Her Perfect Stranger. Jill Shalvis

and crashing for the night in preparation of the crazy week ahead, he didn’t budge. And when the guy behind him vacated his barstool, Mike took it for himself.

      “Don’t bother,” the woman said without even looking at him as she continued to sip her drink, staring directly ahead.

      Mike made himself comfortable, which included smiling at the pretty female bartender. “Don’t bother what?”

      “Trying to charm me out of my panties.”

      Mike laughed. This woman was truly sexy as hell, gorgeous as sin, cool and regal, and funny. A rarity. “Now why would I try do to that?” he asked innocently, though now that she’d planted the thought, he could think of nothing else.

      “Why? Hmm. Maybe because I have breasts? I don’t know.” She shrugged. “It’s a male genetic disorder, I guess.”

      Mike laughed. “You mean I can’t help myself? That’s a handy excuse, indeed.”

      She looked at him then, a hint of a smile on her lips. “That’s right. As a man, you can’t help your self, you’re just a helpless slave to your body’s cravings. Will that help you sleep at night?”

      “Oh, yes. Thank you.” Mike cocked his head and studied her. She was warming up, no doubt thanks to her drink. There was a blush to her cheeks now, and when she crossed her legs—remarkably well-toned legs, he couldn’t help but notice—they appeared to be drying nicely.

      “To be quite honest,” he said. “I hadn’t entertained the notion of charming you out of your panties at all.”

      She slanted him a doubtful glance.

      “Really.” He lifted his hands in an innocent gesture. “Before you came, I was just going up to bed.”

      “Don’t let me stop you.”

      But she did. Everything about her stopped him cold, and it wasn’t just that her nipples were pressing against the material of her blouse, or that her skirt clung to her perfectly rounded hips. It wasn’t just that she smelled like heaven and sin all in one, or that he knew instinctively that her skin would be soft and creamy and in need of being warmed up by his hands and mouth. He couldn’t name exactly what kept him there watching her, why she fascinated him so.

      Everything in his home country fascinated him, and he enjoyed being back after so long away, even given the work ahead of him. He needed lengthy training for the upcoming mission, training that would keep him busy day and night until launch, only four months off now. He’d be far from his own place, which happened to be a suitcase more often than not these days. In fact, he was no longer certain where home really was. He and his four brothers were close, but they were also scattered across the globe, in various military branches. So was his father.

      His mother, a native Russian, had died when Mike—named Mikhail by her—was very young, which was probably why, when he’d had the chance to go to Russia after his stint in the Air Force, he’d jumped at it, wanting to understand the heritage he’d missed. He’d welcomed the opportunity to stay there, in the cosmonaut space program, working on the International Space Station. It was a lifestyle he loved, but he suddenly realized how isolated from female companionship he’d been lately.

      A sharp bolt of lightning startled the large, noisy bar into an instant of collective silence. Thunder rolled immediately on its tail, and after another instant of stunned quiet, the room went back to its dull roar.

      The woman next to him pushed her drink away and sighed. She shivered once, then crossed her arms. “Well. Back to work.”

      Yeah, he should be working, too. He had plenty of reading to do. From now until launch, he’d be living and sleeping this mission, running like crazy to catch up with his crew—whom he’d not yet met—and who’d been training together for a year and a half already. He looked forward to meeting everyone involved, but at the moment, as the woman next to him shivered again, work and everything that went with it were far from his mind. “You have business at this hour?” he asked, slipping out of his jacket and putting it around her shoulders. “What do you do?”

      Those midnight-blue eyes shot his hands a sharp glance, causing him to lift them from her shoulders. “I have some reading to catch up on,” she said, snuggling deeper into his jacket. “Thanks for the coat.”

      “Reading?”

      “I don’t really care to discuss it.”

      “Touchy about work,” he said with an agreeable nod. “Duly noted.”

      “Good.”

      “How about your name? Are you touchy about that, too?”

      Reaching once more for her drink, she tossed her head back as she downed the last of it, then licked her lips in an uncalculated, outrageously sexy move that made Mike want to groan. “Tonight,” she eventually said, her full, bottom lip wet now from her own tongue, “I’m touchy about everything.” But she made no move to get up. “I don’t want to talk about my job, my name, my life. I don’t want to talk about politics or headlines.” She lifted those amazing eyes to his. “Still want to have a conversation with me or have I scared you off yet?”

      There was more than a little dare in her expression, and Mike, the youngest of four boys in a military family, had never, not once in his life, walked away from a dare.

      Lightning struck just then, and when the thunder came right on its heels, everyone in the room oohed and aahed.

      Not the woman sitting next to him, though. Her gaze remained intense and direct and right on his, so that he hardly noticed the ruckus going on outside. He did, however, notice the growing crowd, as more people made their way in from the storm. Which was fine by him, as it forced him slightly closer to the woman still waiting for his answer.

      “I don’t scare easily,” he eventually said.

      “I’m losing my touch then.”

      “Tell me your name.”

      “Why?”

      “I feel the need to call you something.”

      “Fine. Call me Lola.” She lifted a brow in what might have been either self-deprecation or wry humor. “Yes, tonight Lola will do.”

      Oh, definitely, she was warming up. Her skin was glowing and rosy. And her hair was starting to curl as it dried, with little wisps falling in her face even though she kept shoving them back.

      “Usually men quake in their boots when I walk by,” she noted casually. “I have quite the reputation for being terrifying at work.”

      “Ah, but we’re not talking about work, remember? And not your real name, or life, or politics, or headlines.”

      At her own words repeated back, her lips curved. “You’re not a local. You don’t have the slow Southern ways. And you don’t have the accent, either, that lazy, drawn-out way of speaking that makes so many women want to swoon.”

      He sent her a lazy, drawn-out smile and drawled in a perfect imitation of an Alabama local, “I can make up the accent, if it’d make you swoon.”

      “Is it real?”

      “The smile? Or the accent?”

      “Either.”

      “Are you trying to charm me out of my panties?”

      “You have quite a memory,” she said, but smiled at her own expense. “I’ll have to quit giving you things to make fun of me with.”

      “I wasn’t making fun,” Mike assured her. “Much.”

      “Hmm.” She studied him with a sidelong glance. “You’ve very neatly avoided telling me if you’re a local or not.”

      “Maybe your need for anonymity tonight goes both ways.” Without thinking, he lifted a hand and stroked her cheek.

      At the contact, she