So Irresistible by Lisa Plumley Read Free Book Online Page B

after-work drinks forever,” Gabriella said. “You guys know me. I’m not giving up. Not ever.”
    Their conspicuous glares argued otherwise.
    Oh yeah . To them, her retreat to Astoria looked like giving up. Well, they didn’t know the whole story. She wasn’t telling it tonight, either. She was too tired, too stressed, too . . .
    . . . distracted by the guy at the other end of the bar. Whoa .
    For at least a minute, while her tattooed and multiply pierced coworkers razzed Frosty about (a) his telling Gabriella where the after-work drinks were happening, (b) the origins of his new nickname, and (c) his unbelievable good luck in snaring Jennifer for the night, Gabriella only stared at the newcomer.
    Somehow, he didn’t look like anyone else in the place. For one thing, he wasn’t sporting a chin full of hipster facial hair. That was a dead giveaway of a non-Portlander male. For another, he didn’t seem affiliated with any particular group of boisterous lifers in the foodservice biz. He appeared decidedly on his own.
    Most interestingly, he wasn’t glaring at Gabriella. He wasn’t sulking over an irreversible decision she’d made. He wasn’t waiting for her to disappoint him. Instead, he was just sitting there at the end of the brewpub’s bar, looking tall, dark, and ridiculously handsome, from his broad shoulders to his vintage T-shirt–covered chest to his laundered, beat-up jeans.
    Ordinarily, Gabriella didn’t go for the clean-but-scruffy type. She liked her men polished, ambitious, and articulate. She liked her men in suits and ties, taking charge and taking names.
    But something about him seemed particularly compelling.
    Maybe it was his hands. They looked deft and limber as he lifted his bottle of Black Butte Porter—the same brand Gabriella favored—to his mouth. Or maybe it was his lips. They looked full and sensual and wonderfully capable of kissing someone into not cataloguing his better qualities for half the night. Or maybe, Gabriella mused, it was all of him. Because she liked what she saw . . . and her body reacted to that, completely without her say-so.
    All on its own, her heartbeat sped up. Her knees went weak. Her mouth went dry—but the rest of her felt juicier than ever.
    In a rush, every feel-good impulse Gabriella had stifled since returning to Portland flowed over her, making the idea of getting to know Mr. Mysterious sound like an unmissable item on tonight’s decadent to-do list. Not to exaggerate the point, but he looked like sex appeal on steroids. His laughter carried across the brewpub. And when he smiled at a flirtatious woman who’d stopped to talk to him—shaking his head in a friendly denial of whatever she’d asked from him—he looked . . . incredible .
    Yes, the rest of him was good. Really good. But packaged with that killer smile of his? He was downright amazing.
    Gabriella had to know more.
    She leaned toward Pinkie. “Hey. Who’s that guy?”
    Her friend peered down the bar. She did a double take. “Damn! I don’t know, but my ladyparts and I want to find out.”
    At her friend’s bug-eyed, lascivious expression, Gabriella laughed. “No way. I saw him first. He’s mine.”
    After the tough week she’d had, Gabriella figured she deserved him. She deserved to treat herself. So she pushed away from the bar, smoothed down her dress, and headed over to make his acquaintance the same way she did everything else in life.
    Straightforwardly. Boldly. With no holds barred.
    It was past time to blow off some steam, Gabriella decided—and Mr. Mysterious looked like just the man to do it with.

Chapter Four
    At the same moment that Shane stood, the woman he’d been watching across the brewpub got up from her bar stool, smoothed down her sexy black dress, and headed straight toward him.
    They were on a collision course.
    That was exactly the way Shane liked it. Because the reason he’d stood was so he could get to know the pixie-haired hottie with the skimpy dress and