The Dating Experiment Final

by Emma Hart

  Her hair.

  “Did you cut your hair?” I asked, squinting slightly.

  “Oh. That. Yeah. Just a bit.” She blushed and tucked it behind her ear. “Why? Does it look bad?”

  You could be bald, and the answer would still be no.

  “No,” I said honestly. “You look great.”

  She froze, as if she thought I’d tell her otherwise. Her cheeks flushed pink. “Oh. Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.” I tugged my lips up to one side. “I’m gonna go upstairs. Can you lock up?”

  “Sure. I’ll see you Monday?”

  I pulled open the office door and, with a glance over my shoulder to the woman who was still blushing, nodded. “See you Monday, Chlo.”

  Chapter Ten – Dom

  Love was fucked up.

  So was honesty.

  Who wanted to risk a punch in the balls just to be a good person?

  “Fuck.”

  I let go of my cock and rested my forehead against the cold tiles of my shower.

  Waking up with a boner and jerking off to the thought of my sister’s best friend wasn’t how I planned to start my Sunday.

  It wasn’t how I planned to start any day if I was honest. I’d done it a few too many times over the past several years, to the point I was now standing here, wondering if I was in love with her or obsessed with her.

  Were they one and the same? Interchangeable? Polar opposites?

  Could they be mutually exclusive? Was there a healthy way to be obsessed with somebody?

  I didn’t think there was, but if there was, I was living it. I didn’t stalk her, I didn’t hound her, and I did everything in my power to ignore how I felt about her.

  All for her.

  Because, fuck.

  Getting over Chloe Collins was a mountain the size of Everest, and I wasn’t sure I was able to climb it.

  The hot water beat down on my upper back, literally breaking down the stress I held in my shoulders. I rolled my shoulders back a couple times until the dull ache had gone.

  Then slapped my hand against the tiles and pushed off them. Water smacked me in the face, and I rubbed my left hand over it before stepping out of the water to grab the sponge.

  What the fuck was I doing with my life? Standing in the shower lamenting my lack of self-control like I was a teenage boy?

  I needed to get a grip. I also needed a distraction. Work was the best possible one at my disposal, so that was how I’d spend my day.

  I finished soaping off and got out of the shower. After quickly drying my hair, I wrapped the towel around my waist and headed for my room. Since it was Sunday, I knew Chloe wouldn’t be around the office.

  I dried off quickly and tugged on some sweatpants. Droplets from my hair dripped down my back, and I smacked at the back of my neck to stop any more from falling as I made my way downstairs.

  I stopped only to grab my phone and keys, then headed down to the office. It was dark and deathly quiet, almost eerie. The flick of the light switch echoed through the empty room as the bulb blinked to life.

  Thank God for that.

  I blew out a breath and walked over to my desk. While my laptop loaded, I went to make a coffee.

  A search in the fridge said we were out of milk.

  Fuck it.

  I stared at the coffee being poured. I could drink it black, or I could not be damn lazy and go upstairs to my apartment to get the milk out of my own fridge.

  I groaned, but ultimately, there was only one option. I wasn’t drinking fucking black coffee.

  I took the stairs two at a time to my apartment, grabbed the milk from my fridge, and went back down. My coffee was done pouring, so I finished fixing it up and took a seat at my desk.

  I had a list of matches as long as my arm to look at, so I signed into my laptop and pulled the first file from the pile of print-outs to my left.

  Christine Smith. Twenty-eight. Bartender. Lived in Baton Rouge. Looking for a guy between the ages of twenty-eight and thirty-five who lived within one hour of her address, liked food and hiking, and didn’t watch sports all the time.

  Trust me to pick up the hardest one first.

  I huffed out a breath and opened the program. Entering her information and wants would log all the potential matches on our system, and I’d just have to go through them to weed out any that I didn’t think would work. The keyword software simply took the hardest part out of it.

