She rubbed the tears from her eyes and frowned. “Oh my god, I’m a train wreck,” she rasped. “I’m not usually this terrible a date.” She looked at him with big wet eyes but then frowned. “Actually, I’m not sure that’s true. I don’t think I’ve ever been this bad before, but it’s been a while. Maybe I’m rusty.”

Alejandro’s smile widened as Deja tried not to start coughing again and word-vomited about how sad her life was. And when she was done making a fool of herself — hopefully — he handed the glass back to her.

She took slow sips of water this time and refused to meet his eyes.

“This is the best date I’ve had in a while,” he said, pulling her eyes back to his.

“That only makes sense if it’s your first date ever,” she quipped and then shook her head. “No, please don’t respond to that. I don’t actually want to know about your dating life. I’m not trying to pry. It’s too much. Too soon.”

“That’s fine. We have a lot of time,” he offered carefully. “But if you are ever interested, I’m an open book.” The mattress depressed by Deja’s right hip under his fist and the weight of his shifting body. Her eyes moved to his hand, so close to her bare leg, and she shivered. “In the meantime,” he whispered, letting that sentence dangle between them. The air crackled with tension and possibility.

Deja lifted her eyes to his slowly. She felt self-conscious and unsure, but not in the way she normally did; feelings fed by loneliness and insecurity. No, the goosebumps slowly erupting on her body — starting on the hip closest to Alejandro’s hand — were about anything but insecurity. If anything, when she locked eyes with Alejandro and saw the naked hunger in his gaze, and the almost casual, but deeply suggestive, smile on his face, she felt powerful for the first time, in ways she hadn’t in years. And oddly enough, that power was more disorienting than feeling weak.

“Why don’t you wear your glasses more often?” she blurted out.

“I prefer contacts,” he said with a shrug. “Glasses make me look…” He let the sentence trail off with a sheepish grin and another shrug.

Deja’s brow furrowed, and she tilted her head to the left, peering at him with disbelief. “Hot? Is the next word you were going to say hot? Or fine? Or beautiful? Sexy?”

A warm blush spread across his cheeks, and he bit his bottom lip to stem the laughter she could see building in his chest.

She was equal parts exasperated at him for insinuating his glasses weren’t literally the equivalent of makeup on an already beautiful woman and charmed as hell by the shyness she’d never seen on his face before.