Page 13 of The Plus One Professional

“Do you have green eyes?”

His question took me by surprise and worked its magic to hold back my face explosion. I blinked up at him. He was staring right at me, so he had to know what color my eyes were. Was this some sort of pickup line, or something?

I grinned. “Last time I checked.”

“And blonde hair?” he questioned as his fingers slid through the strands.

“Yeah.” If thiswasa pickup line, it was a strange one.

“Sorry.” He dropped his hand to his side. “I was only asking because I’m color blind.”

“You’recolor blind?” Again, that was not what I’d expected him to say.

“Yeah.”

“I’ve never met anyone who was color blind.”

His mouth curled in a cocky, bad-boy half-grin that had my stomach doing more flips than a politician on the campaign trail. Holy moly, this man had quite the effect on me. I’d thought he was dangerous from fifty yards away, but up close and personal, he was deadly.

“Have wemet?” he questioned. “Officially?”

“No. I guess not. I’m Bailey. Bailey Bliss.”

“Bailey Bliss,” he repeated my name, almost in a whisper, as if it were reverent before he held out his hand. “Hi Bailey, I’m CJ, or, um, I’m Cole. Cole.”

“Cole.” As I placed my hand in his, I heard myself repeating his name with the same reverence he’d used to say mine. The moment my fingers slid against the warmth of his palm, my entire body tingled from the innocent contact.

Trying to disguise or at least deflect my reaction to him, I cleared my throat and asked, “If you’re color blind, how did you know I had blonde hair and green eyes?”

His eyes darkened, and I felt a tickle in my nose again. Before I could stop it, I sneezed. Loudly. I covered my mouth with the hand he was not holding. Cole spoke at the same time as my face exploded.

“It’s a little embarrassing to admit, but…”

All of that was happening as the door opened, and Billie walked in, cutting off his sentence. The interruption left me on the edge of my emotional seat, wonderingwhatwas embarrassing. My sister looked surprised to see that I wasn’t alone in the bathroom. That made two of us.

“Got your text.” She held up her phone in the way of evidence.

I pulled my hand out of Cole’s. Now, I was the one who felt like I’d been caught sneaking in after curfew. “Great, thanks.”

Cole politely grinned at her and then looked back at me as he reached behind him and produced a handkerchief from his back pocket, then handed it to me. “It was nice to meet you, Bailey.”

“You, too, Cole.”

He smiled once more at Billie as he walked past her and out the door. She watched him go and then looked back at me, clearly wanting answers.

“We found it.” I pulled the earring out of my pocket.

“That’s not all you found.” She grinned as she looked down at the handkerchief I was holding. “Yousneezed.” Her tone was that of accusation.

Crap.I was hoping that she hadn’t heard that.

“Allergies.”

“The only thing you’re allergic to is getting turned on. Yousneezed.”

If there was one thing in the world I regretted telling my sister, it was that I sneezed when I got aroused. I’d only confessed it to her because I was a teenager at the time, and I’d thought something was wrong with me. I still didn’t know why I did, but it didn’t change the fact that, for whatever reason, whenever my hormones were activated, they triggered my mucus membranes.

“Okay, fine. I sneezed.”

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