Oh, Keep Your Shirt On - Michelle Pennington Page 0,13
don’t feel strong doesn’t mean you aren’t. We barely even know each other, but I’m so freaking proud of you right now.”
I pressed my lips together but couldn’t completely stop myself from chuckling, though it sounded more like a grumpy huff of air. “I can’t believe you hung around. I’m so sorry about…wow.” As the horror of everything I’d said rang in my head, I rushed over to sit on the stairs before my legs collapsed beneath me. I pulled my knees up close to my chest and buried my face in my hands. “I can’t believe the things that came out of my mouth.”
I waited there, wondering what Damien was going to say. I mean, my mom and I had just dumped a bucket of crazy over him.
But he didn’t say anything at all. He looked at me for a long, quiet moment, then sat down two steps below me, angling his body to lean against the wall, and stretched his long legs out. He took up so much room that I waited to feel claustrophobic, or at least uncomfortable. But I didn’t. In fact, having him sort of fill up all the empty space around me…well, it was oddly comforting.
Best of all, he didn’t even look at me. He just leaned his head against the wall and stared up at the ceiling—which was not that interesting.
My quick, shallow breathing slowed and deepened. The trembling tension inside me eased away. I stopped clenching my teeth.
He smelled like morning air and coffee. He felt…safe.
“Why aren’t you talking?” I asked at last, my voice almost a whisper.
His eyes shifted to meet mine. “I thought you’d rather be quiet.”
Because I knew what a normally talkative person he was, that single sentence felt more like friendship than any other interaction we’d had.
I couldn’t let this happen—I couldn’t be friends, but for the moment, I was grateful. “Thanks,” I said, hoping he’d understand, since I wasn’t capable of saying any more than that.
He smiled and went back to looking up at the ceiling. “Don’t get too comfortable. I’m sitting here plotting ways to convince you to go to the wedding with me.”
“Even after the mother-daughter freak show you just saw?”
His eyes found mine again. “Now more than ever.”
Chapter Six
It took me a whole day to recover from my embarrassment and find enough courage to go knock on Damien’s door to pay my late rent on Monday morning.
The cold air stung my eyes and lungs. I wore a thick cardigan over my T-shirt, but it was no match for the arctic wind gusting around me as I waited forever on the porch for him to come to the door. I knew he was home because his truck was parked in the driveway, but maybe he was still asleep.
Sure, I could have just slipped the envelope through the slot on his door, but I wanted to apologize and explain that the extra amount included the late fee and what I guessed he’d spent on my gas. I rang the doorbell one more time, waited thirty seconds, and sighed. Oh well. As much as I wanted to do this face-to-face, I wasn’t about to freeze to death in the time it took him to appear.
Giving up, I stepped forward to stick the envelope through when the door swung open.
Relieved, I looked up and opened my mouth to speak, then froze in a more complete and devastating way than if I’d actually turned to ice.
Damien stood in front of me, bare-chested and glistening with sweat, toweling himself off. “Hey. Sorry. Did you wait a long time?”
Gathering my wits and tearing my eyes away from his abs, I said, “I’m half popsicle now.”
He laughed. “You’d better come in and warm up.”
Go inside? When he looked like that? No way. “I’m just paying my rent. Here.”
But when I held out the envelope to him, he grabbed hold of my wrist and pulled me inside. Once I was across the threshold, he let go of my wrist and wrapped his arm around my shoulders, pulling me closer to him so he could shut the door. My brain was barely functioning at that point. And who could blame me? I could actually feel the heat radiating off his skin and smell the earthy saltiness of his sweat. And there was just so much gorgeous skin.
The clicking of the door latch jump-started my systems again. “What are you doing?”
“Inviting you in for breakfast,” he said, releasing me and walking down the hall, completely