Re: Near the ring of fire, later...: Cat C & Reece E
To be quite honest, Cat didn't think Reece was all that smart. She was fairly sure he would've died in Jersey, all that humor and bumbling, and he'd done a very good job of hiding his capability from her. Oh, there had been glimmers, and him standing up to her in this very bar? That was one of them. But it was easy to chalk that up as a fluke, a one-time occurrence, happenstance. Generally? She thought he was what he appeared to be. A social climber, a business piranha, a man who cared about his shoes. Maybe she was too harsh, because she'd spent a lifetime idolizing a man who would risk everyone and everything for the greater good.
Funny, but she hated that about Bruce now, and she was still holding every single man she knew to that particularly odious bar.
She quirked a brow when Reece explained that Michael didn't remember, and she scoffed as she watched blond hair get pushed away from eyes. "That seems to be going around, not remembering." His question of blackmail? That made her scoff again. "I'm not blackmailing you. I already discarded that option." She had. For Sasha, and she pushed curls away from her face where they'd escaped her loose bun.
But her fingers stilled when he flexed his. She wasn't expecting the offering of metal fingertips, and she watched as his sweater revealed an expanse of sleek black, copper and silver. "There was a man here earlier, and I think his grip was like yours. He was wearing gloves, but they fit like yours do." There was a difference, even with expensive gloves, and perhaps Cat was accustomed to looking for tells. "He tried to grab the back of my neck and pull me over the bar." She straightened and poured two fresh shots, her turn of wrist graceful as she put the bottle between them. "I wondered if he was a friend of yours."
She hadn't been wondering that at all, and the truth of it was unhidden in mossy green. But she did wonder about the stranger, and she was certainly shaken by it. As for touching his hand? She hesitated, because it seemed strangely personal. Not that she cared about that, but she had hard and fast rules with this man occupying the bar with her, and Cat? She wasn't very good at sticking to any rules, even her own. But, in the end, and dragged fingers along the back of that sleek black at his wrist. "Can you feel it? Touch?"