Chapter 8
AVERY
The first week of living with Sam went by in a breeze. The man was almost never at home. I'd successfully managed to avoid seeing him naked when he came out of the shower.
Though I did take a delicious peek when he'd gone to the kitchen one evening late at night.
He'd only had a towel wrapped around his waist as he made himself a sandwich, and I'd spied on those gorgeous abs of his. Only from a distance, of course. I’d stopped on the staircase when I noticed he was in the living room.
But even from a distance, it was obvious his body was very toned.
The lines of his abs and arms were extremely well defined.
During the day, I had the loft all to myself. I spent the entire week building up my Etsy store. It was a completely different beast from owning my own website, but anything I built would look amateur, and I didn’t have money to hire a pro to do it.
I hoped that directing my current clients to the shop was going to kick-start the algorithms. One could only hope. I was very positive about it.
I’d also emailed half a dozen factories.
I needed someone to produce my designs, after all.
Not that I was working on designing much these days.
I’d made an account on Fiverr, a website dedicated to pairing freelancers with customers, offering my design services.
I’d done a few courses of general graphic design, so I was hoping to make some money with that too.
At seven o’clock, I closed my laptop. I'd had enough for one day. My eyes were dry and burning. I rapidly blinked a few times until they felt better.
I headed to the kitchen, inspecting Sam’s schedule on the fridge. Wait, he wasn’t on call last evening? As far as I could tell, he hadn’t been home. But according to the sheet, he’d been free yesterday and was on call today.
I took out a prewashed packaged salad and tossed it into a bowl.
It was my trick for eating more veggies.
I put in sun-dried tomatoes and artichokes dipped in olive oil, then dumped precooked garbanzo beans in it.
I was just drizzling balsamic vinegar over it when the front door opened, and Sam came in.
"Hey, you're home," I said.
He looked utterly exhausted. He had dark circles under his eyes, and his shoulders seemed to have a heavy weight pressing on them. "Last evening was a clusterfuck, and I had to stay, so they gave me tonight off instead."
He groaned, dipping his head back. I had the greatest urge to reach out and give him a neck or shoulder rub or something.
Oh dear Lord, my brain was coming up with the most inventive excuses to touch him.
But I was determined to be on my best behavior.
Living with Sam was easy when he wasn't at home.
But every time we were in the same room, my entire body simmered.
"I made a salad. We can share it. It's huge."
He looked at it suspiciously. "Beans and green leaves?"
"Yeah, I know. It's super healthy, right?"
"Why did you make so much?"
"I thought about keeping some for tomorrow at lunch, but as I said, I'm happy to share."
He nodded. "I'll take you up on that. Thanks." He drummed his fingers on the kitchen counter. They were so long and sexy.
Brain, stop. Fingers aren't sexy. It's simply not a thing.
"Do you mind waiting a bit? I want to take a shower to freshen up."
"Sure. I'm not starving and don’t mind waiting at all," I said. "I was going to make some toast as well, if you want some."
"Thanks. I’d really appreciate that. Good to see you." He leaned in, kissing my cheek.
I sucked in a breath because it had been totally unexpected. Feeling his lips on my cheek sent my senses into overdrive. I held my breath as he straightened up, winking at me.
“Damn, I forgot to take the laundry out of the dryer,” he said as he went into the bathroom at the bottom of the staircase.
I took out a pan and was determined to keep my eyes on it. The washing machine and dryer were in a small room behind the kitchen, so after he was done showering, he’d pass right in front of me.
That's okay, Avery. Stay cool as a cucumber.
I put a bit of butter on the toast—in my humble opinion, butter made everything a million times better.
Then I set the table. I moved my notebook to the edge of it, since I’d taken up the dining room table as my office.
Even though I had a desk in the bedroom, there was simply more space and light here.
When I heard the bathroom door open, I stilled, peeking from the corner of my eye. Oh hell no. He was only wearing a towel. My little heart couldn’t handle this. I moved very precisely with the intention of trying not to look at him, which, of course, made me bump into the corner of the table.
"Ow," I cried, stumbling backward into the kitchen island.
Sam came up to me right away. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, yeah. I just wasn't paying attention and bumped into the table."
"Where did you hit?"
"My thigh."
He was so close that my mind became a blur. I didn't think I'd be in such proximity with his abs so quickly. I hadn't braced myself for this.
"I was distracted," I mumbled.
"By what?" His eyes were more alert. He seemed so much more awake than before. That shower had a magical effect on him.
I cocked a brow. "Can you put on some clothes?"
"Oh, I see. You see me half naked and bump into table corners."
"Sam," I admonished. "You find this funny?”
He threw his head back, laughing. His Adam's apple bobbed up and down. “I find it hilarious.”
Seeing him laugh made me laugh too. I took a step back for a good measure, and he was the first one who seemed to regain his breath.
