Start Me Up. Victoria Dahl

flirty little red shirt that showed off her shoulders. She chewed on her lip and tugged a few brown curls into compliance. He let his eyes slide all the way down to her bare feet…and bright red toenails.

      “Nice toes,” he said stupidly, and watched them curl against the carpet. Clearly he needed to finish the beer. Who the hell told a girl she had nice toes?

      When she’d had enough of him staring at her feet, Lori spun for the kitchen and opened the oven. “Another few minutes,” she muttered. “I’ll make the salad.” By “make,” she apparently meant “get out the bag” because she cut open a plastic bag and dumped the salad into two bowls while Quinn smiled at her back.

      Her shoulders were straight and beautifully pale, brushed by shiny, bouncy curls as she moved. He caught her profile as she went back to the fridge for salad dressing and couldn’t help but lose himself in the careful line of her throat and chest. Her breasts were small, but they rose in a graceful curve that drew the eye. No wonder she wore that baggy outfit at work. The men in her employ would get nothing done if she showed up like this.

      “Do you want to go to The Bar after dinner?” he blurted out.

      Her head popped up and she frowned. “Why?”

      “Because I didn’t bring any wine.”

      “And you think they’d have good wine at The Bar?”

      Well, she had a point. The place was so old and crusty it didn’t even have a real name. “To Aspen then,” he corrected. “There’s a great wine bar on Hopkins Avenue.”

      “Did you talk to Molly today?” Lori suddenly demanded.

      “I—”

      She cut him off by slamming the dressing bottle onto the counter. “Damn it, I told her I didn’t want to date you!”

      Quinn wondered if the air conditioner had just kicked on with a vengeance. All the pleasant warmth of the evening vanished in an instant and left him in the freezing cold. “Really?”

      “Yes!” Lori ran her hands over her face, then shook her head before she met his eyes. “I’m so sorry, Quinn. I’d love to date you, honestly, but that’s not what I’m looking for right now.”

      Now he was confused. That sounded a lot like, “It’s not you, it’s me,” except that they’d never even gone to lunch. “I see,” was all he could say.

      “I can’t believe this,” she muttered.

      “Look, I just wanted to take you out for a drink, and maybe we could—”

      “Whatever she told you, I am not going to use you for sex.”

      The imaginary air conditioner switched off. So did his brain.

      “Not that I wouldn’t love to!” she went on. “But it’s really about random, meaningless fun, not dating. I’m not in a good place for dating right now. I’m sorry you were dragged into this. She just won’t drop it.”

      “Who?” he rasped.

      “Molly! What did she tell you to get you over here?”

      Quinn clutched the beer bottle tighter, feeling the smooth glass press his skin, grounding himself so that he could make his brain work. “Molly hasn’t called me in weeks.”

      Though she’d been reaching for her own beer, Lori’s hand froze just an inch from the bottle. “Excuse me?”

      “I’m not quite sure what you’re talking about.”

      Her hand fell away to hover near her side. “That doesn’t…No. Why would you be here if Molly hadn’t called?”

      Maybe she wasn’t as smart as he’d always thought. “Lori, I came over to ask you out. Period. It’s not that complicated.”

      “Oh.” The pink started right at the skin just above her shirt and floated inexorably higher, past her collarbones, then up her neck to her jaw. Her cheeks flamed redder than the rest of her skin. “Oh, God. Are you sure?”

      “Very sure. But what were you saying about using me for sex?”

      Her body tilted slightly to the left, then the right. Alarmed, Quinn was moving toward her, meaning to grab her elbow and help her to a seat, but the oven timer went off and the sound snapped her straight.

      She moved stiffly to the oven, grabbed a hot pad, and in a moment she was standing at the counter, staring down at a perfectly roasted chicken and a loaf of hot bread. “Okay,” she said to the poultry. “Okay.”

      “Lori—”

      “No, just…Let’s have dinner. I’m sorry there’s not more. I was just going to have a salad and…Oh, Jesus.”

      Quinn let silence fall, utterly unsure of how he should proceed. His thoughts were ping-ponging back and forth, running into each other like drunk kids in a mosh pit. When Lori moved, grabbing plates to set the table, he jumped on the opportunity to give them both time and took her beer and the bottle of dressing.

      Sex. Lori Love wanted sex.

      He grabbed the salads and carried them over while Lori brought the chicken.

      No dating. Just sex. Nothing else.

      He watched her hips as she hurried back to the fridge and let himself imagine. Sex. With Lori. The images came easy and quick.

      Once the food was served and all the busywork ran out, they both lowered themselves slowly into chairs and looked anywhere but at each other as they dug into the salad.

      Though he’d never been into meaningless sex, Quinn wasn’t above liking the idea of it. And, actually, it would solve one of the more serious problems in his life: he was a terrible boyfriend. Seriously bad. Out of all the women he’d dated, not one had been happy for more than a month.

      He forgot things, important things like dates and birthdays. On the phone, he had the attention span of a gnat. Worked late more often than not and liked to read books about engineering when he got home. It was a sad measure of a relationship when a woman grew jealous of New Physics in Architecture.

      Quinn started on the chicken.

      Considering his track record, asking Lori out in the first place had probably been idiotic. But if they kept it meaningless and casual…None of his shortcomings would matter, would they? They’d simply go their separate ways, some very nice memories between them.

      A few minutes later, Quinn set down his fork and raised his eyes. Lori kept chewing for a few moments, until she noticed his attention and swallowed hard.

      “What?” she asked.

      “Did you mean what you said?”

      Relief softened the anxiety on her face, but her smile popped into place with too much brightness. “No! No, of course not. I was obviously joking. Duh.”

      “Mmm-hmm.” He stared at her until she squirmed, then stared some more.

      Her smile vanished. “What?”

      “Because if you weren’t joking—and I don’t think you were—then I’d like to volunteer.”

      “Volunteer?” she breathed. “For what?”

      Quinn took a deep breath and placed his hands flat on the table for balance. “I’d like to have meaningless sex with you, Lori Love.”

      T HE ROOM WAS spinning and hot. A convection oven of mortification spiced with a hint of lust.

      Quinn Jennings had just propositioned her in the most inappropriate way. The last thing she’d ever expected.

      “We can’t do that,” she blurted out.

      “Why not?”

       Because I like you, was her first thought, but that was ridiculous. Did she want to have sex