Page 49
Her gaze drifts beyond my convertible to my covered motorcycle. I haven’t taken it out yet this year, but summer is just beginning.
“Is that a motorcycle?” she asks, her mouth dropping open in shock.
“Yep. It’s a 1000RR Superbike,” I say, my chest puffing up. I catch myself and shrug. What the hell am I doing? Preening like a fucking peacock?
“I have no idea what that means,” she admits with a laugh, looking at me with delight.
“Are you a fan of motorcycles?” I find myself asking.
She grins, that dimple in her left cheek making another appearance. “Love them. I’ve never been on one, though. My parents would have killed me in high school if I ever went near one.”
“How about this—if we win the pro-am, I’ll take you on a ride.”
She gasps. “Really?”
“Really.”
She bites her lower lip and for a moment, my mind goes blank. She’s so fucking adorable, with her braid and her big brown eyes. The fact that she’s still wearing my sweatshirt makes my chest expand even more.
“I just realized I never got a tour of the whole house,” she says lightly as we walk inside.
I sneak a glance over at her and find her watching me with puppy dog eyes. They remind me of Ezra when he’s trying to get something out of me.
Sighing, I drop her backpack off in her room and gesture to the door that leads to the basement. “Shall we?”
She giggles and walks ahead. “We shall.”
“You’ve already seen the kitchen. Thank you for dinner, by the way. It was delicious,” I tell her.
“That kitchen is a dream,” she groans. “The white cabinets, the marble countertops, the giant island?”
Pride swells in my chest, which is ridiculous. It’s not like I’ve built it with my own two hands. I need to calm the fuck down.
“I think you might like the basement even more,” I say, turning on the lights at the bottom of the stairs. It reveals the huge open room with the indoor golf simulator on one side and the home theatre and giant sectional sofa on the other.
Hazel looks around in awe, gingerly touching the control panel of the simulator. “This model must be brand-new. We don’t even have something this fancy at the club.”
Before I can reply, she sees the couch and makes a beeline for it, lying face down on the comfortable cushions. I bring a hand to my mouth to hide my smile. It’s exactly the type of thing I do, and it gives me a sudden jolt of satisfaction to find yet another thing we have in common.
That satisfaction turns into a sudden desire as she shifts around. The movement makes her round ass stick further up into the air, and suddenly all I can think about is how her curves would feel under my touch. Would she squirm? Would she melt? Would she take control?
Fuck.
I squeeze my eyes tight and turn back towards the stairs. “Want to see the upstairs?” I call out gruffly.
This is the one downside to having her in my house. How the hell am I going to deal with my attraction towards her? There’s no way that anything could happen between us, even though she no longer has a boyfriend. I’m helping her with her career, having her join my team.
Anything happening between us would be—wrong. It would be an abuse of power on my end. I grit my teeth and walk up the stairs, not looking back to see if she’s following.
Her steps quicken and she huffs a laugh. “Are you in a hurry?”
“Yes,” I say, a little too quickly.
“Oh.”
“I have an appointment soon,” I say, glad it’s the truth. I need to call Dolores for a therapy appointment. It’s later than she normally takes patients, but she made an exception so I wouldn’t have to wait until she had an opening in her regular schedule.
Upstairs, Hazel gets distracted by the landing, which has a long bench with white frilly pillows, and a big window behind it.