  Besides, there were thousands of applications on this website. There was no way one person—hell, even ten people—could get through this one by one.

  I sat back, tapping my fingers against the arms of my chair as the software loaded through. Names appeared on a list at the side of my screen, and it quickly reached one hundred. I pulled more keywords from her profile and, when the software was done with the first round, I input those for it to match to the one hundred and thirty-one names it’d spat out minutes ago.

  It narrowed it down to forty. Much easier to go through personally. I saved the search and downloaded all the profiles to my laptop to get ready to go through.

  The office door clicked open.

  I froze, my gaze darting upward.

  “What are you doing here?” Chloe asked, standing in the doorway.

  I relaxed. “Working. Why are you here?”

  “Left my phone here last night.” She shut the door behind her and walked to her side of the room. She re-emerged seconds later, her phone tight in her hand. She waved it awkwardly. “What are you working on?”

  “I’ve got some matches that have been sitting here a while,” I said, focused on the screen instead of her. She looked fucking gorgeous in her trademark leather jacket, white tank, and ripped jeans. The last thing I wanted was to be distracted by her when the whole reason for me being here was to focus on something else.

  “Oh. Fair enough. How many do you have?”

  I shrugged a shoulder and glanced at the pile. “I think there’s around six.”

  “So, you’ll be here all day?”

  I nodded.

  “Dom…are you all right?”

  “Why wouldn’t I be?” I asked, disregarding one of the matches the system had thrown out. He played sports, so there was no way he wouldn’t watch it all the time.

  “You just seem…weird,” Chloe said. “For one, you’re working half naked.”

  “Well,” I said, clicking on another profile, struggling to keep my eyes trained on the screen, “I wasn’t exactly expecting you to come by, or I’d be wearing a shirt.”

  “You don’t—I mean…” She trailed off, then coughed.

  I peered over top of the screen, one eyebrow quirked in amusement.

  “Don’t wear a shirt on my account,” she said. “I’m just here for my phone.”

  “Just as well. I don’t have one down here.” I smirked and looked back at the computer.

  “Right. Why would you?”

  I saw her shift awkwardly out of the corner of my eye.

  “I was going to ask you something, but I guess that can wait until tomorrow.”

  I finally pushed the laptop away and looked up at her. “Why can’t you ask me it now?”

  “Because you’re—” She swallowed, blushing. “Never mind.”

  “Because I’m shirtless?” I smirked.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You were going to.”

  “You can’t prove that.” She folded her arms across her chest, eyes flashing in challenge.

  “I don’t need to, Chlo. You’re blushing like a thirteen-year-old who just met the eyes of the high school quarterback.”

  She clapped her hands to her cheeks and pursed her lips. “Now, I’m not going to ask you because you’re pissing me off.”

  Laughing, I waved my hand, then leaned back in my chair. “Just get on with it. I have work to do.”

  She hesitated for a second, as if she were really considering leaving. “I was thinking about what you said yesterday.” She walked to my
desk and put down her phone and keys. “About not wanting a date?”

  “If you’re asking whether I’ve changed my mind, the answer is still that I haven’t.”

  “No.” She gripped the back of the chair on her side of the desk and leaned forward, just slightly allowing me a look down her shirt at her cleavage. “I was thinking about what you said after. About anyone I find not being able to compare to what you want.”

  I didn’t like where this was going. I should have just agreed to a new date, shouldn’t I? Fuck it.

  “What about it?” I ran my tongue over my teeth.

  “What did you mean when you said that?”

  I tilted my head to the side. “Why did it have to mean anything? Can’t I have an idea of the kind of woman I’d like to date?”

  She shifted, one shoulder rolling back as she straightened up. “Well, yeah. Sure, you can. I mean, I have an idea of the kind of guy I want to date. I was just… You sounded specific.”

