by Jill Shalvis
His stare rooted her to the spot as she tried to read the level of his seriousness, while something warm and dangerous slid into her belly and headed south.
“You joked about running away from home,” he said. “But it doesn’t feel funny.”
She gave a slow head shake. “That’s because it isn’t.”
They were standing very close in front of the sink. She had one hand gripping the counter because she needed the balance, needed an anchor in a suddenly spinning world.
“Talk to me,” Spence said and put his hand over hers.
She let go of her grip on the granite, turning her hand over so their fingers could entwine. Talk to him? She didn’t know where to start. Or if she even wanted to. “There’s a lot going on back home,” she said quietly, meeting his gaze. A mistake, as one look into those curious light brown eyes and it all just came tumbling out of her mouth. “So many pieces to the whole puzzle,” she said, “and they all depend on me keeping them in place. Personal and work.” She closed her eyes. “It’s always all on me, you know? Always. And I just felt overwhelmed and . . . tired. And that killed my muse.” She opened her eyes again, knowing he’d be able to see the pain swimming in them but unable to hide it. “I need to find my muse, and to do that, I needed a change of scenery. A break. Even just for a little while. So I got on a plane. I wanted to go to a deserted Caribbean island beach but there was a big hurricane . . .”
“Never thought I’d find a reason to thank a hurricane,” he said, making her smile. “Your mom and brothers depend on you financially?”
And emotionally . . . “Yes. Kurt and Kent are twenty-three. The Peter Pan years, as it turns out. They don’t want to grow up, a syndrome that’s been ramped up since their twenty-first birthday.”
“I remember being twenty-one,” he said. “I’d just graduated Caltech with my master’s degree in mechanical engineering. I had enough debt to sink an entire country and about twenty bucks to my name.”
A mechanical engineer. That . . . fit him. Perfectly. “But you made something of yourself,” she said, gesturing around her. “Kent always says he’d be more inclined to grow up if he saw that it actually worked out for anyone.”
Spence smiled. “I just got lucky.”
“I think I call BS on that. You worked your ass off doing . . .” she raised a brow “. . . mechanical engineering? Whatever that is?”
He smiled. “Still curious, huh?”
“Yes! Of course I am!”
He tugged a loose strand of her hair. “I ran a startup with Caleb, my business partner. We created some technical back-end apps that Google found useful and when it suited us, we sold to them. That’s when I bought this building.”
She sucked in a breath. “Did you just kind of tell me what you do for a living?”
“It was never really a secret. I just liked hearing your guesses.”
She laughed. “It’s actually a relief to know. My next guess was going to be either a spy or a supervillain.” Then his words sank in and she felt her eyes bug out of her head. “You own this whole building?”
Something shifted in his eyes. He wasn’t comfortable telling her all this, but he nodded and she felt something shift inside her too, but in a good way. Because she realized that he too knew exactly what it was like to go from having nothing to extreme success.
She’d felt alone in this for so long she almost didn’t recognize the emotion tumbling through her.
Relief.
Chapter 9
#SonOfABeach
“So other than being a real estate mogul,” Colbie teased Spence, giving him a little hip bump at his sink, wanting to lighten the mood, “what else do you do these days?”
“I still do the app’s updates as needed, but I’m also working on something new.”
“The drones on your coffee table?” she asked.
“They’re part of a big project that’s due in January.”
“How’s it going?”
His gaze met hers. “I don’t know. There’s been a beautiful stranger tossed into the mix and I’m having trouble focusing.”
The air between them seemed to crackle and she got the tummy flutter again. “You . . . think I’m beautiful?”
“I do.”
The air crackled some more and then he stepped into her and then there seemed to be no air at all. He reached for her and . . . from deep in her pocket, her phone vibrated twice in quick succession.
“Son of a beach,” she muttered.
He laughed. “You ever going to answer any of those texts or calls you’ve been getting all night?”
“No.” She hesitated, conflicted, worried. Everyone knew she was on a break, even her brothers. She’d checked in with Janeen and Tracy. She’d spoken briefly to her mom and Jackson when she’d been out in the city earlier, both of whom had wanted the usual. Her mom to complain about her life, and Jackson to get her to agree to some public appearances—an ongoing bone of contention between them because she tried to do the bare minimum when it came to those things.
