Page 19 of Billionaire Romantic
“Stop being such a grumpy fucker. You’ll scare her away. What happened to the always-charming Noah Maddox?”
“Don’t you mean Noah Steel?”
This reminder amuses him even more. “Dude, she’s a girl, not an SEC watchdog. You shouldn’t be this stressed out.”
I lean back and fold my arms. “I’m not ‘stressed out’.”
“You are. You’re getting all worked up because you’re so out of practice. You’re worried she’s not as perfect in real life as she looks in her photo and that you’ll be disappointed like you always are and that you’ll have to let her down gently, which you don’t want to have to do again because they always get immediately clingy once they find out about the bank balance—and also you’re hot so they basically fall in love instantly and then you have to break their hearts,” Colton rambles in one long breath.
I glare at him. He’s not wrong. In fact he’s hit the nail directly on the head. “Did you just call me hot?”
“Objectively speaking, I can recognize that you’re not a complete troll, brother.”
“Thanks. That means a lot, coming from you.” He’s making an attempt to help me relax and I can at least try to appreciate that.
“No more obsessing. You need to go in with zero expectations. Give me your phone.”
I look down at it. “No.” I don’t want him deleting her photo.
“I’m not going to delete anything.”
Colton takes my phone before I can grab it. “There.” He hands it back to me.
“What did you do?”
“I logged you out. And I’m not telling you the password.”
“Why? What the hell, Colton? What if she cancels?”
“She’s not going to cancel. And you need to chill,” he says firmly. “No more obsessing over her profile. Just meet the girl first and see if you vibe without any preconceived expectations.”
I want to argue, but he’s right—again—and it annoys me. “You’re enjoying this way too much.”
The smirk is back. “Consider it payback for all the unsolicited advice you’ve insisted on giving me over the years. Now go home and get ready for your date. Wear something sophisticated and dashing.” Colton winks at me and laughs.
Before I can either punch him or tell him to fuck off, he’s out the door, leaving me alone with my jumble of anticipation—and now without any outlet for my fanatical over-analyzation. Damn him.
With Colton gone, I try to focus on work, but my thoughts keep drifting back to Lucky Irish.
Those blue-on-blue eyes.
That white-gold hair with its jaunty little sun-lit curls.
Those lush pink lips, shiny with lip gloss. Lightly parted.
For me. For my?—
Fuck.
Just the thought of her is me getting hard.
That saucy little phantom image of her feels like it’s been seared into my brain by a sadistic blowtorch artist. I literally can’t think of anything else. There’s no point staying at the office. I need to head home, take a long, cold shower and pour myself a strong drink.
Avoiding everyone as I leave so I don’t have to be on the receiving end of any more gleeful speculations, I take the back staircase.
I end up daydreaming as I weave my Ducati through the Friday afternoon traffic.
Will she really look as beautiful as she does in the photo?
