Chapter 10 #2
Between us on the island, my phone lit up, vibrating with a text message. At first glance, I saw Angelo's name and my hand shot across the marbled countertop to snatch it at the same time Natalia started leaning over to look.
"Woah, what was that about?" She laughed, eyes widening. "It's the secret boyfriend who might have a one-hand-sized dick, isn't it?"
"Stop." I blushed, and my phone chimed again—another text from Angelo. My fingers itched to swipe it open.
"Answer it," she urged. "You're literally turning pink. I'm so invested."
I turned my back, opening the message out of her prying eyesight. "You're still being annoying."
It was a link to a new home listing outside Pompano, accompanied by a text.
Angelo
Can we check this one out?
That was it. No hello, nothing flirty or charming. It wasn't personal, it was business. I bit the inside of my cheek hard. Stupid, stupid woman.
Stupid to be in a haze over last night while Angelo clearly couldn't care less. Now he wanted to be interested in viewing homes? This was the first time since we started working together he'd even sent a potential one.
Our not-a-date last night went so poorly that he was starting to do the real estate work himself to end it sooner.
I started typing, decided I didn't want to seem too on the ball, and deleted my message. Then I talked myself back into the professional mindset of being a quick and open communicator for my clients, and began another quick text that got cut off by the front door hurtling open.
Mateo strode in noisily, kicking off his boots and carrying two boxes of hot pizza down the short corridor into the kitchen. "Brought dinner, and a guest."
Angelo was strolling casually behind him with his nose in his cellphone and I pressed myself into the wall like I might melt into it and disappear. Shit. Shit, fuck, shit.
"Perfect," Natalia quipped. "Mia's here, too."
Angelo's attention whipped toward me, finding me standing there silently with my lips curled in on themselves, avoiding eye contact. I slipped my phone into my back pocket and cleared my throat. "Hi."
"Hey." The corner of his mouth curved upward.
"Sup, Mia." Mateo gave me a brotherly hug before scampering off toward my sister and kissing her very openly and enthusiastically. He leaned down to her belly and plopped a kiss there as well. "What have you two been doing?"
"Baby things," I answered. "I had some free time today and thought I’d start the spoils early."
"We were actually discussing how Mia's getting laid," Natalia blurted. "She's seeing someone."
A spike of red-hot embarrassment coiled from my head to my toes. Angelo tilted his neck, pressing me with a hard gaze and a confused eyebrow raise.
"I am not," I stuttered. "That is so not a thing, at all, and we should immediately stop talking about it."
Mateo put the pizza boxes on the kitchen counter and gave me an equally intrigued arch of his brow, following my panicked expression over to Angelo with an odd interest.
"He may or may not have a big dick. She's strangely confused about the size."
"I actually have to go," I proposed.
"Well you can't leave now," Angelo piped up, and after peering into his amused green eyes, I could feel the shade of pink my skin was taking on like a sunburn. "I'm interested."
"Leave the girl alone," Mateo said, then dialed back slightly with his attention on me. "I mean, was it too dark to see it?"
"Yeah, was it too dark to see it?" Angelo repeated.
My mind was awash with a shame I'd never known possible.
"She swears she's not fucking anyone." Natalia sighed. "I think it has to be a real estate private equity guy or something, but if I can't get the details, you two definitely aren't getting any."
"Smartest thing you've said all day," I mumbled.
"Angelo, how is Mia?" she asked him. “Getting along?”
He looked away from me for the first time since coming into the house and undid the three small buttons at the top of his TechOps polo. "When she's satisfied with me," he said.
I laughed nervously, taking an awkward audit of the room and pressing a serious glare in his direction. My lips thinned while his widened in a grin.
"When he actually gives my listings the time of day," I corrected. "Doesn't just walk through with his hands in his pockets like I'm a tour guide at a history museum."
"That's pretty much your job, only with tiny heels and a big attitude."
"You wouldn't have to deal with it if you were more decisive."
"I think you're a little distracted by the private equity guy."
"So there is someone!" Natalia blurted.
I jammed my tongue into my cheek and pulled in a centering breath through my nose. Angelo's grin lengthened. He flipped open one of the steaming hot cardboard boxes of pizza and dragged a cheesy slice out of it.
"I really do have to leave," I said. "It's been a long day, and I still need to go through a pile of offers that came in today for one of my sellers."
