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Just like his motorcycle, Jasper lives life at full throttle with an unapologetic appetite for good times and pretty women. There’s nothing discreet, subtle, or reserved about him.
Next morning, the blinding morning sun wakes me, leaving me with burning eyes and a parched throat. I stumble out to the kitchen for a glass of water and run smack into Jasper—date nowhere to be seen—cheerfully chugging his green smoothie before he hits the streets for his morning run.
I guess if you work for a sports magazine, you have to be athletic.
I take a deep breath, determined to address what ails me, when he grins sheepishly. Which I wish he wouldn’t do because, dammit, he’s fucking adorable at six-foot-three-ish with thick black bed-head hair and piercing blue eyes so brilliant they can’t even be hidden behind his thick-framed glasses, the momentary fashion rage among Manhattan men.
God help me.
“Hey, Jas, last night—”
He takes a step closer to me and his eyes twinkle, damn him. “Whoa. Are you jealous, Ava?”
Huh? What?Jealous?
Is he kidding?
I’m at a momentary loss for words. I mean, I expect some push back when I let him know I’m not happy about being kept awake until the early hours by his dalliances, but is heflirting?
Withme?
He seems the flirtatious type, no doubt. My brother’s friends are all lady-killer sorts of guys, men who make a profession out of getting into the pants of attractive women. But until now, I’ve never been the target of their charm, especially Jasper’s. When we do interact, which is not often, he usually rubs my head and calls mekiddo, as if he’s an extension of Andy.
And for fuck’s sake, this is not about jealousy.
But his effortless approach to life does intrigue me. I can’t lie. The lightness of his being is enviable, confounded by my own inability to really let loose.
He places a hand on my shoulder, bare except for my sleep tank, and tilts his head. “You’re too pretty to be jealous.”
He finishes the last of his smoothie, winks, and leaves me standing there like a starving lion in front of a meat buffet.
As the door clicks shut behind him, I realize everything is within my reach. Everything I want, I can have. And the gap between my double lives—one where I’m the confident sex columnist and the other where I’m a sexual incompetent—can be closed quickly and quietly. The drive to understand the ‘big deal about sex’ just took a dramatic, personal turn. Why isn’t the woman orgasming under my roof until the wee hours of the morningme?
Why not me?
I’m not fighting for a column inGlisten, I’m fighting for myself.
* * *
5
JASPER
Bastard.
He gets an office while I am relegated to the shithole bullpen with all the otherSports Incorporatedwriters.
I know that’s how journalism works and all that crap, and that’s why my noise cancelling headphones are my office savior, but my buddy Ethan Lancaster, just because he’s in sales, has a view of New York City as far as the eye can see. His walls are covered with giant posters of our top-selling issues, which are usually the bathing suit covers, so that means he gets to look at the world’s most beautiful women all day long while he flaps his gums over the phone.
I don’t mean to put down what he does. Hell, if guys like Ethan didn’t sell ad space in the magazine, none of us would have freaking jobs. It doesn’t matter how expertly I cover trends in sports—no advertisers equals no money equals no magazine.
And no job for good old me.
So, the fact that he’s seen as a rainmaker, actually the top rainmaker among the entire sales team, gives him a special God-like status in magazine-world. Guys like him are hard to come by.
But guys like me, who can type over a hundred words a minute and churn out an article analyzing sports scores like a freaking math savant?
A dime a dozen, especially in a city like New York.
