a manly pose. His thighs were taut and his abs sturdy, masculine and ripped beneath his shirt. She felt a tingling in her fingers. They itched to reach out and touch his bare skin. She’d bet his flesh would be warm. How would it taste? Heat drenched her face. She’d never thought of putting her mouth on a man before.
She cleared her throat and forced her attention back to business. “Your cell phone,” she said.
He lifted a brow. “What about it?”
“You answered it in the restaurant.”
A smile touched his lips. “I answer it wherever it rings. That’s why they call it a mobile phone. It’s a phone on the go.”
She rolled her eyes. “Proper etiquette dictates that you should turn your cell phone off in a restaurant just like you would do at church.” From the look on his face she got the distinct impression that he didn’t turn his phone off in church, either. Or maybe the look meant he didn’t go to church.
“And if I miss a call?”
“You’ll know it and you can call the person back once you leave the restaurant. Was it someone you couldn’t call back later?” In a way she didn’t want to know. What if it was a woman he was interested in?
“It was Mercury being nosy.”
“Mercury?”
“My brother.”
She nodded and tucked her legs beneath her on the sofa. She noticed his gaze followed her every movement. “You have a brother named Mercury?” she asked.
“Yes, and before you ask, the answer is no, he wasn’t named after the planet or that Roman god. He was named for Mercury Morris. Ever heard of him?”
“Of course. I’m from Florida. He was a running back for the Miami Dolphins in the seventies, during the time they were unstoppable, undefeated one season.”
She watched him smile and wanted to roll her eyes. Did men think they were the only ones who knew anything about football?
“My father was a huge Dolphins fan while growing up,” he said. “He still is. In fact, he got drafted right out of college to play for them, but a knee injury kept that from happening before the start of what should have been his first season.”
“How sad.”
“Yes, it was for him at the time.” He paused a moment and then said, “Okay, I get the ‘no cell phone in the restaurant’ rule. What’s the other?”
She shifted in her seat when his gaze drifted down to her breasts and she wondered if he’d noticed her hardened nipples through her blouse. “The other is tooth picks. I didn’t see you use them and I’m glad for that, but several others in the restaurant did. You don’t stick a toothpick in your mouth after finishing a meal.”
“We had ribs.”
“That makes it worse,” she said.
“But they’re on the table.”
“I noticed. Usually there’re at the cash register on your way out. There’s nothing nice about a person using a toothpick to pick their teeth at a restaurant, especially when others are still eating. You should take the tooth pick and use it in the privacy of your own home.”
He leaned forward in his seat. “And you know all this stuff, how?”
She smiled. “I studied it in college. I got a degree in history, but I took every course offered on etiquette and even saved my money for Emily Post Finishing School a couple of summers.”
He nodded and stood up, and her gaze traveled the length of him. He was tall, well over six foot, muscular and his body was honed to perfection. He had an abdomen with