"Take a slice for the road," Mateo offered, grabbing his own pizza and dropping onto the living room couch with it.
"I'll walk you out." Angelo came to my side. "Left something in my car anyway. Be right back."
"Love you!" Natalia shouted to me. "Keep me updated on the nursery decor."
It was seconds after we got outside the front door that Angelo's hand wrapped delicately around my wrist. I pulled it away nervously. "Are you trying to draw attention to us?"
"Are you seeing someone?"
"No, of course not," I said sharply.
"Just me?"
"I'm not seeing you." Angelo's car was parked in the driveway. He opened the driver’s door and put us in the shelter behind it, sweeping a rogue strand of my hair behind my ear.
"Kiss me," he said.
"Are you crazy? Did you not hear what I just said about us getting caught?"
"We're alone. They're talking about boring, married things inside." He lifted my chin, thumb brushing the curve of it. "Kiss meeeee, Miaaaa." He dragged the syllables out playfully, whiningly.
I couldn't help the smirk twitching at my lip. "You don't deserve it. You called me a tour guide with an attitude."
His white teeth shined, and the dimples in his cheek deepened. "I didn't say I didn't love it."
My resolve withered and I pushed up onto my toes, pressing my mouth gently against his. He took more immediately, a hum of approval accompanying the slide of his tongue against mine. He quickly pulled my hips into his with one arm around my lower back and I gasped quietly into his open mouth.
"Wait." I pushed him back. "I'm mad at you."
"What else is new?" he said, leaning back in.
I pressed a finger to his lips. "You didn't say anything all day. After last night, nothing. Not a text, email…it's like you weren't even thinking about it. Then you send me a listing out of the blue while I've been overthinking this entire thing since the second I got home…"
"Does it feel like I haven't been thinking about it?
" Angelo dragged my hand to the zipper of his pants, holding it firmly against a very warm, very hard erection.
My pulse thumped, but I catalogued the thickness of him in my palm, suddenly too overwhelmed to think clearly about the brashness of the situation.
"Is it big or is it small, Mia? You tell me. "
My eyes fluttered closed slowly, then opened in a dazed blink and found his dark, fog-in-a-forest stare. "Big."
"Big,” he repeated, nodding. "Did it ever occur to you that I was looking for reasons to text you for the last eight hours in a cramped, sweaty lockbox of a post office doing a security install?
That there wasn't a second of time under my brother's constant watch that I could manage a message just to tell you how wrecked in the head I've been, wishing I could taste you again? "
A surge of need dialed straight to my center. It might have weakened my legs, but Angelo was still holding my waist, keeping me from falling over. "Really?"
"My best excuse was to send you that listing. Then you were here, and now it's impossible not to want to tell Mateo that something came up. I have to go, and take you somewhere quiet, where we can talk all you want about last night."
He let go of my hand and it dropped limply, though I wanted it right back where it was. "And why can't you?"
Angelo smiled, a brisk laugh shooting out of him. "Weren't you the one telling me I was being too obvious?"
Get it together, Mia. There was more to life than a little whisker burn from a hot guy while being cradled in his strong arms.
"You're right." I cleared my throat, reluctantly wiggling out of his hold.
"I really do have to work on some things, anyway.
Plus I'll do some research on that listing you sent me and reach out to the seller's agent for a viewing appointment.
In the meantime, try not to text me while I'm at my sister's house. She was so close to noticing."
"You're my realtor. Am I not supposed to text you?"
"It's too risky."
Angelo tapped my forehead. "You're overthinking."
I pulled my lip into my mouth and he tugged it back out with his fingertip, then replaced his touch with a feverish kiss.
I could kiss him all night, standing in the driveway with the sun setting behind us and the dog-day cicadas buzzing eagerly.
But again, I was forced to push him away with a clipped laugh and a smile so persistent my cheeks were starting to ache with it.
"Go back inside," I said. “Before they come looking.”
Angelo closed his door with nothing in his hands and I realized there was never something he forgot in his car. "Make that appointment so I can see you again."
"When I can," I told him.
"Soon."
"Patience."
"All out of it, babe."
My eyes flared and I shot him a warning look, pressing a hushed finger to my lips.
Angelo copied me, flaring his eyes, backing away quietly toward the front door of Mateo and Natalia's house.
I would call that seller's agent on the car ride home. Definitely.