“First off, I love that you can fight. Second, I’m glad you didn’t try to take me down, because those boots are sexy as sin but look lethal as hell, and third, I’m psyched that my buds called me pathetic and made me get on the app, because I’m having a great time with you tonight.”

Those tingles? They sweep faster through me. They race along my skin. “Me too, Logan. Me too.”

He scrapes a hand across his jaw, his expression a bit nervous. Or maybe it’s not nerves, but a sense of freedom from this unbridled honesty. “You posting on Made Connections. Me posting on it. It’s sort of . . .”

“Kismet?”

A smile tugs at his lips. “Yeah. It does feel a little like kismet.”

The click of shoes echoes across the floor as the server returns. She sets down two drinks, a sprig of mint in each one. “And here are your Plot Twists. Enjoy.”

When she leaves, Logan lifts his glass, and I do the same.

“To moments,” he says. “To moments that might lead to more moments.”

The tingles inside me multiply once more. “And to not missing them.”

I take a sip, and my taste buds bow down and thank me for ordering this delicious drink. I actually moan out loud. “Mmm, that is delish.” I lick the corner of my lips, and when my eyes lock with his, I see that he’s watching me, his irises darkening.

“Yes, delicious,” he says, his voice a little hazy.

I don’t think he’s talking about the drink. I think he’s talking about the way my tongue just teased the corner of my mouth.

A part of me wants to end this date right now and cut to the next part of the night.

But I also don’t want to miss the dance. The fox-trot to the bedroom, if that’s where we’re going, should be danced to completion. “So, how did the lunch box go over?”

He gives a thumbs-up. “I’m dad of the year.”

“Excellent,” I say, taking another drink. “And she’s seven?”

He nods. “Yes, I’m divorced, and have been for two years.”

“Good to know. Because sometimes a guy says he is and then you meet him and it turns out, oh, he’s actually ‘separated.’ But by ‘separated,’ he means still living in the same house with his wife.”

Logan recoils. “That is not at all separated. That’s more like dating while deceiving.”

I tap my finger to my nose. “Bingo.”

“My ex is definitely the ex. She’s out of the house and already with someone else. And that’s why it ended.” He heaves a sigh. “Sorry, was I not supposed to say that? Is that too much? I haven’t gone on a lot of dates.”

I laugh, then reach a hand across the table and set it on his. “I’m fine with that, and I think at this point in my life—I’m thirty-two⁠—”

“Same.”

“—that I’d rather just be direct. I’m divorced too. He was jealous of anything I did without him, and he said that’s why he cheated.” I give a WTF shrug. “He’s with her now.”

“Mine said if I’d been home at five instead of seven, everything would have been different,” he says, sharing the what-the-fuckery. Logan lifts his glass again. “Their losses.”

I clink once more. “Our gains.” I lift the glass, then stop midair. “Actually, let’s drink to kismet.”

His smile is wildly sexy as he says, “I will definitely drink to that.”

6LOGAN

This is . . . refreshing.

Though “refreshing” isn’t quite the right word.

Refreshing is a drink of water after a hard run.

A healthy salad after a few days of pizza.

This date is not a salad.

But it is refreshing as hell to talk to a woman like Bryn.

She’s sexy and direct. She’s flirty and bold. And most of all, she seems honest.

Or honest enough for a night or two of fun.

And that works for me, since I’m not looking for more. Honesty, though, is a prerequisite. Without it, I’m outta there.

The guy on the piano taps out a crooner tune. As the notes wrap around us, Bryn and I chat about music. She tells me she loves pop, from Greyson Chance to 5 Seconds of Summer, and I tell her I dig old standards like Gin Joint plays. Still, I admit that I’m also that wannabe hip guy who loves to find obscure new bands on Spotify that no one has heard of, like Daredevil Pigeons Circle My Sidewalk.

“And their names must be intensely weird and make little sense, clearly,” Bryn says darkly.

“Of course. That’s a given. Also, on this channel, there are no band names fewer than five words long permitted. Though, in all fairness, I did listen to a new punk band called The Incident and Accident, and that was four words. But I was so irritated over the lack of a ‘the’ before ‘Accident’ that I turned it off.”

“It really would have sounded better with a ‘the.’ It needed symmetry. I support your decision to tune it out.”

“Thank you. I’m glad you’re in the same camp,” I say with a laugh.

We talk about the city next, and the best drinks in Manhattan, till the server brings us another round.

After we toast again, I ask Bryn something I’ve been curious about. “So, the lunch box thing. What’s that all about?”

“I like kitsch . . .”

Her sentence comes out unfinished. Is there more to it?

I push a little bit, eager to understand her. “Any reason?”

“Ah, but isn’t there always a reason?” She doesn’t continue the thought, and something about the set of her shoulders tells me that we might be treading on ground she doesn’t want to walk across right now.

Fine by me. I back off. “Listen, let’s not make this hard. Let’s just have fun. We don’t have to talk about it.”

She smiles softly. “It was my mom’s thing. Vintage kitsch. That’s why I like it. She had a lot of retro stuff, and we used to visit garage sales and pick things out together.”