Accidental Swipe on a CEO

First Date III

“I lost a bet.”

I blinked. “That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

I stared at him, trying to decide if he was serious. “You’re telling me you went through all of that just because of a bet?”

“Yes.”

No hesitation, no embarrassment, nothing. I leaned back slowly, studying him in a new light.

“That might be the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”

“It’s not the first time I’ve been told that.”

“Do you usually follow through on dares like this?”

“Only when they interest me.”

“And this interested you?” I asked.

His gaze held mine, steady and deliberate. “You did.”

My breath caught slightly. I looked down at my glass, trying to ignore the way something warm and unfamiliar settled in my chest.

“You already knew what I looked like,” I said after a moment, my voice quieter now. “My profile wasn’t exactly mysterious.”

“No,” he agreed. I glanced up at him. “But that wasn’t the part I found interesting.”

Something in the way he said it made it difficult to respond. There was no exaggeration in his tone, no attempt to charm. If anything, it sounded like a simple statement of fact.

I shifted slightly in my seat, suddenly aware of how still the air between us had become before I could say anything else, a faint chill brushed against my skin.

At first, I ignored it, assuming it was nothing more than the contrast between outside and the cool interior but as the seconds passed, it settled more noticeably, raising a faint line of goosebumps along my arms. I resisted the urge to rub them barely.

“You’re cold.”

I looked up, startled. “I’m fine,” I said automatically.

He didn’t look convinced. His gaze moved briefly to my hands resting on the table, then back to my face, as though confirming something.

“May I?” he asked. The question caught me off guard.

“May you…?”

“Warm your hands.” For a second, I just stared at him. The request was so unexpected, so oddly specific, that it took a moment to process. “You don’t have to….” I started.

“Jana.” My name, spoken quietly, stopped me. There was no pressure in it, no insistence, just a calm kind of patience. I hesitated, then nodded once.

“Okay.”

He reached across the table slowly, giving me enough time to pull away if I wanted to, I didn’t. His hands closed gently around mine, warm. That was the first thing I noticed. My breath hitched slightly at the contact, the sudden awareness of how close we actually were. His grip wasn’t tight, just enough to hold my hands between his, his thumbs brushing lightly across my skin as if testing the temperature.

“You weren’t exaggerating,” he murmured.

I swallowed, forcing myself to meet his gaze. “I said I was fine.”

“You’re not,” he said simply.

I opened my mouth to argue, then stopped because the truth was, I wasn’t. And for some reason, sitting there with my hands in his, it didn’t feel necessary to pretend otherwise. The warmth spread slowly, seeping into my fingers, my palms, lingering longer than it should have or maybe I was just more aware of it than I should have been, neither of us spoke for a moment, we didn’t need to.

I became acutely aware of everything, the soft hum of conversation around us, the faint clink of cutlery, the steady rhythm of my own heartbeat and him.

“Do you always do this?” I asked quietly.

His thumbs stilled slightly against my skin. “Do what?”

“Take care of people you barely know.”

A faint smile touched his lips, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes.

“Only when I decide they’re worth it.”

My breath caught again, softer this time. “That’s a very selective system.”

“It works for me. “I shook my head lightly, though I didn’t pull my hands away. “You say things like that very easily.”

“Would you prefer I didn’t?”

“I don’t know yet,” I admitted.