“Oh, how about Pierce Brosnan?” Gray suggests as she looks from me to Georgia.

“And Denzel Washington,” Georgia adds.

“Kevin Costner,” Gray says with a girly sigh.

“Liam Neeson,” Georgia sighs dreamily.

They both look at each other, and almost simultaneously say in dramatic fashion, “Richard Gere.”

“Okay, enough,” I say with a laugh as I turn away from both of these women who are enjoying themselves a little too much. I grab a bottle of red wine I’d pulled from the cellar earlier and hold it up. “Want to stay for dinner, Gray?”

She shakes her head. “No, thanks. I’m not about to impede on your ‘date,’ ” she says, holding up sarcastic air quotes. “But maybe we can all go out and celebrate. There’s a game tomorrow night, so night after next?”

“Sounds good to me,” I agree as I start to open the wine. “I’ll call Lexi tonight and tell her the results, but first, we celebrate with a glass of wine.”

“I’ll pass,” Gray says, then turns to Georgia. She puts a hand out. “It was really nice meeting you.”

Georgia bats Gray’s hand away and wraps her up in a hug, which she immediately succumbs to with a twinkling smile at me over Georgia’s shoulders. Gray even gives a thumbs-up sign to me surreptitiously and I grin back at my daughter.

One of my two daughters.

Hot damn, this is turning into a great night, and by the way Georgia and I were kissing before Gray’s arrival, I’m betting it will continue to get better.

Chapter 20

Lexi

“Thank you for taking the night off,” Roman says as he holds his glass of wine out toward me.

I pick mine up, tap it against his, and smile with a tilt of my head. “It’s definitely not a hardship to take a night off to spend with you.”

We both take a slow sip as we stare at each other across the empty plates and low- flickering candles. Roman got back from his West Coast trip last night and asked if he could spend tonight with me. It meant giving up my regular shift—not a big deal—as well as the tips from my singing—I’d make it up with an extra shift over the weekend, but that’s all okay. While this is still very new between us, I was surprised how much I missed him when he was gone. We talked as much as our schedules allowed, and texted when we had stolen moments, but it wasn’t the same as being with him.

So he asked me to take tonight off, and after some mad scrambling to find someone to cover me, I was on my way to Roman’s house. I stopped and picked up Italian, and he had the candles going and the wine opened when I arrived.

I was very impressed, and told him so.

He told me he was just trying to impress me so he could get in my pants.

Then he pulled me into his arms and gave me a long, warm hug with his arms holding me tight.

Then he kissed me, and that was even better.

“What do you want to do tonight?” he asks as he puts his glass down and leans back in his chair, studying me over the flickering candlelight.

I shrug. “Want to go out dancing?”

“No.”

“Roller skating?”

“No.”

“Yahtzee?”

“Definitely no.”

Laughing, I lower my voice and practically purr at him. “Spend the rest of the evening in bed?”

“Now you’re speaking my language.” He grins at me, then leans forward to place his elbows on the table. Roman steeples his hands in front of his face and gives me a serious look. “But…if you want to go out and do something, let’s do it. I suppose I need to take you out on a proper date, you know, if we’re dating and all. I do have a tarnished reputation to overcome, or so it’s been said about me.”

I roll my eyes at him and his backhanded jab at Gray.

“That’s a good thought,” I say thoughtfully, and take another sip of my wine. “We should go out at some point.”

“But not tonight?”

I shake my head slowly and flash a sexy smile. “I think I’d rather spend it in bed tonight.”

“I’m not going to argue with that if that’s what you’re looking for,” he says agreeably.

Laughing, I set down my wineglass and push up from my chair.

“I don’t want you to change my mind,” I tell him as I grab my empty plate. “Let’s get the kitchen cleaned up and then get naked.”

As I start to walk past Roman toward the sink, his hand shoots out and wraps around my free arm. I stop and he carefully takes the plate out of my hand, sets it on the table, and pulls me onto his lap. His hand goes in between my legs but he just gently squeezes the inside of my thigh. Still, his actions cause a pure thrill to run through me, knowing that this is a small display of his dominance. That he’s the one who says when we get naked.

“Will you come to tomorrow night’s game?” he asks, and I’m surprised by the about-face in subject. I thought he’d be starting to strip me by now.

I tilt my head at him, wondering why this is coming up right now, we when we were talking about being naked.

“The last game you came to,” he continues, seeing the question written on my face. “You were supposed to sit in my seats, but you went up to the box. Of course, you ended up breaking up with me too before the game, so there’s that.”

“If it helps,” I tell him sincerely as I wrap my arms around his neck, “that entire game I watched you whether you were on the ice or on the bench, completely bummed out over the decision I’d made. It felt wrong right from the start.”

Roman smiles, his eyes shining in appreciation. “So now that we’re together, I want you sitting in my seats. So I can see you during the game. Can’t see you up there in the owner’s box.”

I’ve never dated a professional athlete before, so things are obviously a bit different here. But knowing that he wants me to be a part of “his” game causes warmth to fill every molecule of my being, and a feeling of completeness takes root. It’s the first time I truly realize that Roman sees me as something more than just an interesting girl who is fun to hang out with.

He needs me.

“And I know you took tonight off work to see me, so that’s asking a lot to take tomorrow off too, but—”