  “I would hope I did. Otherwise, my idea of the woman I’d like to date is just a hair color and the fact she has a pair of tits.” I drained the last of my coffee and got up. Her eyes followed me as I walked to the kitchen, mug in hand. “Are you checking me out, Chloe?”

  “No!” she shouted a little too loudly. “I was just…watching you go and thinking that you’re lying.”

  “Ah, lying.” I put the mug in the sink and leaned against the doorframe, grinning at her. I folded my arms. “There’s some of that going around today.”

  Her gaze dropped first to my arms, then to my lower stomach.

  I cleared my throat. “You’re doing it again.”

  “Oh my God, put a shirt on!” she snapped. “Walking around like that you’re basically asking me to stare at you like you’re a piece of meat!” She flung her arm in my direction, running her other hand through her hair.

  My cheeks hurt I was grinning so much. “I don’t have a shirt. I told you that. You’ll just have to behave until this conversation is done. Unless, of course, you want to leave.”

  “I want you to tell me what you meant when you said what you did. I can help you find—”

  I shook my head. “No, you can’t help me. It’s done, Chloe, give up. I don’t want to date anyone right now.”

  “But—”

  “There are no buts!” I pushed off the frame and stared her down. “No buts. I don’t want to date. I don’t want you to find me a date. It’ll happen when it happens. Shouldn’t you be worrying about your own date instead of what I’m doing with mine?”

  “He’s still out of town.” Another awkward shuffle.

  “So, you’re fixating on me now?”

  “If you’d put a shirt on, I wouldn’t have to.”

  I laughed. “I’m not putting a shirt on. Just like I’m not gonna put any underwear on.”

  She dropped her eyes to my crotch.

  I cleared my throat once again.

  “For the love of God!” Chloe clapped her hand over her eyes and spun around.

  More laughter escaped me. “Someone needs to get laid.”

  “Someone needs to dress to see other people,” she hissed.

  “Excuse me if I wasn’t expecting you to come by today.”

  “It’s my office, too!”

  “I know. I have to listen to you bitch at me at least five days a week.” I walked back over to my desk. “Now you’ve gotten your phone, are you gonna leave me in peace to work?”

  “No. Maybe I’ll stay and work, too,” she shot back defiantly.

  Just to be a pain in my fucking ass.

  “Why? Do you wanna stare at me some more?”

  Her jaw dropped, making her lips form a little ‘o’.

  “I get it. It’s not bad, is it?” I motioned to my body. “I work for these abs. They’re too good to be kept under a shirt. Look away, Chloe.”

  Her eyes darted across my body once more before she glared at me.

  At my face.

  “You’re so full of yourself. No wonder you’re single. Nobody could put up with your egotistical bullshit,” she snapped.

  “You’re the one who keeps staring at me and feeding the ego, babe.”

  “If you call me babe again, I’m going to shove my fist down your throat.”

  “If you don’t get distracted by my stomach on your way.”

  She set her jaw, her eyes flashing with frustration as she stared at me. “I hope you find the girl you’re determined is so perfect and she wants to twist your cock off with a rusty wrench when she realizes how much of an insufferable human being you are.”

  I already found her.

  And I’m pretty sure the wrench thing came from the heart just then.

  “Shouldn’t be too difficult,” I told her. “I already met her, and I’m pretty sure she feels that way.”

  She did a double-take, blinking furiously at me. “You already met her? Is that why you won’t let me set you up with anyone?”

  “No, I won’t let you set me up with anyone because I don’t want to go out with anyone. How many more times do I have to say that?”

  “Until you can say it convincingly enough for me to believe you! I can’t believe you’ve already met someone and you let me set you up in the first place!”

  “It’s never gonna happen!” I threw my arms out. “All right? Me and her are never gonna happen because she doesn’t know, and I’m not going to tell her.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, for one, she hates my guts.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Can’t imagine why.”

  “For two, she’s seeing someone else. Someone I set her up with.”

  She gasped. “It’s a client? Your ideal woman is a client?”

