Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Kayla
Sawyer Maccini cooking is not something I had on my bingo card when I moved in.
Not every day, but enough that it’s noticeable. The first morning, I assumed it was a fluke. The second morning, I suspected coincidence. By the third, I’m fairly certain the man is deliberately feeding me.
Which feels wildly inconsistent with everything else about him.
I’m halfway through a chapter at the island when the cabinet above the stove slams shut.
I glance up.
Sawyer is standing in the kitchen, already dressed for work. Dark slacks. Crisp shirt. The sleeves rolled halfway up his forearms, like he got distracted halfway through getting ready and never corrected it.
He grabs a mug and makes a coffee, then looks over at me. “You’ve been typing for three hours.”
I shrug. “I’m a writer. It’s what I do.”
“That’s becoming your excuse for everything.”
“It’s a lifestyle.”
He shakes his head slightly and reaches up to grab something from the cabinet above him. At the exact same time, I push back from the stool and stand.
My head bumps his shoulder. “Sorry—”
I step forward. He steps forward. We both reach for the cabinet at the exact same time.
I freeze.
So does he.
Because the cabinet door is open and Sawyer is leaning over me slightly, one arm braced against the frame.
My back nearly hits the counter.
I glance up, which is a big mistake. Sawyer’s already looking down at me.
“You’re in my way,” he says calmly.
“I was here first.”
“You’re standing on my side of the kitchen.”
“I didn’t realize the kitchen had zones.”
“It does now.”
His hand moves past my shoulder to grab a bowl from the cabinet.
My brain immediately starts cataloging details I do not need to notice.
How tall he is.
How solid he feels, standing this close.
And somehow, he still smells distractingly good at five in the morning.
My brain stops cooperating.
“You’re very close right now,” I say.
Sawyer raises an eyebrow. “You stepped under the cabinet.”
“You leaned over me.”
“You’re shorter.”
“That’s not my fault.”
His mouth twitches. He pulls the bowl from the cabinet and straightens, which should end the moment, except neither of us moves immediately.
The kitchen feels quiet in a way it didn’t a minute ago.
Sawyer studies me for a second longer than necessary, like he’s seeing me differently all of a sudden.
Then he steps back. “Problem solved.”
I clear my throat. “Right.”
He sets the bowl on the counter and grabs his keys. “I forgot I have a meeting.”
“Of course you do.”
Sawyer pauses at the doorway before he glances back at me once.
“Try to eat something today,” he says, and then he leaves.
The door closes behind him.
I stand in the kitchen for another minute, staring at the cabinet like it personally offended me because something about that moment crossed a line neither of us acknowledged.
I have a feeling my writing productivity is about to spike again.
The apartment falls quiet after Sawyer leaves. Which is strange because it wasn’t exactly loud before, but somehow, the absence of him changes the space.
I shake my head and grab my laptop.
“This is ridiculous,” I mutter.
At this point, Sawyer Maccini is becoming a workplace hazard for my creativity.
Unfortunately, my mind seems to disagree.
I carry the laptop down the hallway to my room and close the door behind me. The moment the screen lights up, the words start coming.
The words come too fast for me to stop them. The scene forms almost immediately.
Two people standing too close together in a kitchen. A cabinet door open above them. The heroine trapped between the counter and the hero’s arm braced against the wall.
I pause for half a second, then keep typing.
The tension builds as the heroine notices everything. The way he smells. The way his voice drops when he speaks to her. The way he looks at her, like he’s trying to decide something.
My pulse speeds up a little, which is deeply annoying because I know exactly where the inspiration for this scene came from. And I know exactly which man’s voice my brain keeps using when I write the dialogue.
I stop typing when the line between fiction and memory disappears completely.
“Unbelievable,” I whisper.
I immediately begin to replay the moment in the kitchen.
Sawyer leaning over me while his hand was braced against the cabinet. How he looked down at me, like he’d suddenly noticed something new.
I stare at the screen and continue. The scene shifts. Now the hero’s hand slides along the counter beside the heroine.
Not touching her, but close enough that the lack of contact becomes its own kind of torture.
My stomach flips, which is new for me because I’m the one writing the scene.
I lean back against the headboard and read what I’ve written.
Not touching her, but close enough that the lack of contact becomes its own kind of torture.
Which means the chapter is definitely staying.
I close the laptop. The problem isn’t the scene. The problem is that Sawyer keeps replacing the fictional hero in my head.
And that image has dark hair, rolled-up sleeves, and a very irritating tendency to stand too close in a kitchen.
I drop my head back against the wall. “Oh my God.”
This is becoming deeply inconvenient. Now every time I think about the scene, my brain immediately substitutes Sawyer.
I sit here on my bed for a moment, staring at the ceiling. I can already tell this is about to spiral.
I sigh and slide further back against the pillows.
“Well,” I tell the empty room, “this is your fault.”
Which is ridiculous because Sawyer Maccini is currently somewhere across the city in a meeting.
Completely unaware that he’s managed to derail my concentration again.
The irritating part is, if he walked into the room right now, I’m not entirely sure my reaction would be appropriate.
And that realization is probably a sign that I should stop thinking about him immediately.
I slide down my headboard and lie flat on my back, closing my eyes. Maybe if I just think about something horrible.
Instead, my brain plays a little scenario. Us in the kitchen again, but this time, his hand falls to my hip, ditching the bowl entirely. He slides it around to my stomach and pulls me against him.
I lose my breath when I feel his hard body against mine.
Before my brain can stop it, I’m unbuttoning my jeans and pulling them down, along with my underwear.
This is so wrong. I shouldn’t be doing this, but I’m far too worked up.
And the scenario just keeps going.
He pushes me up against the counter—aggressively. The slight pain from the force is nothing compared to the erratic beating of my heart. His hand fists in my hair, pulling my head back just enough to make my breath catch.
His tongue starts at my collarbone and runs up my neck to the back of my ear.
Heat rushes through me so fast it’s almost embarrassing.
I reach between my legs and put my fingers at my lips and run them along the slickness of my opening.
Then I bring them up to my clit and start to rub soft, slow circles as I let the images play in my head.
It all happens so fast. Before I know it, he has me stripped bare and leaning on my elbows over the counter, driving into me hard enough to make the counter dig into my hips.
I moan out my release as I let the fantasy completely take over and wreck me.
It’s not until I come down from the high that I open my eyes.
Tonight is going to be a disaster.
Because now I have to look Sawyer Maccini in the eyes like I didn’t just completely lose my mind over him.