Amber By Night. Sharon Sala

neatly take command of an unruly situation, take a patron’s order and dodge grasping hands without misplacing that smile on her face.

      To his dismay, the room began to sway, and he grabbed hold of the table to settle his world. It would be hell if he fell on his face before he ever learned her name. He went from interest to lust so quickly he caught himself shifting uncomfortably in his seat. He hadn’t been this hard this fast since his sixteenth birthday when Kissy Beth Syler had skinny-dipped in front of him just for kicks. And then he grinned to himself, remembering that she wasn’t the only one who’d gotten her kicks that day. He’d had a soft spot for farm ponds ever since. It was a memorable way to celebrate one’s arrival into manhood.

      “That’s one fine-looking lady,” Seth murmured.

      Tyler’s eyes narrowed. Fine didn’t begin to describe his opinion.

      And then Seth’s grin widened as he nudged Tyler’s leg beneath the table with the toe of his shoe. “Hey great, she’s coming this way. It looks like we lucked out tonight, my friend. We’re sitting at one of her tables.”

      “What’ll you gentlemen have?”

      Amelia stood with pen poised above paper, staring at a point just to the left of the men’s shoulders. She never actually looked them in the eye. It was her way of retaining what she considered anonymity. But she need not have bothered. She was as far removed from Amelia Beauchamp’s persona as diamonds were from coal.

      The man with his back to the wall mumbled something totally unintelligible, forcing Amelia to look up. Her heart thumped wildly as sweat broke out on the back of her neck.

      Their gazes locked. Tyler looked up into eyes so green they looked wet and then he blinked. No, maybe they were blue. He could swear he saw sky. He watched her turn pale beneath the layer of makeup she was wearing. A glimpse of pearly white teeth slipped down across her lower lip and Tyler frowned as he watched the pressure increasing. If she wanted her lip bit, he’d be glad to oblige.

      Amelia groaned. Oh my God. I knew that this might happen! Now what in the world am I going to do? If he goes back to Tulip and tells, I’m ruined! Why him? And why now?

      Here he was, the man of her dreams sitting less than a foot away, and she had to fight the urge to run. At this point, the band swung into a loud jazzy number that made hearing nearly impossible. She leaned forward.

      “Excuse me, sir, but I didn’t hear your order. What did you say you wanted?”

      As she leaned, both men got a better than average look at a tightly encased bust threatening to spill from strapless red spandex.

      The room took another tilt as Tyler realized he had the strangest urge to lay this woman down beneath their table and peel that red stuff off of her a little bit at a… To his dismay, he verbalized his thoughts.

      “Want? I want you!” Oh, good God. What did I say? “Uh…I mean, I want you to excuse me. Seth, you order. I’ve got to…I need to…where’s the…?”

      Amelia breathed a sigh of relief. He didn’t recognize her. “First door on your left down the hall,” she said, and then waited to get their order as Tyler strode away from the table.

      Tyler leaned over the sink, splashing his face with cool water, although it wasn’t the part of his anatomy that needed cooling off. He stared blankly at the water droplets running down his face and absently blotted them with a handful of paper towels.

      “What in hell just happened to me?”

      But his reflection didn’t answer. From the looks of it, his reflection was just as scared as he was. This didn’t look good, but that woman surely did. He tossed the towels into the trash and headed out the door.

      Seth shoved a tall glass of cola in front of Tyler. “Are you all right? I didn’t think you needed anything alcoholic. You looked like you were getting sick.”

      He shrugged, unwilling to admit how she’d rattled him. “I’m okay. I don’t know what…”

      Something lacy and black caught the corner of his eye. Perfume wafted across his nostrils. Even in this din, even through the smoke, he smelled her coming.

      Amelia walked up behind him and set a small dish of peanuts on the table to go with their drinks.

      When her arm came across his line of vision, he jumped as if he’d been shot.

      Already nervous at being in such close proximity to a walking disaster, Amelia leaned down once more, shouting to be heard. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

      Tyler stared, once again lost in those blue-green eyes and that cloud of chestnut curls drifting around her face. If she bit her lip again he was in serious trouble.

      “That’s all right, miss…?” Seth Hastings waited with a smile on his face, expecting her to fill in the blanks with her name. She obliged.

      “My name is Amber,” she answered. “Will there be anything else?”

      Her name is Amber! Tyler grabbed her arm. “Yes.”

      She waited, and then waited some more as his fingers tightened around her wrist. She began to panic again. What if he was beginning to…? And then he shouted in her ear.

      “Bring me some nuts.”

      Seth’s grin widened perceptibly, which did not help Tyler’s unraveling composure.

      Amelia looked at him as if he’d grown horns and carefully pushed the dish toward him that she’d just placed on the table.

      He looked down at the salty, brown nuts and reluctantly let go of her wrist.

      “Oh…uh, thanks.”

      Seth rolled his eyes. This was getting better by the minute.

      “Will there be anything else?” Amelia asked. She was almost afraid to wait for the answer.

      “If there is, we’ll yell,” Seth said. “And thanks…Amber. You’re a doll.”

      Tyler frowned. He didn’t think he liked the fact that Seth just paid the woman a compliment. He grabbed his cola and downed it in one gulp, watching that bobbing bustle over the rim of his glass as Amber walked away.

      Seth grinned. “Old girlfriend?”

      “I wish,” Tyler muttered, and then grinned back at his friend’s owlish leer. “Just shut the hell up, Seth. I haven’t signed that contract yet. If you keep this up, I still may not.”

      Seth pursed his lips into a comical expression of propriety and calmly lifted the bowl of nuts from the table.

      “Here you go, Tyler, have a peanut.”

      Two

      It was almost closing time, and without doubt, the evening had been the longest of Amelia’s life. The relief of knowing that Tyler Savage hadn’t recognized her had left her weak and shaken. It was her first close call since she’d started living a double life.

      She fidgeted with the top of her suit as she gathered up her gear. With one last tug at its too-snug fit, she emptied her tips onto the bar and began to count. At least one good thing was coming out of this deceit. Her car fund was growing. At the other end of the bar, Raelene was performing a similar routine while employees began to clean up.

      And then a voice in Amelia’s ear made her jump. Her suit slipped a notch as she whirled around. Openmouthed, she clutched her suit with one hand and a wad of bills with the other as Tyler Savage leaned forward and poked a dollar bill lightly into the crevasse between her breasts.

      “You dropped this,” he explained, with an obliging grin.

      Amelia gasped, and yanked it out with a flourish. “Thank you,” she muttered, and spun around, anxious that he not see her so closely, face-to-face.

      “Amber…?”

      Her