Bad Behaviour

He shook his head. “Nope. I don’t see you in an orchestra anyway. Band, I think. And every time you put that flute up to your mouth, I bet you broke some poor kid’s heart.”

“You’re betting a lot tonight.”

His smile widened. “I’m feeling lucky.” He watched her closely, his eyes unsettlingly intent. Amusement glimmered in his irises, something that suggested an inside joke—on her.

And suspicion dawned. “My friends put you up to this, didn’t they?” Delaney demanded, rising on tiptoe to stare at the rest of the gang. They were watching avidly, though, not a grin among them.

“Nope, no help,” he confirmed when she glanced back. “Why, am I right?”

She raised her chin. “Who’s asking?”

“You really don’t know?” He grinned. “Come on, don’t tell me your memory’s already going at thirty.”

“If you wanted to flatter me you’d have said twenty-five.”

“If I hadn’t known better, I would have guessed twenty-four.”

And like a seismic vibration, the beginnings of recognition quivered through her. “I don’t believe it,” she said slowly. A younger face, rounder, peach smooth with adolescence. Not him, but someone shorter, blonder. Someone who was… “Oh, my God!”

“What?”

“It can’t be.” She stared. “I know you. It’s Jake, right? Jake from South Junior High School. Jake—”

“Gordon,” he finished. “Hello, Delaney.”

HE’D RECOGNIZED HER THE minute he’d seen her, with the same hard punch of reaction he’d felt for her all those years ago. Back then, it had been a half-formed yearning that he hadn’t quite understood. Now, he recognized it, oh, yeah, he recognized it—plain, old-fashioned lust, as sharp and immediate as he’d ever known. Of course, generally when he felt this kind of need, it wasn’t coupled with the shock of seeing a face, a person resurrected from his past.

And from his dreams.

Approaching her hadn’t been a matter of debate. He couldn’t have stayed away if he’d tried. The fact that she hadn’t recognized him had only added a bit of spice to the game.

“But you’re…” She waved her hands feebly at him. “Different.”

He threw his head back and laughed. “That’s reassuring, considering it’s been, what, fifteen years?”

“Sixteen,” she corrected faintly.

Her scent was different now. When they were kids it had been light, playful. Now, it conjured up images of smoky jazz clubs and throaty laughter, of velvet-clad chanteuses singing over the husky tones of a saxophone.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Came down to take a break, do some diving.”

“Fifteen years go by—”

“Sixteen,” he corrected.

“Sixteen. And you live where?”

“Long Beach, more or less.”

“Once a surfer, always a surfer. I live in West L.A.”

“I thought you were an agouti wrestler.”

“I moonlight,” she said in exasperation. “Sixteen years. I never once see you after you go off to private school, not in Anaheim, not in L.A. I go to an obscure bar in an obscure town in Mexico and presto, you’re here?”

He looked hugely amused. “Like I said, small world.”

“I guess.” She folded her arms, looked him up and down. “You turned out well.”

“So did you.” It was Delaney and yet not Delaney, her face more angular, her hair shorter than he’d ever seen it, and silky looking enough to have his fingers itching to touch. He’d approached her because of the girl he’d once known, but she was a woman now, and that changed everything. “I think we should find somewhere quiet and do some catching up.”

She laughed as though she knew exactly what he was thinking. “Oh, you do, do you? I’ll tell you what I think, I think we should—”

“Are you holding our drinks hostage?” a voice demanded from behind them. Dom glanced back to see one of the women Delaney had come in with. Here to track down the cocktails, maybe, or to check him out. You never knew with the sisterhood. Always looking out for one another—and always curious.

“Aren’t your feet hurting?” Delaney muttered to her.

“They’ve recovered. Excuse me,” the woman said to him, reaching around Delaney to rescue a couple of the drinks. “I’m Cilla,” she added over her shoulder.

“Dom,” he said automatically.

Delaney, juggling three of the other glasses, sent him a sharp look. “Dom?”

He nodded. “Need some help?”

“The more the merrier,” Cilla said happily.

He picked up the other two and headed after them.

Delaney flicked a glance at him as they sidled through the growing crowd. “Wait a minute, I’m confused. When did you start going by Dom?”

“It always was my name. Jake was just a nickname my dad gave me because I was so into the wrestler when I was a kid.”

“Jake the Snake,” she said in sudden comprehension.

“Bingo. When I switched schools to St. Joseph’s, it seemed like a good time to drop it.”

“Not to mention a few other things,” she replied.

He gave her a quick glance. Her voice didn’t carry the slap of old anger so much as challenge. Then again, Delaney always had kept him on his toes. It could, he decided as they arrived at the table, be an interesting evening.

“Want to join us?” she asked.

He wanted a whole hell of a lot more than that. He wanted to be somewhere private where they had all the time in the world. Yeah, he remembered what it had been like to kiss her, he thought, staring at her mouth, and he was now imagining what it would be like to kiss her again. But he wasn’t fourteen anymore and kissing wasn’t enough to satisfy him. Not even close.

For now, though… “I’m here with a buddy. Let me go get him and then you can introduce us both at the same time.”