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18
BRISTOL
I half-expectWill to drag me to his bedroom as soon as we get back to his apartment, but he doesn’t.
Instead, he changes out of his wet clothes, then goes to the kitchen and opens the fridge. I lean against the countertop, pop a Jolly Rancher into my mouth, and watch him. He scrolls through his phone, glancing at the shelves, expression guarded.What’s going on with us?That’s the first question I want to ask.How can you wash my hair and hold my hand and then keep yourself so distant?
Will’s hair is still damp from the rain. The tousled look is hot on him. I’vebeenhot for him this entire time. Waves of heat that I could have mistaken for the fever.
I guess the fact that he’s angry at me and wants me to leave and also wants me to stay has no effect on his relative hotness.
He flicks his eyes to mine. “What?”
I flutter my eyelashes at him. “What’s your plan, Mr. Leblanc?”
Will scowls, his eyes going dark. “Keep you in my apartment and use you as my corporate whore forever.”
The sharp breath I take almost sends the Jolly Rancher into my windpipe. I probably shouldn’t eat them around Will. They’re dangerous. “You cannot call me a corporate whore when the twins are in the next room.”
He cocks his head. Just then, Mia’s voice reaches the kitchen. “This shirt itches. I hate it.”
“What about this one?”
“That hit me in theface.”
“Ohno,” teases Ben. “Are you going to live?”
Will nods. “They’re not listening. And if you don’t want to be called a corporate whore at home, don’t call me Mr. Leblanc.”
“If I call you Mr. Leblanc, will youactuallytreat me like a corporate whore?”
He peers at me from around the refrigerator door. “For someone who doesn’t want her siblings to find out she’s a corporate whore, you seem interested in continuing the discussion.”
My heart zigzags at the color of his eyes. It’s undecided in the light of the kitchen. Blue or green? Stay or go? “I don’t know why you want us to stay with you.”
“It’s safer here.”
“So what?”
He lets out a breath. “So, you were sick. The twins needed someone else to keep an eye on them. There were three men staking out your apartment for unknown reasons.”
“Do you let all your former employees stay at your apartment when something creepy happens?”
Will glowers. “No.”
“I’m different, then.” We’re existing in this weird in-between, where I live in his house and he takes care of me, but I’m also a corporate whore. Where I feel brave enough to tease him about rough sex in the rain but not quite brave enough to explain the tangle of emotions taking up most of my chest.
He looks at me, and the expression on his face reminds me of the moment after he made the joke about carrying his tub. It was so sweet, and so genuine, and socornythat I almost thought I made it up in a painkiller delirium. Or after he told me about his building’s pickleball courts. Like he’d gone too far. Embarrassed himself by being playful.
He’s going to deny it, isn’t he? Insist that he doesn’t want me here, just like he did at work. And I’m going to tell him it’s bullshit. Will came to my apartment with the twins to rescue me. That’s just not the behavior of a man who really thinks I’m a corporate whore.
Even if it is hot when he says it.
His eyes move over my face. My lips. I hold my breath. It’s like being searched, only I haven’t stolen anything. Slowly, slowly, his sea-glass gaze travels back to mine.
“Yes,” he admits. Then he sticks his head back behind the door and moves something around on the shelves.
It’s one terse word, and Will looked embarrassed to say it. The sweetness on my tongue from the Jolly Rancher intensifies by a thousand percent. I could swoon. Maybe I’m still sick, because a clippedyesisn’t a very romantic gesture, but coming from WillI Hate HugsLeblanc?
