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Everything comes to a crashing halt, my brain no longer focused on the whirlwind of racing thoughts. I sit up abruptly, planting my bare feet on the floor to ground me. “Brody? But...how did you get this number?”
“Your friend at the lawyer’s office?” He sounds surprised that I’m questioning him. “She texted my number, said she’d got it off the business card that you’d given her because you were too embarrassed that you’d forgotten to give me your number in return...” He trails off, realization sinking in. “...which I’m assuming wasn’t the truth at all.”
I’ll kill Jenn. Ever fiber of my being is alive with the need to wring her dainty little neck. It also feels like I need to rein in my thoughts about Brody because I’ve been thinking about him all freaking evening and, boom, he calls out of thin air, like my mind has magically conjured him up.
Or, like Jenn has done some scheming and conjuring of her own.
“No,” I answer truthfully. “I didn’t know Jenn was going to memorize your number when I showed her your card, or that she would text you my number, for that matter.”
“But you were discussing me with her.” I can hear the smug satisfaction in his voice, and it causes heat to creep into my cheeks. “So, women really do that, huh?”
“Do what?”
“Get together and talk about the men they find attractive.”
“You, Mr. Marsh, are seriously delusional,” I assure him.
“But you didn’t say you didn’t find me attractive,” he replies, obviously amused.
“I’m hanging up now.”
“Wait,” he chuckles. “Wait. Jesus, I’m kidding. I swear, I’m just being an ass.”
“Finally, something we can agree on,” I tell him. I hope to God he can’t hear my heart beating wildly, but the way it’s pulsing loudly in my ears, I can’t see how he can’t. “We should really end this call now, Brody.”
“Give me one good reason.”
“Because...it’s a conflict of interest,” I stammer. But it sounds hollow even to my own ears, and he picks up on it.
“And is it the conflict you don’t want, or the interest?” he counters. “You told me yourself, you’re just the assistant, Corinne. There’s no conflict at all between you and I.”
I beg to differ, on a multitude of levels. Hell, there’s a whole lot of confliction going on inside me right now, but I can’t admit that to him. “We’ve got nothing to talk about,” I assure him.
“Funny, your friend seems to think so.”
“Well, Jenn is wrong,” I snap. “Christ, why did you call, anyway, Brody? Because you thought it would be fun to put me on edge just a little bit more?”
“To say thank you,” he says evenly. “But...”
“But what?” I bark, exasperated.
“I’m just trying to figure out if my ability to put you on edge is a good thing or a bad thing.”
I breathe out, frustrated as hell and ready to freak out on him. “Trust me, Brody, there’s nothing good about this.”
“You don’t know that, Corinne.” There’s a hint of mischievousness in his voice. “You’ve never experienced having me take you to the edge before.”
More heat rises in my cheeks, and I hate myself for feeling a delicious sizzle of excitement at the mere prospect of his words. What the hell is wrong with me?
Two years of relative celibacy and an undeniably gorgeous man on the other end of the phone, that’s what. “Now, I really need to hang up.”
“Why, because you might actually like the sounds of it?”
“No, because you’re an asshole who—”
“I’m not Jackson.” Brody interrupts my impending rant with a level of assertiveness I hadn’t heard until now. “You can blame me for his stupidity, and you can blame yourself for it, too, Corinne. But Jackson cheated on you, no one else. Placing blame elsewhere isn’t helping anyone. It was a dick move on his part, but there’s no one to blame for it other than him.”
“I’m not blaming you—” I choke out, shocked.
