Page 59 of The One Who Never Left: Colter

“It wasn’t a lap dance, we were asleep.”

“Yet, he started bringing you coffee. There’s more to the story.”

“We had breakfast at the diner the other day.”

“So breakfast twice. Coffee every day.” Jo grinned like she’d just lit a fuse. “When are the save-the-date cards going in the mail?”

“Save-the-date cards?” Her voice cracked and wasn’t that annoying. “Even if there was something to send one for—which there isn’t—I’m done with dating. My family is Lynlee and that’s enough for me.”

Jo didn’t snort or glare. She simply went very still, lips pressing together as she studied Sutton like a puzzle she’d already solved. Then she leaned back with a slow, knowing smile and shook her head once. “Again, I call bullshit. You miss sex.”

"I miss a lot of things. Sleep. Silence. The concept of a bathroom door that locks."

"Sure. But mostly sex."

Sutton rolled her eyes, smirking. “There are other ways to be satisfied.”

From behind her, Colter’s voice slid through the air, low and teasing. “Other ways? What did I miss?”

Sutton felt a zing of awareness, which turned to a jolt when she saw him leaning casually against the counter, with that smirk twisting in a way that made her stomach flip.

The problem—and it was a significant problem—was that he looked even better than she remembered, which was saying something considering she'd spent the last twelve hours trying to forget.

Worn jeans sitting exactly where worn jeans had no right to sit. Flannel rolled to the forearms like he'd personally consulted a manual on how to ruin a woman's concentration. And that mouth. That completely unreasonable mouth, doing that thing where it wasn't quite smiling but was somehow worse than smiling.

“Yes,” she said, voice steady despite the heat creeping up her neck. “Ways you can’t even imagine.”

“Oh? I’m pretty imaginative. Care to show me?”

“I don’t give demonstrations. That’s not my style.”

His voice dipped into that low, gravelly tone he knew made her brain melt. “Guess I’ll just have to be persuasive then.”

“It’s a hard pass.”

Colter leaned in, just close enough that she could feel the heat radiating from him. “You haven’t even let me get to the creative part.”

“What are you even doing here?” she asked.

“Picking up coffee for the office.”

He grabbed a to-go cup that had his name written down the side.

“Oh,” she said, suddenly feeling silly. He hadn’t just been picking it up for her. He’d been bringing it for the whole office. Her face heated with embarrassment.

“Unless your office is now a party of two, then your maths aren’t mathing,” Jo said.

"Thank you, Jo," he said.

"Anytime."

Sutton opened her mouth to give him a hard time, when a small pink blur came barreling across the café.

“Mister Colter!”

He barely had time to turn before Lynlee catapulted herself at him. He caught her easily, laughing as he scooped her up and swung her around.

“Well, hello there, Princess,” he said, settling her on his hip. “You trying to knock me over before eight o’clock?”