Part of what had drawn her to writing—besides the fact that she absolutely loved the actual writing—was the simplicity of the life. She didn’t want to be a public figure. She wasn’t good at it, as proven by what had happened the last time she’d reluctantly agreed. She’d been sent to do the Late Night show and had tripped coming out onstage. On camera.
The YouTube video of her revealing her black lace thong had seven million views.
But that her phone kept going off made her worry that maybe there’d been some kind of emergency.
“There’s this little thing called the power-off button,” Spence said. “Works like a charm.”
“I thought about turning it off,” she admitted. “But I’d know the messages were still there and worry about missing an emergency.”
“Feel free to check in,” he said easily.
“I know I shouldn’t keep it on me like this, but I’m a hopeless control freak, apparently. Old habit from when the twins were minors and capable of unbelievable stupidity.”
“It’s okay, Colbie.”
Reluctantly, she pulled the phone from her pocket. One look at the screen had her taking a deep breath. Kurt. No surprise there. And . . . Jackson. There’d been a time when just seeing his name would’ve made her heart leap like she was a teenager with a silly crush.
But he’d fixed that for her with one shockingly hurtful event, eradicating any romantic feelings she’d had in a blink, which didn’t mean that she was ready to face him.
She pushed the thoughts aside and called Kurt back first. He was always the easiest to get things out of. “Hey,” she said when he picked up. “What’s wrong?”
Except she could hear what was wrong. “Why is the smoke detector going off?”
“Because I was making a cheeseburger and set off the alarm,” he yelled.
“Again?” she asked, putting her finger in her other ear, as if that could help her hear past the wailing alarm. “Seriously? How hard is it to turn the vent to high when you’re cooking burgers on the range?”
“What?”
“Turn on the vent!” she yelled.
“I can’t hear you!”
She closed her eyes and shook her head.
“I can’t remember how to get it to turn off!” her brother yelled.
“The broom! It’s in the corner by the trash. Wave it at the smoke detector and then call the security company to let them know it’s a false alarm—” She broke off. “Are you eating in my ear?”
“Hey, gotta eat the burgers while they’re hot.”
She pulled the phone from her ear and stared at it before punching disconnect and shaking her head. “I’m sorry.”
“How old is he again?” Spence asked.
“Twenty-three going on twelve.” Since she had the phone out, she went ahead and flipped through the unread texts. Kurt from earlier, wanting to know where her car keys were. Jackson wanting to know when she was sending a chunk of her
manuscript. Kent wanting to know if she’d send him some money because he forgot to pay the electric like she’d asked and now there were extra fees to turn it back on.
She stopped and transferred some money but by then Kurt was contacting her again, wanting to know if she could get him tickets to Hamilton to impress a date. And last but not least, her mom wanting her to bring her some soup from her favorite deli, even though the deli was literally half a block from her mom and three thousand miles from Colbie.
Did no one read her texts? “I know you said the chef doesn’t do dishes but I’d really like to,” she said. “It calms my brain.”
“How is that even possible?”
“I’ll show you.” She turned to the sink.
“Uh . . .”
She paused and he grimaced. “You should know something,” he said.
“Okay. What?”
He grimaced again. “I’ve never done dishes in this place.”
“Never?”
“I’m not even sure I have dish soap.”
She stared at him and then laughed.
“But I swear I’m not like your brothers,” he said. “I don’t have a sister but if I did, I wouldn’t call her for money or help. I’d take care of her.”
Wishing that those words hadn’t moved her, she found some dish soap beneath the sink.
“Not my doing,” he said, lifting his hands. “Trudy. She takes care of this building and also me. I’ll have to give her a raise.”
Colbie made the water hot and squirted soap into the sink. “Put your hands in here and scrub a dish.”
He did and then slid her a look.
“Is your brain calm yet?” she asked. “And empty of thoughts?”
“Does imagining you doing these dishes in those heels you’re wearing and nothing else count as calm and empty of thoughts?”
Amusement and arousal vied for her current top emotion, which had never happened before. Having both those things barrel through her with equal fervor left her momentarily unable to decide what to do.
So her inner child came out and she splashed him.
Water dripping from his nose, hair, and glasses, he grinned—the kind of grin that felt like 100 percent trouble of the naughty variety.
Which, clearly, she was imagining.
“Now I’m imagining you wet and doing dishes in nothing but those heels,” he said.
