Chapter 16 #2
I forced a look over to Grandma, who gave me a shrug of feigned innocence.
The other women had their gazes lingering on his exposed legs.
When I cleared my throat and stepped forward to block him from view, they looked away.
Only after the fact did I realize that I’d shielded him without thought, even if it put their attention on me.
But I’d felt suddenly extremely protective of him.
Yes, he volunteered to be a live model, which was, let’s be honest, very on brand, but still. He wasn’t a piece of meat.
He grabbed his fireman tote and followed me as I spun on my heels and headed up to my apartment.
“Does it bother you to be looked at like that?” I asked as we trudged up the back stairs to my place.
I went first because I could only imagine all the nooks and crannies I’d be seeing if he walked ahead of me up the stairs in that robe.
“Nah. They’re harmless.”
I shuddered. “The thought of being the actual center of everyone’s attention, knowing that they are seeking out every flaw or imperfection . . .”
“Or maybe they are just looking at it objectively. Or thinking nice things? I’m not ashamed of my body.”
“Well, duh. You are a perfect specimen.”
There was a beat of silence, and I was glad he couldn’t see my face after that blurted compliment.
“Remember my feet? I think you think that just because I have muscles, I’m perfect—” I started to object, but he went on, “This isn’t—I’m just trying to say, maybe people aren’t judging and are simply observing, and even if they are judging, okay, oh well. It has zero impact on me either way.”
I frowned at his point. Did he really not care? Was that a man thing or a Pace thing? I couldn’t even pretend to fake not caring.
As I opened the door to my apartment and gestured for him to come in, I was all too aware of what a cluttered little house mouse I was.
Every stacked pile of paperwork I’d promised to get to later, every clean basket of laundry.
Every dirty pile of laundry. Everything was exactly where I knew it to be in its own chaos pile, but looking at it now .
. . there was a chance that to an outsider it would look like I was incapable of putting things away.
“I live on this floor.” I gestured around. “Grandma has a bedroom on the bottom floor, behind the shop.”
I was so very aware of him being up in my space. My space. Here he was with his smell and body, and Romanesque features in my safe place.
I fidgeted with my hands as he slowly crept around, not even pretending to hide his curiosity.
“This is exciting. A glimpse into the life of Sophie.” He looked at me with a huge grin, and I paused from where I’d been trying to discreetly shove things away into a closet.
“Just where I hang my hat.” I tried for nonchalance, but then remembered that no single chalant person would ever use that turn of phrase.
“How better to get to know someone?” He turned back to examine a stack of media in the TV room.
“I was going to text you,” I said, finding it easier to say to his back. Even if those thighs were bitable. “I was working up to it.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I wasn’t sure . . . I would have waited,” he added as his head tilted to read titles of books. “But since I was here, I wanted the chance to say I’m sorry for how I handled things the last time we saw each other.”
“Me too,” I said quickly.
“I wanted to talk about that. The disappearing thing—” His hand was moving along the rows.
“Wait. Sorry. I’m distracted by all this.
” He waved to the massive built-in shelves overflowing with organization cubes, which Grandma lovingly referred to as my Shelves of Shame or Hobby Has-Beens. “You have a lot of interests.”
I stepped closer until we were shoulder to shoulder. Well, shoulder to bulging biceps. “Comes with the territory.”
He pulled out a dusty pair of tap shoes. I’d forgotten about the very short-lived tap shoes phase. As my downstairs neighbor, Grandma was not a fan. I shoved them to the back of the shelf behind a half-finished crocheted baby blanket. That baby was now in first grade, I realized with shame.
“Some of them more successful than others,” I explained. “It’s research for the shop, really. And also, I tend to move on quickly.”
“Do you do the purchasing for the shop?” he asked, and I was relieved he didn’t make fun of me.
I nodded in answer to his question. “I also try out a lot of the new trends. I’m really into diamond painting right now. I help Grandma decide what to stock and see what’s trending online and stuff too. These things are cyclical, like most trends.”
“And what about all the lady porn? I think my mom has this book.” He pulled out a well-worn paperback with a Fabio-esque man, shirt open, wind blowing, far away, lusty stare. Pace could totally don a wig and be a cover model. He could make a killing. “Sophie?”
“Sorry. I went on a journey. I’m back.” He chuckled, and I felt a million feet tall.
“This isn’t porn. And quite frankly, to reduce an entire genre into a degrading term is the patriarchy brainwashing you.
” I went an octave lower as I imitated a masculine voice, “‘Oh, women like it and therefore it must be worthless. Haha, women are so silly.’”
I thought I had actually made my point pretty clearly, for me. I fully invoked the power of El Kincaid.
Pace held my gaze a beat before he pointedly cleared his throat and looked down at the book. He read with slow deliberation. “‘She slowly worked his throbbing member; both hands were hardly able to circle his massive length—’”
I snatched the book away.
Pace stood, trying to make a circle with his hands, his eyes going wide. “That might kill her,” he mumbled.
“Okay, yes. To be fair, there is also sex. But it’s the fantasy. Look, it’s not my job to educate you on your male shortcomings. Read some books.” I sniffed and lifted my chin.
“I definitely will be.” He reached past me to look at the title of the book again before he slid it back onto the shelf.
His body heat encompassed me, and it was too soon after reading about throbbing members.
I swallowed and felt my body pull toward his.
“I liked hearing your opinion on the matter though. It was nice to hear you speak your mind,” he said.
He was still leaning close to me, and his spearmint-and-shampoo scent fired up all my nerves and made me feel alive.
There was no denying my crush at this point. My body had never reacted to anybody else like this. I felt my eyelids growing heavy as I accidentally dropped my gaze to his lips. This close, it was easier to see the light freckles, almost invisible around the edges of his mouth.
“I didn’t realize I had such a strong opinion,” I whispered.
It had been nice to let the words flow out of my mouth instead of looping them on repeat in my head later as I washed dishes.
Even if it wasn’t perfect or neat and tidy.
Getting the thoughts out made a little space up there.
Maybe that was the benefit of being in a relationship?
Talking to someone about all those swirling thoughts allowed them to be pulled out and examined, so they stopped taking up so much mental space.
“Actually, that’s what I was going to say,” Pace said and cleared his throat. I blinked and flushed, realizing I’d really, really been watching his mouth move. “Before I got distracted by all the man nipples.”
“They are easily distractible.”
We both looked pointedly to where his robe had slipped open to reveal his dark nipples and a dusting of reddish-blond hair. I stepped back and twirled away to hide my face.
Was I being painfully obvious? Did he care? He admitted that he was used to people staring and didn’t give much thought to people’s opinions of him. But for some reason, that made me feel worse. I didn’t want to be like everyone else. I wanted to be different.
“Sorry.” He cinched his robe tight, tucking away his pecs.
Peace out, nips.
“It’s a little hard to have a serious talk about this stuff when you’re wearing Ken’s robe,” I said lightly.
“Yeah, that was an oversight on my part. Can I change really quick?” he asked.
“Of course. You can change in the bathroom right there.” I pointed to the door off the living room. “I’ll make us some tea?” I asked.
“Sounds good.”
I barely even thought about the fact that he was naked again, just yards from me, as I set the kettle and made tea.