Don’t Deny Me: Part Two Read Online Free PDF Page A

hives, but somehow a case of light beer and some tortilla chips just didn’t seem like the right thing to bring to this kind of party. How he’d even managed to become a part of this crowd, he had no idea, but he was glad he had, because of Alice.
    “Jay and Alice are driving together and they’re on their way. Paul called to say he’d be here in a half hour. Dayna is coming, too. You haven’t met her yet. She’s a friend of mine from work. Tanya unfortunately won’t make it, she’s actually moved to Ohio to take a new job. But that makes room for new friends!” Cookie peeked into the basket and made a sound of appreciation. “Oh, this looks wonderful. You didn’t have to, Mick.”
    “Of course I did. My mom told me never to go to a party without taking something for the hostess.” Mick followed her inside and carefully closed the door behind him, then waited for an awkward second. “So … should I put …”
    Cookie, halfway up the stairs to the living room, turned. “Oh! Do you mind the rumpus room bedroom? You had it last time, and I know some people don’t care for it, but—”
    “No, that’s great, actually.” Mick looked toward the stairs to the lower level. “Let the wild rumpus start, right?”
    Cookie laughed. “Get settled, and then come upstairs. I’m going to slice this bread and we can have wine. You drink wine, don’t you, Mick?”
    “I’ll drink whatever you have,” he told her honestly, and took his things into the small basement room he’d used the last time. He tossed his bag on the bed, thinking he’d unpack it later, if at all, but for a second he sat. Testing the mattress. Thinking about Alice and if this was where they’d finally make good on all those subtle promises they’d been making to each other over the past couple of months.
    The thought stirred him up, so he forced himself to stand. In the small attached bathroom, Mick splashed his face with cool water. For good measure, he brushed his teeth. They hadn’t talked about how they were going to handle sharing what they’d been up to with the rest of the weekend crowd, but he was sure that if he had the chance to kiss Alice, he was going to take it.
    Upstairs in the kitchen, Mick took a glass of wine and plate of bread, cheese, and mustard, along with some small sausages Cookie had cut. Bernie offered him a cigar, too. Mick wasn’t much of a smoker, but when in Rome, he supposed.
    “Living like kings,” Bernie said.
    “And queens,” Cookie added archly. “But smoke outside.”
    On the deck, Mick tried not to pace or act antsy, though as forty minutes and then almost an hour passed without Alice’s arrival, he was starting to go a little nuts. Paul showed up laden with bottles of wine with labels the names of which Mick couldn’t even pronounce.
    “How’s it going?” Paul leaned against the railing, a glass of wine in his hand. He held out his hand for Mick’s cigar.
    After a second, Mick gave it to him. He watched the other man take a long puff and then look over the cigar with an assessing eye. He waved it away when Paul offered to hand it back, though. “You keep it.”
    “Not into cigars?”
    Not into sharing them with other dudes he barely knew, Mick thought, but shrugged an answer, instead. He sipped his wine and listened for the sound of tires crunching on the gravel. The French doors opened behind them, and he was already turning at the sound of a new female voice, but it wasn’t Alice. A pretty blonde in a flowy sundress stood there.
    “Hi. I’m Dayna. Cookie sent me out here to meet you … Mick?” She pointed at him. “And Paul?”
    Paul straightened. “Well, hey, now. Hi.”
    Dayna laughed and shook her head, her blond ponytail swinging. She stepped carefully out onto the deck, her feet bare. She’d painted her toenails red, Mick noticed. Everything about her seemed designed to make a man notice.
    She shook Paul’s hand, then turned to Mick. “Hi.”
    He shook it, but didn’t let