can be,” he said, sliding his cell phone onto the coffee table before he came to stand near my feet, his sexy blue-green eyes fixed on me.
“Did you get it all worked out?” I asked him.
I could feel his eyes as they raked over me. “Yeah,” he said, his voice a deep rumble. “I did.”
“Just to be nosey, what is it that she told you to do?”
Jake cocked an eyebrow at me.
“You told Liz that you were doing what she told you to do. And that was…?”
He smiled. “To find the girl who inspired me to write and do whatever it took to have her.”
That hadn’t been what I was expecting and the sinking feeling in my gut returned. So, I really was his inspiration for writing and now he was what? Using me to progress the book?
I shook it off and forced a smile, staring up at him.
Knowing this was about to go in a direction that we wouldn’t be able to come back from—a place that quite frankly scared me because I could feel my heart getting too invested when it seemed this was possibly one-sided—I held up my hand. “I need my journal.”
Jake’s forehead creased momentarily as his gaze slid up to meet mine.
“The pink book I sometimes draw in,” I told him, chuckling at the lost look on his face.
“Right.”
I watched as he disappeared from the room, returning a minute later with my sketchbook and a pencil.
“Thank you.” I took both from him, then rolled over onto my stomach and started to draw.
Sometime later, Jake startled me by clearing his throat. I honestly couldn’t say whether he’d been in there with me the whole time or not, but I looked up to see his wide grin.
“Your cell phone rang,” he told me, his eyes raking up and down my body as he held out my phone.
I took it from his hand, noticing the time. I’d been right there on the floor for two hours and hadn’t even realized so much time had passed. It was strange how comfortable I was, being there with him. Like two friends who’d been together for a while. Easy, comfortable.
On top of that, he had inspired me to draw for the first time in months. Nothing major, but it was progress and I was happy with the result.
Sitting up, I pulled up my call log to see that I had missed a call from Gil.
My roommate was probably making an attempt to ensure me that they weren’t having an orgy, though in reality, they probably were. Rather than call him back and listen to him give me a hard time, I shot him another text, letting him know everything was good and that I’d be home tomorrow night.
“You hungry? Thirsty?” Jake asked, holding out his hand and helping me to my feet.
Once I was vertical, I looked around, noticing for the first time that Jake had started a fire in the fireplace.
“Wow. When did you do that?”
“About an hour ago,” he said with a smile. “You were a little busy, so I didn’t want to bother you.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“No apologies,” Jake said, erasing the distance between us, his hands sliding up to my hips, beneath the shirt. A tremor danced down my spine as his warm hands brushed my skin. “I understand all too well what it’s like to be in the zone.”
I forced my eyes up to meet his, noticing the heat blazing in the blue-green depths. “Am I distracting you?”
Jake grinned. “Definitely.”
“Is that a bad thing?”
“Not at all.”
“Because I could always lock myself in a room and—”
“As long as you know I’ll be in there with you,” he said with a sexy smirk.
I didn’t know what to say to that, but I knew I had to say something. “Sixteen days,” I blurted.
Jake frowned.
“Until your deadline,” I reminded him. “The last thing we need to do is get something started that might interfere with that.”
There, I’d said it. Not the easiest thing to do, but I’d given him a valid reason as to why we shouldn’t pursue this just yet. Did I want to? Fuck, yes. But I knew what happened in a new relationship. Everything else fell to the wayside, and Jake had a book to write, and I had a contest to enter—maybe.
“You’ve been thinking about this,” Jake muttered, leaning down closer.
I nodded.
“That’s a very interesting reason,” he said.
“Valid reason,” I added.
Jake leaned in again, his breath fanning my face. “Stupid reason.”