Crushing on my Billionaire Best Friend - Jolie Day Page 0,30
in my cheeks and let out a nervous laugh. “I’m not going to take my dress off in front of you right here in the middle of the kitchen. You’re crazy. Let me change real quick, and then I’ll give it to you. You have a secret stain remover or something?”
“I didn’t mean here in front of me.” He chuckled.
Oh, my gosh. Of course not! I was so silly; words were just falling out of my mouth. Yup, nerves. And my brain. It short-circuited. Well, now would be a good time for my brain to get back to normal mode.
“But you’re more than welcome to take it off here,” he said. “I’ll even turn around. As a matter of fact, I’ve seen you in a bathing suit before. It’s no big deal.”
“That’s different.” I retreated into my bedroom, grumbling to myself, wishing he would stop making things worse like always. If only he could have said it for a reason other than feeling bad about causing me to mess up my new favorite dress. I popped back out a minute later, wearing a baggy shirt and shorts with the ruined dress in hand.
“How’s it different?” He stared at me expectantly.
Of course, he couldn’t just let it go.
“Here.” I handed him the dress. I wasn’t about to go into the fact that undressing in front of him was what made it different. I didn’t need another reminder that he was so indifferent to my half-naked body. “Maybe I wasn’t wearing any underwear.” Honestly, I surprised even myself with my reply.
A smile tugged at his lips. “Oh, is that so? I guess I’ll never find out.” He grabbed my dress and picked up a bottle of dishwashing liquid in his other hand. “Could you grab the hydrogen peroxide from under the bathroom sink, please?”
A few minutes later, he’d mixed up some sort of concoction and was blotting it against the stain. “There. Now we just let it sit for about an hour. Your stain will be long gone after we wash it.”
“Thanks.” I smiled lightly. “I didn’t realize you were such a laundry expert.”
“My granny taught me,” he said with a shrug.
I tried to shake off the swell in my heart that came with the mental image of sweet little boy Ollie bonding with his grandma over laundry. It was too much to take. Like puppies or kittens sending me into cuteness overload.
“What are you doing here, anyway? I thought you were checking out that bar you texted me about.”
“So, you did see it?” He smirked, like he’d just caught me in a lie.
“Yeah, so?” I shrugged. “I never said I didn’t see it. I was just on my way home and didn’t feel like going out, so I…didn’t respond because I couldn’t come up with a good excuse. Why didn’t you go ahead without me?”
“Because I wanted to go with you,” he shot back, the smirk gone from his face.
Oh.
“With me?” I could feel the familiar heat rising to my cheeks. “Why?”
He flashed an incredulous smile and poured himself a glass from my bottle of wine. Then he sat down on the stool across from me, and his eyes bore into mine. “Laney. We need to talk.”
Oh, shit. My throat tightened, making it hard to swallow. My heart was pounding even harder than before. I threw back a gulp of my wine. “About…what?”
“Sit down,” he commanded me.
I’d rarely ever heard Oliver be so stern, and he had definitely never talked to me like that. No wonder he had women falling over him left and right, doing whatever he told them to do. His regular voice was sexy enough—but bossy, pissed, dominant Oliver was impossible to refuse.
I plopped down on the other stool without giving it a second thought. “Oliver, you’re scaring me.”
“You’re the one scaring me,” he argued. “What’s going on with you? I mean, I know you’ve always blown off most of my invitations to go out. But it’s been even worse since you moved in here with me. I feel like I see you less now than I did before you started staying here.”
I had to bite my lip to hide the trembling. I always did hate keeping secrets, and I hated getting caught or getting in trouble. I tried to think of some joke I could make to blow the whole thing over, but I could tell by the serious expression on Oliver’s face that he was nowhere near a joking mood.