But Garrett didn’t seem to be interested in cooling methods anymore. His chocolate-brown eyes narrowed, glittering with a mixture of amusement and curiosity as he studied her chest. “Are you…uh, lactating?”
Huh?
She quickly glanced down, suppressing a groan when she saw the round water stain that had seeped from her bra right through her thin yellow tank top.
“Ice,” she blurted.
“Pardon me?”
“An ice cube fell down my shirt.”
He gave a husky little laugh that made her ni**les harden again. Damn it. Everything about this man was way too appealing. His warrior body, his messy dark hair and teasing eyes, his laughter. She’d been attracted to Garrett from the second he’d sauntered into her bakery last year to buy a cake for his commander’s birthday. He’d requested the most obscene message to be written in icing, and from that moment on, she’d been a goner.
Maybe she was through with dating military men, but she knew that all John Garrett had to do was ask and she’d have her clothes off in a nanosecond.
But he didn’t ask. He never asked. In the year she’d known him Garrett hadn’t shown one iota of interest in getting naked with her.
“You should take off your shirt.”
Until now.
She managed a startled laugh. “Really? Why is that?”
His smile was boyishly innocent. “Because it’s all wet. Or, if you’d prefer, I could get a couple more of those ice cubes and rub them over your right breast. You know, so you match.”
She laughed again, this time to cover up the zing of arousal she’d just felt at the words “rub” and “your” and “breast” coming out of this man’s sexy mouth. He was obviously joking around. He had to be. Because although she’d imagined Garrett’s hands on her br**sts countless times before, she knew the fantasy would forever stay in her imagination. If John Garrett wanted her, he’d have made a move a long time ago.
So instead of responding to his flirty remark, she said, “You’ll miss the end of your game.”
Something that resembled disappointment flickered in his dark eyes. “Yeah.” He coughed. “You’re right. I should, uh, head back in there. Sorry I came in here and bugged you.”
What? He thought he was bugging her?
She opened her mouth to tell him he could hang out with her a bit longer, that she wasn’t trying to shoo him away, but he turned around before she could say a word. She got a glimpse of his taut backside disappearing through the doorway leading into the café and then he was gone.
Well.
Shelby leaned her elbows on the counter and rested her flushed face in her hands.
What exactly just happened here? She replayed the entire scene in her mind, starting with the way Garrett walked in and demanded she turn on the air conditioner and ending with his offer to rub her br**sts. And then, of course, his abrupt departure.
Had she done something wrong? Had she not flirted enough? She would have flirted more, but she hadn’t seen the point. She’d tried it before, and Garrett always brushed off her suggestive remarks, making it obvious that he wasn’t interested but never making her feel as if she were inadequate or anything. He genuinely seemed to like her, but after a year of friendship it was clear he wasn’t into her the way she was into him.
“You don’t want to get involved with him anyway,” she muttered to herself.
The reminder helped, but only a little. Yeah, she wasn’t interested in dating an officer again, but…but damn it, she really wished John Garrett would have sex with her.
“Another shot for our lovely hostess?”
She looked up and found Paul, the married lieutenant, by the counter, yet again holding the tequila bottle and a shot glass in his hands. The guy was obviously trying to get her drunk, and she wondered if she ought to tell him that no amount of tequila would convince her to sleep with a married man. Nah. He’d find out soon enough, especially if he did something stupid, like grope her. If he did that, then he’d also find out she was pretty damn good at kicking him in the balls.
“I’m already feeling tipsy,” she admitted, eyeing the bottle warily.
“Tipsy, shmipsy! It’s the first heat wave of the summer! It’s a special occasion.”
Had he just said tipsy shmipsy?
Trying not to laugh, Shelby tucked her hair behind her ears. “No thanks, I’ll pass.”
She couldn’t go upstairs until the Padres game ended, but drinking herself stupid was no way to pass the time until everyone left. And it wasn’t like another drink would help her forget that John Garrett, her long-time fantasy, was in the other room, not wanting to sleep with her.
No amount of tequila could make her forget that.
“Face it, she’s just not into you,” Carson Scott said with a shrug.
Garrett forced his gaze to stay glued on the television and not drift in the direction of the doorway separating the café from the bakery. His peripheral vision caught a flash of movement—Shelby rounding the counter to chat with Lieutenant Paul Aston and his tequila bottle. Oh shit. Did Lieutenant Asshole actually think he had a flying f**k of a chance of getting Shelby Harper into bed? Dream on, brother.
Shelby would never mess around with a married man. Or at least that’s what Garrett kept telling himself.
Because in all honesty, the thought of his sweet, sexy Shelby burning up the sheets with Lieutenant Asshole, or any man for that matter, caused jealousy to spiral down his chest and seize his intestines like a death vise.