Total pages in book: 88
Estimated words: 86573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 433(@200wpm)___ 346(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 433(@200wpm)___ 346(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
“I’m in a very weird place right now, both personally and professionally, I guess.” I cannot believe I’m admitting this to anyone, least of all her. “It just occurred to me now that I haven’t done anything active outside in . . . Christ. I don’t even know.”
“What would you do first if you could?”
“Hike a mountain.” I used to do that a lot back home, though nothing on a grand scale.
“Which one?”
“I don’t know—nothing like Everest if that’s what you’re thinking.”
We both laugh, the sounds mingling.
“Wasn’t exactly thinking Everest, more on the lines of maybe something in the Adirondacks.”
I ponder that, twisting my water glass on the table. “I love it up there.”
“Let me guess, you have a cabin there.”
A smile tugs at my lips. “Maybe.” And I wish I could take you there, someday. You and me. Mountains. My cabin. Solitude.
Nudity.
She rolls her eyes but then scoots forward as if she’s about to tell a secret. “Do you let contracted employees stay in the cabin for free?” She wiggles her eyebrows, looking adorably cute.
A belly laugh bubbles out of me as my head tilts back, humor hitting me square in the chest. “Only if they do a good job for me.”
She rubs her hands together. “Then I’ll start planning my little jaunt now, because I know I’m going to blow your socks off with this campaign.”
Blow.
Wish she would blow something other than my socks off right about now.
I shift in my seat, my eyes glancing at her cleavage again as she takes a drink. So goddamn full. What I wouldn’t give to pull her across this table, unzip the back of her dress, and take her nipples in my mouth, right here in the dining room of this fancy-ass restaurant. I wouldn’t care about indecent exposure. I would only care about how she tastes, how her hardened nipples feel in my mouth.
I clear my throat. “Have you always had an eye for graphic design?” I ask her, stuffing the other piece of bread in my mouth and chewing slowly, giving her time to answer.
“Yes. Well, yes and no. It wasn’t my major or anything in college, but I did like glitter and design growing up.” She smiles at the table for a brief moment, biting her lip before raising her head again. “I thought I’d be an architect, but I wasn’t great at math. So I had to change my major, ended up with a business degree. Draw in my free time, photography and all that jazz.”
“So. The creative type.”
“Sure, I guess.”
“Is your apartment all bright and colorful?”
“Is that how you picture it?”
I study her. She’s not the flighty type, just . . . happy. “No.”
“What do you picture?”
I quiet, thinking. I picture her naked, standing in the middle of an all-white room, her tits full and aching for my touch, her long legs ready and willing to wrap around my body.
But I don’t say that. “I imagine your place to be like the Pottery Barn threw up inside your entire living space. Just trendy vomit everywhere.”
“What.” Peyton chokes. “Okay fine. It’s true. That is what my place looks like, so sue me. Sue me for liking trendy, beige things.” She shoots me a sidelong glance, finger trailing the rim of her wineglass. “What about you? What does your place look like?”
“Not like Pottery Barn barfed inside of it.”
“Want me to venture a guess?”
I lean back in my seat. “Sure. Have at it.”
“Well . . .” She begins. “I see lots of black—to match your mood. Lots of cold spaces. Concrete floors. High ceilings—and stainless steel. You bought it that way and haven’t decorated any of it yourself. Someone came and did it for you, and you hate it, but it was too expensive to change, so you left it.”
What. The. Fuck.
Her brow goes up. “I’m right, aren’t I?”
I cannot help but laugh—a loud, booming laugh that goes along with the hand I whack onto the table. That’s how fucking surprised I am that she has me pegged.
“Yeah. You’re totally right.”
“How right am I?”
“That’s my place, down to the concrete floors.” Which I hate because the entire damn apartment is always freezing. And if I’d had known, I would have put in carpet. “I have to wear slippers every damn day no matter how warm it is outside.”
“You. Wear slippers?”
“I do.”
“What do they look like?”
“Guess.”
“Um . . . black leather with Sherpa insoles?”
“Pfft,” I scoff. “Hardly. They’re grizzly bear slippers. Hunter gave them to me and they’re badass.” Every time I take a step, the bear opens his mouth and looks like he’s snarling.
“Is that some joke? Or do you seriously have teddy bear slippers?”
“I did not say teddy bear—I said grizzly.”
“Same thing, kind of.”
“No, they are not the same thing.”
Peyton holds her thumb and forefinger together with one hand, squeezes one eye shut. “Lil’ bit.”