“Only if it's a game day.”

“Hot. But those shorts, I think they have to go. Sometimes less is more, you know,” he teased. Tate raised an eyebrow.

“You think they're too short?”

“Yes.”

She whirled away from him and took long strides to the other end of the bar. She picked something up and then headed back towards him. It took him a second before he realized it was a blow horn. She smirked at him and then lifted it to her lips.

“Everybody! Hey!” she shouted. There was a roar of cheers and the music was turned down. “This man here thinks my shorts are too short! What do you all think!?” She pulled the blow horn away, lifting her arms up in a questioning gesture.

The place went nuts. The crowd had to be seventy-five percent male, and all of them were hooting and hollering at her. Tate smiled, and winked, biting the tip of her tongue between her teeth. It was clear that she knew what she was doing, knew how to work the crowd. She turned around and bent at the waist, shaking her ass a little. The roar grew to a deafening level. She finally stood up and turned back around, waving everyone away. Then she turned to Jameson.

“I didn't say you looked bad,” he pointed out. She shook her head.

“You're ridiculous. If you don't like what I'm wearing, leave,” she suggested before prancing back down the bar to wait on customers.

“Not until you agree to talk with me, Tatum!” Jameson shouted over the din. She glanced at him while she expertly twirled bottles in her hands, throwing liquor in to glasses.

“I still don't know what it is we have to talk about!” she yelled back, twirling two shakers at once. She was very good at her job.

“The way you talk, the way you dress, your makeup, your ass!” he replied. At the word “ass”, some idiot next to him cheered.

“Best I can tell, not one of those things is any of your business!” she laughed, cracking open one of the shakers and letting a blue concoction pour in to a martini glass.

“I'm making them my business. I want to get to know you,” he said.

“But not date me,” she clarified, pouring the second drink.

“Don't be fucking stupid,” Jameson laughed.

Tate made her way back to him and then planted her hands on the bar, spreading her arms wide. She leaned close to him, very close, her breath hot against his lips. Her loose shirt hung forward and he had a perfect view down her cleavage.

“What do you want, Kane?” she asked in a low voice. He dragged his eyes away from her tits and stared her in the eye.

“Call me that name again, and I will punish your mouth,” he warned her. She chuckled.

“Don't make promises you won't keep,” she retorted.

Oh my, I may have met my match. This should be interesting.

“Who says I won't? I have big plans for that mouth,” Jameson said, pinching her chin between his fingers. She rolled her eyes.

“Not gonna happen, Kane. Not any part of me, is going to touch any part of you, so you had better get used to that idea,” she informed him before pulling away.

We'll see about that.

“Alright. But we are going to talk,” he said. She heaved a sigh.

“Fine. Fine. How about we make an appointment? Say, tomorrow? One o'clock? Does that work for you, my lord and master?” she taunted. He took out his phone.

“I'm marking it down. Meet me at my office,” he told her. She snorted.

“Fine, whatever,” she grumbled at him. He glanced up at her.

“You had better show up. If I have to come get you, you won't like it,” Jameson warned her. Tate laughed.

“Talk, talk, talk. In my experience, men who talk as much as you, have very little action to back it up,” she said. He laughed as well.

“You've experienced me in action. And there wasn't very much talking.”

She rolled her eyes and then grabbed his glass, drinking the rest of his bourbon in one shot.

“You put too much emphasis on the past, Kane. It was one time, one time. The great Jameson Kane is hung up on a one night stand? It was nothing, it's long gone. We'll talk about whatever you want tomorrow, and then it's goodbye,” she informed him before walking off. He smirked at her.

Twice. She called me by my last name twice. Now she really owes me.

~5~

Tate sat in a chair in an anteroom outside of Jameson's office. She had thought about blowing him off, but she didn't want him showing up at her apartment again. How had he known where she lived, anyway? And he had said he was scared of it – Mr. Prissy Pants had probably never been in a low-rent building.

Asshole.

She had no clue what was going on between them. He challenged her, she played his games. She could have walked away from him – the moment he entered that conference room, she could've walked out. When he touched her leg, she could have slapped him. Could have screamed and acted like a scared girl.

But something about him still got under her skin. There was truth to what Ang had said, her night with Jameson had greatly affected her. It not only set about a major change in her life, but had helped her discover a new side to herself. Tate liked to be treated roughly. She liked to be talked dirty to, liked to be pushed around. Of course, only on her terms, and only by men she liked. She didn't like Jameson Kane, and nothing with him was ever on her terms. He made her nervous. Her made her hot. He confused her.

“Ms. O'Shea?”