Okay, so she hadn’t imagined anything and at the knowledge, her knees wobbled. “You’re . . . flirting with me.”
“I am. You okay with that?”
Oh boy. Her gaze dropped to his mouth. “I’m just not used to the feeling,” she admitted. “I’m not sure what to do with it.”
“Let me help you with that,” he said and splashed her back.
This started a water fight that invoked squeaking—on her part—and swearing—on his part—and the most fun she’d ever had doing dishes ever.
After, he got them each a towel. “Are you cold?” he asked. “I’ve got some hot chocolate mix. I make a mean hot chocolate.”
She met his gaze. He’d had to remove his wet shirt, and somewhere along the way, he’d also lost his shoes. His feet were bare and for some reason, she found this combination incredibly sexy. Maybe she just found him sexy . . . “I do love hot chocolate but it’s getting late . . .”
“The hot chocolate comes with marshmallows,” he said. “If that interests you.”
“The freeze-dried marshmallows or real marshmallows?”
“Are you kidding me? Real, of course.”
She smiled. “So you’ve got your priorities.”
“Damn A straight.”
Gah. That smile. But she needed to think and she needed to do so without him looking at her, because when he looked at her like he was right now, like to him she was pretty and sexy and interesting, her, Colbie, not CE Crown, she couldn’t think at all. “Thanks for letting me in your space tonight.” She got the feeling it was special that he’d done so, and rare.
“Uh-oh.” His eyes locked on hers. “I sense both a ‘but’ and a blow-off coming.”
She shook her head. “Just a ‘but.’ ” She paused. “But . . . I really should go.”
“Before dessert.”
She bit her lower lip in indecision.
“What?”
“I’ve never successfully resisted dessert.”
He smiled. “A woman after my own heart. Sure, dessert is the base of my food pyramid.” He opened one of the pantry drawers. It was filled with cookies, candy bars, and more.
“Holy cheese toast,” she murmured. “It’s the mother lode.”
“Help yourself.”
Said the spider to the fly . . .
He began plying her with an armful of cookies and the like. He added on one too many packages of cookies and it all fell out of her arms to the floor.
Laughing, she bent low to scoop them up, just as he did the same. They bumped heads, and not nearly as graceful as he, Colbie fell backward to her ass.
“Sorry!” they both gasped at the same time, and then their gazes locked and there was that crazy spark again, bouncing through Colbie’s insides, touching down at all her good spots—of which she seemed to have far more than she remembered having.
Spence, still crouched low and easily balanced on the balls of his feet, dropped to his knees and pulled her up to hers. Brushing the hair from her forehead, he eyed the spot where they’d connected. “You okay?”
She started to say yes but his gaze slid to her mouth and she lost her train of thought, instead licking her suddenly dry lips.
Spence, watching the movement avidly, let out a rough breath. “Colbie,” he said quietly, in a very serious, very low octave that sounded like pure sex.
She stood up. “Y-yes?”
Also standing, he slid his hands up her arms, giving her a very slow tug, almost as if expecting resistance.
There was no resistance. Hell, she nearly took a flying leap at him.
He laughed softly, sending a bolt of heat through her. Her knees wobbled and his arm wrapped around her waist, steadying her. Their gazes locked and they both froze in place, she from a sudden rush of emotions, Spence probably from watching them play out across her face. She once again started to say something—still had no idea what—but was silenced by his hot mouth covering hers.
Yes was her only coherent thought and she pressed up against him as he angled his head, taking the kiss even deeper. His arms tightened on her, pulling her in hard, and she squirmed to get closer still, suddenly desperate to feel as much of him as she could.
He kissed her long and deep, and she heard a moan. Hers, she realized, shocked at the neediness of the sound as well as the hunger and desire that flooded her at the same time. It’d have humiliated her to the core if she’d been alone in this but with Spence’s arms closed around her, along with his rough groan, she knew he was right there with her.
When she was breathless—which took shockingly little time—and on the verge of ripping off his clothes, she forced herself to pull back. Out of her comfort zone, with her heart threatening to secede from her chest, she stared at him as the battle raged inside her. Fear and lust were in mortal combat, the outcome uncertain. “Okay,” she said breathlessly. “So now I’ve really gotta go.”
Spence drew in a deep, shuddering breath that wasn’t much steadier than hers and pulled off his now crooked glasses. “Hang on a second.” He tossed them aside. “I need to check on something.”