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“My grandparents told me you were happy with the conditions of the lease,” he says, all business. His mouth is a severe slash on his clean-shaven face, his eyes dark as they roam over my features.
“I am,” I say, impressed that my mouth was able to form words.
He pulls out a crisp business card that has just his name and phone number on it. “Call me if there are any issues. I’ll be taking over from my grandparents in managing the rental.”
“Of course. Thank you, Desmond.” I smile again, and our gazes linger slightly on each other.
“Call me Des.” He extends a palm toward me, and we shake.
Starting a new project has injected me with new life. A couple of weeks ago, if a man who looked like Desmond would have stared at me likethat, I would have assumed I had ketchup on my face. Right now, I can’t help but feel attractive and confident and… Well, I feel likemeagain. Like the woman who gambled her financial future on her own daring plans, who backed herself, who became a millionaire by the time she was thirty.
As Desmond’s dark eyes warm me from the inside out, I don’t feel like a bitter, washed-up divorcée. I feelhot.
Unfortunately, that’s exactly the moment that Sebastian’s truck pulls into the parking spot directly in front of the gallery.
It’s also the moment that I realize Desmond never let go of my hand.
9
SEBASTIAN
Oh,hellno.
I thump my hat on my head as soon as I exit the car, slamming the door closed with the flat of my hand. A ringing starts in my ears when Georgia’s hand stays clasped in the man’s beside her, sending a strange buzzing down to my extremities.
The stranger arches a brow, finally dropping Georgia’s hand. Unfortunately, he doesn’t take three big steps back from her, which is the minimum distance I’d want between them.
Guess she was right about me. I’m an overbearing asshole. I still don’t like this guy and his fancy clothes; he reminds me too much of the lawyers that sat across from me while my ex-wife tore my life apart. He looks like a shark, like he wants to crush me under his heel.
I spent nearly a week rehearsing an apology for Georgia. I lambasted myself for the way I treated her, flogged my own back for being such a sexist jerk to her. And now I get to watch some other guy crawl up into her space? I get to see how close I came to having her, only to have some other asshole swoop in?
My carefully crafted apology withers on the vine. I forget every word of it while I step onto the curb, eyes shifting from the lump in a suit to the woman I’ve been dreaming about since I was fifteen years old.
“Georgia,” I growl.
Her pulse flutters visibly in her throat, but she squares her shoulders and lifts her chin. “Sebastian.”
I love her spine. Her stubbornness. The way she fights back. Love it and hate it all at once. It makes me want to wrap my arms around her and protect her from anything that might hurt her, and it also makes me want to strip her down to the skin and show her that she doesn’t need to be that strong and defensive when she’s with me.
She gestures to the guy. “This is my new landlord, Desmond Thomas.”
I’ll be honest, I don’t really care what his name is. And I don’t know what she’s renting from him, nor do I have enough space in my brain to ask. I want to know why he felt like he had the right to stare at her like she’s edible—but I can’t quite think of a way to put that into words while the pounding of my heartbeat in my ears intensifies.
I have no right to feel this protective of her. I have no right to even talk to her, considering the way I acted the last time we saw each other.
But.
But I can’t help myself from feeling fierce possession over her, fromknowingthat her body melts whenever it’s in contact with mine. We have something—a connection, a spark, magic, whatever you want to call it. It’s been there since she grinned at me in English class in the ninth grade.
My pulse pounds, and it feels like I watch myself from a distance. I know, in the tiny part of my brain that’s rational, that I’m going to make a fool of myself. I’ll push Georgia away. I’ll make her think she was right to storm off on me, that she should do it again. If I give in to my temper, I’ll expose myself as the brute I am.
But Desmond Thomas is staring at me with a flat, expressionless look on his face, and it feels a whole hell of a lot like a challenge.
He might be slick and well-groomed and wearing clothes that are a lot more expensive than mine, but that doesn’t stop my blood from heating. A man knows a challenge when he sees it. I’m three seconds away from laying him flat on his back while he clutches his bloodied nose.
The moment hangs between the three of us, pulsing.
Then Desmond puts his hand on Georgia’s back. “You know this guy?”
