To My Arrogant Boss (The Inappropriate Bachelors #2) - J. S. Cooper Page 0,29

head. “A book is too advanced for what I do. I like to write short stories.”

“Oh, cool.” I was surprised. “What sort of short stories?”

“Just whatever I can write in ten minutes.” He laughed. “It’s something that helps me to de-stress.”

“Any particular genres?”

“No.” He shook his head and then he smiled awkwardly. “I’m not a good writer or anything. I just do it for fun.”

“That sounds cool. I’d love to hear one sometime.” The words were out of my mouth before I had time to think. Why had I told him I wanted to hear one? He would read far too much into it.

“I have one on my phone if you’d like to hear it.” He smiled. “We’re almost at the gym, but maybe later sometime?”

“Yeah, that would be cool.”

“So now it’s your turn. Tell me something no one really knows about you.”

“That’s hard.” I chewed on my lower lip. “I’m pretty much an open book.”

“Not to me you’re not.”

“Yeah, I guess that’s true.” I stared at him for a few seconds and then said. “I like to paint, usually with acrylics, but I’m interested in learning oil painting as well. I’m not good or anything,” I said quickly, lest he think I was some sort of Georgia O’Keefe or Frida Kahlo.

“I bet you’re better than you think.”

“I doubt it.” I laughed. “I just like to sip a glass of wine and paint something. It helps me to relax.”

“Sounds fun.” His eyes crinkled. “We both have these creative extracurriculars. We should do them together sometime.”

“What do you mean?”

“Maybe we can meet up and do some writing and painting,” he asked almost shyly. “I’d say you could come over to my place, but I feel like you might end up in my bed and then you would think I only invited you over to fuck.”

“Tate, does everything always go back to sex with you?”

“Of course not.” He grinned. “So will you come over to my place to write and paint?”

“No.” I laughed. “You’ll have me trying to be your nude model or something.”

“Maybe I want to be your nude model.” He winked, his blue eyes laughing at me. “I could be your six-foot Adonis.”

“What if I said yes?” I said suddenly. “What if I said, yes I want you to be my nude model and I want you to do whatever I ask of you?”

“Is that a real question? I’d be in so fast.” He looked at me hopefully. “Was that a real ask?”

“No, Tate. I do not want you to be my nude model.” I rolled my eyes at him but heat rushed through my body at the thought. I was lying through my teeth. I would absolutely love for Tate to model nude for me. I’d love to study his cock under the pretext of needing to examine it for my painting. Honestly, it wouldn’t matter how long I stared at it, my painting would still look the same. I enjoyed painting, but I wasn’t good at it. I probably had the artistic skills of a first-grader. Not that he knew that, of course. I could pretend I was creating a masterpiece.

I smiled to myself at the thought.

“What’s so funny?” Tate’s eyes narrowed. “What are you thinking about?”

“Nothing.” I gave him my most innocent smile. “Is this the gym?” I said as we stopped outside the Equinox facility.

“Saved by the fitness bell.” He shook his head. “You were thinking naughty things about my cock, weren’t you?” He leaned forward and grinned. “It’s okay, you can tell me.”

“You wish, Tate.” I pushed past him and headed into the gym. Maybe this hadn’t been my best idea. It was a spur of the moment decision to join Tate in the gym and tease him slightly, but now I wondered if the person I was going to be teasing most was myself.

“Meet you by the treadmills in ten minutes?” Tate asked after I’d finished signing my temporary fitness pass.

“Sure,” I said with a quick nod. “So, there are separate changing facilities then? I know you mentioned a coed steam room before.” My mind was racing. How was I going to slip the note inside his bag?

“There are coed and male and female changing rooms and lockers. Do you want to use the coed?”

“What do you normally use?” I asked him, curious.

“Honestly?”

“Let me guess, the coed?”

“Actually, no. I usually use the male locker rooms. Most guys here use the coed rooms hoping to get lucky, so most of the time the male rooms