Lucky Charm by Valerie Douglas Page A

group led Steve away, talking to him intensely at the other end of the bar.
    “You should see Carly’s new hottie,” Miriam was saying with a lift of her chin to Aidan and a few of the others. “Went past them on the way to the bathroom. They’ve huddled in that back booth all night.”
    With a grin, Aidan said, “The ice queen strikes again,” as he turned to look.
    Ariel turned, too, to see who they were talking about.
    She froze.
    Thick blond hair. Beautiful green eyes. Matthew.
    She could only agree when Miriam referred to him as a hottie.
    Now in a polo shirt that made the most of his broad shoulders, muscled chest and narrow waist, he looked fantastic. He wore khaki slacks more suited to the woman beside him than the jeans he’d been wearing when she’d met him. To be honest, Ariel had liked him better in the jeans. They had seemed to suit the man she knew. The dark t-shirt, too.
    The woman, well, Ariel understood exactly what Aidan had said about ice queen.
    She was one of those blondes with classic features, a fall of straight hair and cool blue-gray eyes. Tall, thin and distant. Sitting side by side with Matthew the way he was dressed, they looked like the perfect country club couple.
    Had her instincts gone so bad in the years since she had last dated?
    It hadn’t been the circumstances in which she’d found him that had made her want to make love to him, it had been the look on his face and in his green eyes when he’d seen her there. Fear for her. Battered, beaten and bruised, she’d watched him try to gather himself for the effort to protect her. It had been there in that moment of hesitation that morning when he realized where he was, who he was with and stopped, although he’d clearly been aroused. She’d known in that moment that if she said no, he would have. She still thought so, or maybe she just wanted to believe that. He wasn’t the type to hop from bed to bed, or so she’d thought. Maybe she’d been wrong. Maybe shed misjudged him. Maybe her own longing and loneliness had given him character he didn’t really possess.
    For some reason it hurt, although it shouldn’t have and she knew shouldn’t let it. She hardly knew him. This was what happened when you let down your guard.
     
    Matt looked up as the attention from a few of those at the bar turned their way just at the moment Carly leaned in to whisper something in his ear, something he missed completely for the look in Ariel’s dark-fringed bright blue eyes. They were so very blue in contrast to her fair skin and dark hair.
    Confusion, doubt and disappointment.
    She lowered her eyes and looked quickly away, as if ashamed, and that stung.
     
    From the end of the bar, Steve called, “Shots for everyone, on me. Set ‘em up.”
    Shots? Ariel glanced toward him, grateful for the excuse to look somewhere, anywhere else than at Matt, until she saw the expression in Steve’s eyes and the spitefulness reflected in them. He’d drunk her margarita and found out there was no alcohol in it. Not knowing why she didn’t drink, he was trying to put her on the spot. She glanced across to the booth where Matt sat and as quickly away.
    It had been fun for a while but all the pleasure had suddenly disappeared. She’d misjudged everything tonight.
    “Miriam,” Ariel said, “I’m going to go.”
    “Aw, but Ariel the fun’s just getting started,” Miriam protested as she accepted her shot.
    With a small smile, Ariel said, “I have a long drive tomorrow afternoon. It’s better if I go. Thanks for bringing me, though.”
    “To Ariel, a toast,” Steve called. “Come on, Ariel. There’s one for you, too. You have to drink to this one.”
    Taking a deep breath, she said evenly, “No, I don’t. Good night, everyone. Have fun.”
    Ariel went resolutely out the door into the humid Fort Lauderdale night, looking for a cab.
    She felt stupid and foolish. How had she misjudged Matthew so badly? She wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt