Page 16 of The Wanderer

His eyes blazed with fierceness. "Don't let the dickheads drag you down. You have a dream, you go for it."

His unexpected protectiveness made her want to snuggle into his arms, so she defused the situation. No good could come of wanting to get closer. "And I will, if your company is as good as you proclaim at getting the job done right."

"I'm the best." He winked, as if sensing her need to lighten the mood. "As I'm sure you can attest to."

"We're not talking about your construction skills anymore, are we?"

"There can be a tool belt involved next time if you want."

She arched an eyebrow, deliberately provocative. "There's going to be a next time?"

"Only if you're lucky," he murmured, trailing a fingertip down her bare arm, leaving a trail of goose bumps.

Their eyes locked and in that moment, with the heat from their earlier encounter still pulsating through her body, the guitarist's soft melody filling her with yearning, and Logan's teasing touch, she really wanted to get lucky again.

Chapter Nine

Logan had picked up the phone to call Hope over the weekend because the passion she’d shown at the pub four nights ago intrigued him.

Not solely because of the alley sex, which had been beyond hot, but because he'd never seen a woman so into her work. She'd practically glowed when she talked about her music. This, after he'd watched her listen to that guitarist, transfixed, eyes wide, mouth open, like she couldn't get enough. He hadn't been lying when he'd told her it was a turn on. Seeing her so completely in the moment, after the sensational sex, ensured he'd been hard every time he thought about her, which had been too often over the weekend.

When they'd parted at the pub, he'd sensed her withdrawal. She'd been cool and aloof, shaking his hand after he walked her to her car. Shaking his fucking hand, like he was some inconsequential acquaintance. Considering the way she'd come onto him in the first place, then later shared all that stuff about her music, he'd expected more.

He'd got nothing.

After the way they hooked up, he'd expected her to call and when she didn't, he wanted to. He'd settled for a text instead, a brief

How are you?

She responded with a terse

Fine, see you Tuesday

That put him firmly back in his place.

It surprised him, her ability to have sex like a man. Then again, what did he really know about her? She'd been cool initially, had morphed to hot, then reverted to cool again. Maybe this was a game she played with all guys? More to the point, why did he care?

He had to be thinking with his dick. The sex had been phenomenal so he wanted more of it, stood to reason. But he couldn't ignore his insistent voice of reason that made him remember how much he'd enjoyed seeing her light up while listening to that dude in the pub, meaning she intrigued him beyond the sex.

Dawn streaked the Melbourne sky as he pulled up outside Hope and Harmony. His team were arriving at seven so he made sure he got here at six. Stepping from his Ute, he shrugged into a suit jacket and adjusted his tie. He hated getting dressed up, preferring the good old days when he was on the tools, wearing shorts and a T-shirt and a high-visibility safety vest. But he always arrived on the first day of any job in a suit, intent on being the model CEO instilling confidence in the clients and this job would be no different.

However, as he knocked softly on the glass door and glimpsed Hope moving through the shadows at the back of the shop, he knew he was kidding himself. The instant hardening of his cock and the accelerated heart rate meant that seeing her again after what they'd done in that alley behind the pub ensured this job was different.

She unlocked the door and let him in, locking it behind him. "Did you have to get here at the crack of dawn?"

Even bleary-eyed and frowning, with her hair caught up in a messy ponytail and a raspy voice that wouldn’t win any song of the year contests, she was gorgeous, with that just-tumbled-out-of-bed look that had him hankering to take her to bed.

"Not a morning person I see," he said, resisting the urge to kiss her cheek as the faintest waft of her rose fragrance tickled his nose.

"I'm a muso. We keep late hours. What do you think?" She continued grumbling under her breath as she stalked ahead of him, doing some weird stretching thing with her arms and shoulders. "Coffee's on if you want some."

“I’d love a cup." He followed her, checking out her ass. She wore grey yoga pants and a matching hoodie. But what captured his attention was the VPL. A visible panty line meant she didn't go commando all the time. Or was she trying to send him some unspoken signal that what had happened between them was strictly a one-off?

"Help yourself," she muttered, as they entered a small kitchenette and she pointed to a state of the art coffee machine tucked into the corner of the narrow bench-top. "I need to inhale this caffeine otherwise I'm not fit to be around humans."

She sat at a table for two, picked up a mug, and cradled it between her hands. She lifted it to her face and inhaled the steam first, before taking a slurp. "Ah…so good…"

Logan gritted his teeth and turned away before she spotted his boner, her appreciative moan for coffee eliciting a clear memory of how appreciative she'd sounded when he'd made her come.

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