“I can’t hear what they’re saying,” I whispered to Griffin.
He smiled. “It’s okay. I know Skeet well. Let’s let them conclude business, and then we’ll pay Skeet a visit.”
Good plan. Then I would know exactly what Donner had dragged my husband into. “Maybe we can get Juke to do some background investigation on Donner Walker.”
“Who?”
“The guy in the suit. I’m almost certain that’s who I overheard Scott having a conversation with at Gritz and Glitz. He was talking about going down for something. But the guy, Donner, said he had to stay the course. It sounded sketchy.” I couldn’t believe I was blabbing this to Griffin, but the thing was, I trusted him. Wasn’t like he didn’t already know that Scott was a turd.
“What’s Gritz and Glitz?”
“A gala thing. That doesn’t matter. I just suspect there is more to what Scott is doing than screwing me over.” A flash in the mirror caught my eye, and I saw Scott rise from his stool. He looked to be heading over to—“Shit.”
Griffin noted the movement behind me and dragged my stool toward him. Then he did something that stunned me. He leaned over and started nuzzling my neck. Like totally kissing it, his arm curving round me to bring me closer. My mind registered that he was protecting me from being busted, but my body liked it a little too much. For one thing, he was good at kissing necks. For another, his hands were on my body in such an intimate way that I felt the heat deep in my belly unfurl and do a little tap dance toward the basement, a place that had not felt such stirrings in quite a while.
“Shh,” Griffin warned, midsmooch, as I tried to relax. I felt him glance up. “Help ya?”
“You don’t happen to have change for a hundred, do you? The bartender’s short.” Scott sounded normal. Polite. The same as he always did.
“Nah, dude. Sorry,” Griffin said, sounding put out about having his make-out session interrupted.
“You got your hands full. I’ll leave you to it,” Scott said, sounding amused.
And it might have been spiteful of me, but I didn’t care. I cupped Griffin’s jaw and pulled his mouth to mine.
And Griffin wasn’t born yesterday. I mean, obviously. So he took what was offered, angling his head and tucking right into my lips like I was dessert. And though I knew I was going to lie to myself about this whole situation, convincing myself that we were merely two people acting into each other so my ass of a husband didn’t discover I was wearing a wig and spying on him, I let myself enjoy the heck out of that kiss. Griffin tasted hot, yeasty, and about as dangerous as that box of cinnamon rolls I had dipped into the previous day. I wanted to keep going, wanted to open my mouth, slide onto his lap, and straddle him. But that was wrong. Very wrong. Because like it or not, I was married. And I wasn’t a douchebag like my soon-to-be ex-husband.
So I broke the kiss and whispered, “Is he gone?”
Griffin nodded, and I swear, that man tried to look unaffected, but I could tell that our little lit match had left some smoke behind. Which meant satisfaction curled up inside me like a fat ol’ tom.
I mean, I knew I would be thinking about the scruff of his jaw, the way he smelled, and the way my body had craved more for many days. Griffin might as well have something to think about, too.
Risking a glance in the mirror, I saw Scott return and the old fella dig out a twenty from his ratty billfold, obviously covering his own beverage. The three men went back to their discussion as I sipped my beer to disguise the sudden jittery feeling that had nothing to do with the fear of getting caught by Scott and everything to do with my little break in sanity.
“So let’s try to look normal,” Griffin said, taking a sip of his beer. “So have you ever been fishing?”
“Fishing?”
“Like on a lake. Hook. Pole. Fishing.”
“Um, once when I was at summer camp. I didn’t really like killing the worms. Because then you used their poor dead carcasses to catch fish that you then also killed. It was a chain of killing.”
Griffin’s mouth twitched. “So you’re opposed to killing things for food.”
“No. I eat meat and fish.”
“Oh, so you’re opposed to the killing of the food but not the eating of the food.” He nodded, his face in mock thought. “Isn’t that a bit hypocritical?”
“Well, when you put it that way,” I said, rolling my eyes because I now understood that Griffin enjoyed getting under my skin. And I would really enjoy him getting under my jeans. Which was wrong. But maybe I could admit to myself that somewhere deep inside, under the vows I had taken and the morality code I had believed in, I was attracted to Griffin. And I would like to do dirty things to him.