She was immersed in the text from Letitia and wasn’t quite sure she’d heard that right. She flashed him a polite smile. “Of course.” Maybe he had a strict policy about silencing his phone while walking his dog.
After typing back a quick reply for Letitia to manage a glitch in a probate court issue, Suzanne took a bite of her salmon. Perfect.
The next few minutes were all about eating, sipping wine, and getting used to being silent in snippets around a new guy.
Promising. This was looking promising, though the lack of reciprocal interest had her on edge.
Maybe DoggieDate wasn’t such a bad idea after all. Kari had told her about it—the mystery shopping company she worked for had lost the account to a competitor—and Suzanne had made a profile there just last week.
Chandler’s quick response and request for a lunch date had been a welcome break from all the dick pics and requests for hookups that came with most sites.
But he was only talking about the dogs now, and that made her wonder.
“How do you handle elimination?” he asked smoothly, as if they were talking about retirement account investment allocations.
“Elimination?”
“Yes. Do you glove up? Bag the waste?” He leaned in, his Patek Philippe watch glittering as a skylight ushered in rays of sunshine after clouds parted. Funny how that status symbol followed quirky guys. “Or do you use dog diapers?” He whispered the last two words with reverence, then licked his lower lip.
She recoiled, the bite of salmon in her mouth suddenly tasting like mulch.
“You—I—well, I use a glove and bags. Always,” she added. Was this some kind of purity test to see if she was a responsible dog owner?
“And a muzzle?”
“No. Never! Why would I do that?”
His face fell.
“Sometimes it’s necessary, especially when a puppy is being very, very bad.” His eyes widened and he took a big swig of his wine.
The way he said bad made her spine tingle, and not in an arousing way.
The date just went from promising to rescue text in three minutes.
A new record.
“Do you have a picture of Joe?” she asked suddenly, eager for any option that took them out of this disturbing discussion.
“No. Why would I carry a picture of my dog in my wallet?” The look he gave her said she was the crazy one. Disarmingly charming and decidedly manipulative, Chandler’s ability to make her feel an array of emotions set off alarms.
It was one thing to be attracted to a guy and lose internal control.
It was another to have him keep the ground beneath her emotional feet shifting constantly.
“Let’s get down to business,” he said, as Suzanne put her knife and fork down, stomach in rebellion, all hope of salvaging the date long gone. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but the conversation had turned in such a way that she was done.
“Yes?”
Business? Was he another networker like Steve? Regrouping, she put on her badass hat and made a mental note to reach out to Kari for another ice cream run tonight. Sheesh.
“You have something I want. I have something you want. We could have a fine relationship meeting each other’s needs.”
Blunt. She had to give him credit for being blunt.
“Other than the muzzle issue, I like your style, Suzanne.” He reached for her hand, his thumb caressing the broad line into the wrist. “I like a woman who knows how to control her puppy.”
He kept calling Smoochy a puppy. Strange.
“I don’t really need to control dogs. As long as they behave, it’s easy,” she said, using a casual tone but measuring her words carefully.
“And if they don’t behave?” The stroking turned warm, his hand heating up. The pulse at the base of his throat started throbbing so hard she could see a blue bulge of vein. He swallowed. Was he starting to sweat?
“I don’t know. I’d put them in their crate.”
“Yes,” he answered, the word like a hiss. Chandler shifted in his seat, pupils dilating.
The guy was getting aroused talking about dogs?
“And then what, Suzanne? What if you had a puppy who wouldn’t stop sniffing your crotch?”
She stood so fast her napkin went flying up and knocked over her partially-full glass of wine, which tipped toward him. A drop rolled across the table, like a line of blood, soaked into the cloth before it could hit the edge on his side.
“What are you talking about?” she snapped. People turned to stare at the commotion. Chandler’s eyes went flinty cold, his nostrils flaring.
He did not stand.
“Sit. Now.”
“I’m not a dog you can order around!” she protested, reaching down for her purse and resuming eye contact. Instinct kicked in. Not flight, though she was about to leave.
Fight.
Don’t back down. Call him out. Override the fear.
He flushed. Not from embarrassment, but damn—he was turned on.
“Please sit down.”
“No. I’m done.” She turned on her heel, not even certain why this was over, but absolutely convinced that leaving was the right choice.
He followed. She no longer cared about the bill, or the scene they were making, or anything else. Escape was paramount. The guy was off.
“Suzanne, I believe there’s been a mistake,” he said from behind her, and then he made a mistake.
A big mistake.
He grabbed her arm.
Her elbow met his solar plexus with the kind of artistic grace and perfect timing that made the split-second connection an object of beauty, its own entity independent of time and space.