Page 30 of Foreplay on Words

“Are you hungry?” He smiled as I headed toward the back door.

“What are you planning to feed me?” I asked excitedly. Getting all these amazing meals I had no hand in was a treat.

“Am I your personal chef now?” he scoffed, pretending to be offended.

“You’re the one who mentioned food!”

“I did,” he nodded with a little wink. “Have to keep that mouth of yours full.”

“Do you have an apron? That’d make the personal chef fantasy complete,” I teased.

“Oh, we’re talking fantasies now?” He looked all sorts of intrigued by that topic. I was curious as well.

“No, but I think you’d look hot in an apron,” I shrugged. Maybe with no pants underneath. No, definitely no pants.

“Because aprons are so sexy.”

The exaggerated eye roll he gave made me bite my lip to contain the laughter. I stopped in the open doorway from the patio and winked at him over my shoulder.

“Who said you’d be wearing anything else.”

He made a sound halfway between choking and whimpering, and I cracked up laughing as I sauntered in and took a seat at the island.

“So, is naked chef a new character I can expect from you?”

“Not in this book, but I wouldn’t be opposed to starting my research early.” Bantering with him was becoming my new favorite activity.

“It’s a little early in the day for a striptease.”

“But you’ll give me one later?” I asked eagerly. “And for the record, it’s never too early or too late for a striptease.”

He stopped pulling ingredients out of the refrigerator and braced himself with both arms outstretched in front of him on the island. “It depends.”

“On?” I was genuinely curious.

“How much work we get done today. We still have two more scenes you haven’t looked at yet.” Well, that was a buzzkill. All work and no play made Evan a clothed boy.

“I looked at all the pages Adrian sent me.” I frowned. I’d already marked up the hard copy to let him have as a reference.

“These weren’t included in that.” Hmm...there was more.

“I thought the manuscript was finished.”

“I felt inspired,” he shrugged. “I wrote another chapter last night.”

“Inspired by what?”

He winked and turned back to the fridge. “I’m sure you can figure it out. But it involves the detective pinning her to the wall in an interrogation room.”

My eyes widened, and I fanned myself with my hand.

Was it getting hot in here?

Evan

Connecticut

We sat beside the firepit the rest of the day, passing the laptop back and forth. We edited most of the scenes, and I prepared a PDF for Adrian. I knew they weren’t quite finished, but we wanted feedback to determine what we needed to work on next.