  I shrugged a shoulder. I couldn’t clarify it to her. If I said yes, she’d do her best to find her. If I said no…

  She’d probably figure out I was talking about her.

  “Doesn’t matter. Give it a rest, yeah?” I ran my hand through my hair. “It’s not gonna happen.”

  “How do you know it won’t happen? You don’t know unless you try.”

  “Because I know. I just do.”

  She folded her arms. “I think you should try.”

  “I think you should give it a rest.” I met her eyes and walked over to her. “Seriously, Chloe, drop it. I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

  “Why not?” She stared up at me, eyes shining with frustration. “Just tell her how you feel. It’s not a big deal.”

  “It is to me. All right? It’s a fucking big deal to me.”

  “Dom, your job is literally matching people up. If she’s the person you think you should be with, why don’t you just say it?”

  I rubbed my hand over my face. “I’m not telling her. Why is that so fucking hard for you to understand?”

  “Because I don’t get it! If she’d make you happy, just tell her!”

  “It’s not going to happen! She hates me.”

  “So, should every woman in her right mind! My God, Dom. Grow a pair and fucking tell her how you feel!”

  My stomach tightened in knots.

  She wasn’t going to let this go.

  I’d backed myself into a corner, and there was only one way out.

  “You want me to tell her?” I turned around to face her, meeting her eyes.

  She nodded. “If she’s got you this fucked up, you have to.”

  “Fine. I’ll tell her.”

  “Okay, good.” She shuffled, dipping her chin and looking at the ground.

  My heart thumped in my chest as I crossed the room. The distance between us closed in seconds, and Chloe looked up right before I stopped in front of her.

  “What are—”

  I cupped her face and kissed her.

  She froze.

  And so did I.

  We stood in the middle of the office, my hands on her face, lips together, neither of us moving save for taking a breath.

  Then, she leaned into me. Her fingers ghoste
d across my waist as she moved onto her tiptoes.

  And I lost all self-control.

  I dove my fingers into her hair, holding her right against me as I deepened the kiss. She tasted of cinnamon and sugar, and I knew that she’d had donuts for breakfast.

  Her hands slid up to my waist, and she dug her fingers into my skin as my tongue flicked against her lips.

  I wanted more. I wanted to taste her more, kiss her harder, bring her closer to me.

  I slipped one hand out of her hair and down her back, pulling her body flush against me. Her hand ran up my arm and cupped the side of my neck, and she parted her lips, touching my tongue with the tip of hers.

  I pushed her back against the wall, breaking the kiss only for a second to make sure I didn’t push her against the door. The second her ass hit the wall, I kissed her again. She tilted her head back, her nails digging into my skin.

  My pulse thumped, sending blood rocketing through my veins and straight down to my cock. The more I kissed her, the harder I got, and the more I wanted her.

  I’d spent years wondering what it’d be like to kiss her, and now I was doing it, it was fucking beyond anything I’d ever cooked up in my imagination.

  I wanted to kiss her until I couldn’t breathe. Until I could hear nothing but my pulse thundering in my ears. Until there was nothing but Chloe consuming every inch of my body.

  I could kiss her for-fucking-ever.

  She slowly broke her lips away from mine, dipping her chin so that her nose grazed across my jaw. Her breaths were unsteady, and they fanned across my collarbone.

  She didn’t move, and neither did I.

  I’d just kissed her.

  And she’d kissed me back.

  That wasn’t how it was supposed to happen—she’d been supposed to push me away, hell, she could have even hit me, and I wouldn’t have cared.

  “You just kissed me,” she whispered, lifting her head and meeting my eyes.

  I took a deep breath and nodded. “Yeah. I did.”

  “Oh, my God.” She pulled her hands from me and covered her mouth with them. Her eyes were wide, shining with confusion and—fuck, want.

  The same desire that coursed through my body as I tried to calm my own breathing was the same one I saw reflected back at me in her gaze.