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“He’s got nice forearms, I’ll give him that,” Sara laughed. “Seriously, though. I don’t know how you do it, Li.”
“Do what?”
“Focus without needing to physically bang out your frustration sometimes. I’d get so much done if I were you.”
“I think that was God evening out the playing field. You’d take over the world if you didn’t need to stop every twelve hours and have sex with someone.”
She paused. “I think there was a compliment in there. Somewhere.”
“There was,” I giggled but I quieted down fast when I heard the front door of the townhouse swing open downstairs. “Ooh. I gotta go.”
“Why? Hottie’s home?”
“You know the drill,” I said with a grin.
“Okay, bye. Save me a truffle or I’ll hurt you!”
“’Kay, bye!” I whispered, hanging up as I listened to Lukas come up the stairs. The first night of our deal, he’d come home to hear me giggling with Sara on the phone. I heard his footsteps pause in the hall and when I went to peek in the peephole, I confirmed him smirking at my door. With a tired laugh and groan, he said, “You’re killing me, Lia,” then disappeared into his apartment. I blushed to myself for probably thirty minutes after that.
Last night, it was similar. I’d peeked out into the hallway to see him gaze at my door for a good second before cursing under his breath and going in.
It was surprising to me, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t flattered and charmed. I’d half-expected Lukas to plain forget about me by day one. He had beautiful women of every kind at his beck and call – I really couldn’t imagine that he’d wait several days for me instead of round them up to have multiple threesomes in the penthouse of his favorite hotel.
Hearing him approach his door, I tip toed to mine, peeking out into the hall. Damn, I bit my lip when I saw him walking in looking tired but unbelievably sexy with his tie and jacket in his hand, his shirt un-tucked those deft fingers undoing the first few buttons.
Shit. I ducked when he peered over his shoulder at me.
“I can hear your slippers every time you come to the door,” he said, his voice a mixture of amusement and exhaustion. “You better be working your ass off in there. I heard you giggling on the phone the other night.”
“What – I am!” I retorted. “I haven’t left my house in three days!”
His door was open now but he leaned back against it to squint at my door. “Are you serious? That’s not healthy,” he laughed incredulously. He cocked his head as if to get a better look at me. “You can’t open the door for a second so I can at least look at you?” he asked.
“Trust me, you don’t want to.”
He massaged the back of his neck. “Trust me. I can’t think of anything I want more right now,” he said.
My cheeks were hot as I bit my lip again. There was surprisingly no flirtation in his statement – it was just matter-of-fact. And somehow, that made me blush even more. I turned away from the peephole and leaned my back against the door.
“One more day, Lukas,” I said, if even to remind myself. “You’ve already gone this long without breaking the rules. Don’t do it now.”
“Fine. I won’t,” I heard him say. It was quiet for another few seconds as I leaned against my door. But finally I heard Lukas laugh to himself, go inside and close the door.
But barely thirty minutes later, there was a knock.
“Seriously, Lukas?” I shook my head as I marched over to the door, gathering my messy hair into a topknot and securing it haphazardly with a tie. Knotting my robe, I suppressed the smile on my face and swung open the door. “Lukas, didn’t we just – oh!”
I blinked when I realized it wasn’t Lukas. The man at my door was about a foot shorter including the chunky bicycle helmet. His look was blank as he held out a paper bag, raising his eyebrows expectantly as he waited for me to take it.
“Lia Pope, yes?”
“Oh. Yes.” I grabbed it, confused as I examined the bag. “Sorry, what is this?” I asked. But by the time I looked up again, he was gone and Lukas was opening his door.
Goddammit. He was barefoot and shirtless, wearing just a pair of grey sweats that hung well below his hips. I stared. Didn’t even try to hide it. He looked good enough to lick. When I looked up, an irresistible grin spread across his lips.
“Lukas.” I shook my head. “This has to be breaking the rules.”
“Not at all. The rule was that I couldn’t knock. There was nothing about getting a delivery guy to do it for me.”