"Okay. I’ll take mercy on you and no longer distract you. I’ll go to my room and change."
"Yes, please do." I put the back of my hand theatrically to my head. "How else can I resist your holy hotness?"
His eyes glinted, and I swallowed hard, realizing what I'd implied. I cast my gaze to the table again and focused on splitting the salad as evenly as possible between our two plates.
Thankfully, he went to the laundry room for his clothes and then up to his bedroom without saying anything else. I fanned myself as I sat down at the table, hoping that by the time he was back, the tension between us would subside a bit.
It didn't.
The second Sam appeared again at the top of the staircase, I felt as if all the air in the room had been sucked out.
He was wearing shorts and a shirt, but he could very well have forgotten the shirt. He hadn't dried himself properly, so the white fabric was clinging to his skin. His hair was still wet.
"That shower was just what I needed," he said, sitting down at the table. "It woke me up, and I made you blush deliciously."
I looked up from my plate. "Sam!"
"What?" he asked, feigning innocence. "Your voice is stern."
I nodded vigorously. "I feel like we should make a few more things off-limits, but I'm just not sure about the parameters exactly.”
"The parameters," he parroted. "Since when did you incorporate business vocabulary in your day-to-day life?"
I groaned. "Since I spent the entire day looking up business lingo for Etsy. I never thought I'd have to start from scratch again, but I have a good feeling about it," I said, digging into my salad. “They do everything different on the site, but I think for my new startup, it’s the best way to go.”
"I'm very proud of you."
"What for?" I asked him between bites.
"Because not only did you follow your dream, but you lost it, and now you're building it back again."
"I don't really have another choice."
"Yeah, there's always a choice. Most people would just quit."
"That's not an option," I said and left it at that. I couldn't imagine doing anything else. And I also wanted nothing more than to show up my ex-business partner after what she’d done to me. The more I thought about it, the angrier I got, and the more determined I was to succeed.
He flashed me a charming smile. "Look, I talked to my brothers. If you need any sort of help, or business ideas, you can chat with them."
It took me a few seconds to process what he'd said. "You spoke to your brothers about me?"
"Yes. These days, I can't seem to talk to them without mentioning you."
I stretched my legs under the table and accidentally touched his. Goose bumps broke out on my skin as he sucked in a breath. I cleared my throat. How can we still react to each other this way after all these years?
"Why?"
"You know why." He pointed between us. "They predicted this."
"What exactly?" I asked.
"The tension."
I laughed nervously. "Really? So did Alana. I told her she was imagining things."
“That makes two of us. Are we oblivious or what? But we were both wrong, weren't we?" His gaze was trained on me.
I was rooted to my seat. But I couldn’t fall prey to those baby blue eyes.
Don't, I chastised myself. It will not bring anything good. He's probably on the rebound.
I pointed my fork at him after I ate my last mouthful of salad. "No. I know what's happening. We just need time adjusting."
He cocked a brow, and heat pooled between my legs.
Holy shit, my body was reacting weirdly.
"You flashing those delicious abs around me is not helping the matter," I continued.
"It just spurs my imagination, making me wonder what else you're hiding.
Not that I have to wonder, of course. I remember. "
He tilted his head playfully. "Would it help if you saw me commando?"
"I walked right into that," I murmured. My heart was beating rapidly. This evening couldn't possibly become more tense.
Luckily, he didn't say anything else as he finished his salad. Afterward, I rose to my feet, but he shook his head. "No, you prepared the meal. I'm cleaning up."
"I made salad from a plastic bag. It was already washed. There wasn't much preparation involved."
"Still, I'm cleaning up." He stood from the table, taking everything at once, putting the plates on top of each other and then the salad bowl. As he grabbed the stack, he accidentally brushed my notebook, and it fell on the floor.
"I got it," he said, putting the stack of dishes back on the table. "Well, well. What do we have here?" he said, slowly rising with his eyes glued to a page that fell out of my notebook.
What could he possibly mean? He probably found my to-do list for the week, but that wasn't terribly exciting.
"You still do pro-and-con lists?"
I gasped. In a fraction of a second, my face felt flaming hot.
He flashed me a purely seductive smile. "You already wrote down that it might be hard to resist my… wait, what is the phrase exactly?"
I took the paper and notebook away from him, putting it on my chair. I didn't just need to fan myself; I wanted to pour a bucket of ice on top of my head. My pulse had gone so haywire that I had trouble hearing properly over the pounding in my ears, but I couldn't miss Sam’s voice.
"So, you foresaw some of this trouble even before you moved in?"
He'd called me out on it. No way could I disagree; it was right there in my own handwriting.
I straightened my shoulders. "Why do you think I was hesitating?"
His eyes flashed. "You were right. We do need to identify a few more things as off-limits."
I nodded. "Yeah. I'll try to come up with more, but not tonight."
"Why? Too distracted by my holy hotness?" He smirked.
"Oh shut up."