She looks at me inquisitively and waits for me to enlighten her, instinctively knowing there’s more to the story of my name.

“Lord Alfred Tennyson,” I supply.

“Ah… now that’s a name I do recognize. I think we had to read him in college, but I hate shit like that.”

“Me too,” I commiserate.

“Going to take a piss,” Kyle butts in and stands up from his stool.

Neither Casey nor I look his way but continue to stare at each other.

Her lips curve upward in amusement, and I focus in on how full and soft they look. She leans a little more across the bar, and I struggle not to let my eyes drop to her breasts again. “Your parents are romantics then,” she hypothesizes. “Lovers of poetry?”

I smile at her and shake my head. “Literature in general. And more my mom than my dad, God rest her soul.”

She gives me a sympathetic look over the reference of my mother’s passing but doesn’t dwell on it, which I appreciate. “Interesting. Any siblings?”

“Smart girl,” I compliment her. “Younger brother. Woolf.”

“As in Virginia?”

“As in,” I say with a smile as I hold my bottle of beer up to her again in salute.

Casey takes a hand and traces an unrecognizable pattern on the wood of the bar with a fingertip. She watches her progress for a moment, and then raises her eyes back to mine. It’s a subtle yet flirty gesture. “Your name should be Woolf. It’s a better biker name.”

Chuckling, I shrug my shoulders. “I’m not a biker.”

“Yet you ride a bike,” she points out. “You wear the Harley t-shirt, have your shit kickers on, tats all over the place, and a dangerous look about you. Very Sons of Anarchy.”

I snort and slap my hand on the bar. “You watch too much TV, Goldie.”

Casey slides her hand closer to mine and with the end of her finger, strokes it lightly across the side of my wrist. My skin fucking tingles from the contact, and her subtle flirting goes full on in my face. I find it fascinating that the woman who proclaims to have a boyfriend is so free with her touches, and all of a sudden… I’m not feeling so gentlemanly about her being involved with someone already.

“A shame,” she whispers, her eyes moving from our hands to my face. “Something just really hot about bikers.”

My hand snakes out and wraps around her wrist, my thumb coming to rest right over her pulse, which I can feel fluttering madly against me. “I’m a biker then,” I assure her with a growl. “Whatever you want if you’ll cancel your date with your boyfriend tonight.”

Casey’s head turns left and then right, looking down both ends of the bar and assuring herself that she’s not needed by any customers at the moment. When she looks back at me, her eyes spark with playfulness. “Just out of curiosity, what would you do with me tonight if I didn’t have a boyfriend?”

Many women have flirted with me. I understand it is often a playful, back-and-forth banter that ultimately seeks an outcome of two people coming together. Sometimes, I enjoy that shit, other times, not.

Now is one of the times I’m not into it, because Casey is too direct and forward to engage in that crap. So I just decide to throw the truth out to her. “If I had you tonight?”

She nods at me, her gaze locked to mine.

I lean across the bar and in a tone so low I can barely hear myself, I tell her, “I’d make you come over and over and over again. And when you insist you couldn’t give me any more, I’d make you come again just to prove you wrong.”

Casey inhales through her nose sharply and her pupils actually dilate. Her soft, pink lips part and a tiny huff of spearmint breath blows out. “You don’t mince words,” she observes with a murmur.

“Not when I see something I want,” I tell her, my thumb now stroking the silky skin of her wrist. And then I command her, “Dump the boyfriend, Goldie. Come spend the night with me.”

And there it is… in her eyes, I see it—the first signs of acquiescence. I want to stand on the bar and beat my fists against my chest in victory.

But I don’t dare let go of her wrist until I get the words I want from her.

She opens her mouth but before she can speak, a hand claps me on my shoulder and I hear Kyle say, “Look who I found, dude.”

I don’t turn to look at him. I don’t let go of Casey’ wrist. I continue to stare at her and wait for her to give me the words I want. To tell me that I can have her… at least for tonight.

But the heat and promise dies from her gaze just a tad, and she slowly turns her head to the right to look at Kyle as she pulls away from my grasp. Her eyes light right back up again in more than just nominal recognition of Kyle, and a smile forms on that beautiful mouth.

“Hey Andrea,” Casey says brightly, and I realize all at once that Casey must know Kyle’s sister. Not so unusual, this being a tiny community and Andrea recommending we meet up at this bar.

I turn to give my attention to Kyle and his sister, and I’m momentarily stunned when I see how beautiful she is. Like Casey, she has blond hair but hers is a bit darker and more yellow in tone. She’s tall but still comes a few inches shorter than Casey does and without being obvious, I notice that her body is built to almost perfect proportions. I say “almost perfect” because Casey has true perfection down to a science, and there’s no touching that.

“You must be Andrea,” I say with a genial smile as I reach a hand past Kyle. “I’m Tenn Jennings.”

“Pleased to meet you,” she says as she pumps my hand, and then her gaze flicks back and forth in question between Casey and me. “I see you already met my friend, Casey.”

“Kyle and Tenn helped me change a flat tire a little while ago,” Casey supplies an explanation.

“Hmmmm,” Andrea muses. “That was nice.”

“Yeah, we’re regular fucking Boy Scouts,” Kyle says as he loops an arm around Andrea’s shoulders and pulls her in close. Leaning over, he gives her a kiss on top of her head. “Missed you, little sis.”

“Missed you too,” she says with a smile and slides her arm around his waist as she looks at me pointedly. “Why don’t you guys grab your beers and let’s go sit out on the back deck. You can tell me all about the trip out here.”

I don’t mistake the tone of her voice. It screams right at me, I don’t trust you. Stay away from Casey.

But I won’t be scared off so easily.

I give her a charming smile. “What are you drinking, Andrea? I’ll grab it for you and meet you and Kyle out there.”

Her eyes narrow at me, but her tone is polite. “Anything on draft is fine.”

I nod and turn away, effectively dismissing her and giving my attention back to Casey. “How about a draft, Goldie?”

Casey’s eyes slide over my shoulder and I watch as they move across the room, presumably following Andrea and Kyle out to the back deck. She doesn’t look back at me but turns and bends into a cooler to pull out a frosted pint glass and sticks it under the tap labeled “Stella”. When it’s full, she sets it in front of me and says, “That will be $2.75.”

Her voice is distant, and I know the spell that we were both under just a few minutes ago has been completely broken. But I’m just cocky enough to know I can get it back with a little effort. There’s a connection there. Sexual, of course, but a connection all the same.

Reaching into my wallet, I pull out a five and hand it to her. “Keep the change.”

She smiles and nods her head in thanks. As she starts to turn away, my hand jets out again, latching onto her wrist. The minute my skin connects to hers, the spell is back in full force again. I can feel it pulsing through me, and I know she sure as shit can.

Casey sucks in oxygen and drags her gaze from our hands back up to mine. Her eyes are immediately warm and expressive. Her chest rises and falls deeply.

“Dump the boyfriend,” I tell her again, daring her to defy me. “Let me have you.”