“Oh, I’ll talk about it. I walked in on my husband fucking some instamodel that he’d known for two seconds.”
“He’s an asshole.”
“He’s a man,” I said.
Ryder shook his head. “Not all men are assholes.”
“Prove it.”
He flashed me his cocky smile. “I will. And now that we’re on the topic of things that people shouldn’t be doing…are you stalking me?”
“What?!No.” That sounded way guiltier than I’d meant for it to. But he’d caught me completely off guard. With both the question and how such an accusatory question could sound so sexy. It sounded like he’d just said “get naked so I can fuck you” instead. And he was still super bad at segues! “You’restalkingme!”
“Stalking you?” he asked.
“Yes. Stalking me. That’s how you knew I had a husband. And I see you staring at me every Tuesday and Thursday at 8 o’clockwhen you leave One57. And what are you doing there twice a week anyway if you live here?”
“Hmmm…sounds like you’re the one stalking me.”
I yawned. Running around all night had been exhausting. “No way. You, sir, are the stalker.” I adjusted the pillow behind me to get more comfortable.
“You watch me with binoculars.”
“That was one time!”
He narrowed his eyes at me.
Fine. It wasn’t the only time I’d watched him with binoculars. I just hadn’t thought he’d noticed. But the fact that he had noticed proved thathewas stalkingme. “You’re definitely stalking me, buddy.”
“Whatever you have to tell yourself to sleep at night. Speaking of sleep…I’m going to go slip into something a little more comfortable.”
“Ow ow,” I called as he took the stairs two at a time. What was he going to do? I was torn between him putting whipped cream on his junk or just coming back fully nude. Either way, something sexy was definitely about to go down.Finally. He had been teasing me all night. Didn’t he know that was no way to treat a girl who hadn’t had sex in months? I tried to get into a sexy pose, but nothing felt right.Whatever.I eventually gave up and just pushed my boobs together.
Don’t rape him, don’t rape him, I repeated to myself as his footsteps came closer. I did not need a repeat of the Dr. Lyons incident. And that incident reminded me of the originalincident. I looked around for any lit candles. Luckily the coast was clear. I wouldn’t be setting my stalker on fire tonight. And yes, despite what he said,hewas stalkingme.
I looked over my shoulder. Above the railing I could see his bare chest.Yes!God, he was so hot. But he wasn’t naked like I expected. He was wearing gray sweatpants.Yum.What was it about guys in gray sweatpants? I wanted to devour him. And yet…I also wanted him to take them off. I held out hope for a striptease until he sat down next to me on the couch.
“Ah, that’s so much better. Anyway, where were we? I think you were confessing to stalking me?”
“In your dreams.”
His Adam’s apple rose and then fell as his eyes lingered on my lips again.
Had he been dreaming of me too? I wondered if his dreams were as sexy as mine always were. Or if they were just murdery.
“You’re stalking me so hard that I bet you even know the license plate number of my red Rolls Royce.”
“Huh? I thought it was black?” I immediately clapped my hand over my mouth.
“That was entirely too easy.”
“It’s been a long day,” I protested.
“It has. Want some wine?”
Another weird segue.I kind of liked that my stalker was a little awkward like me. My first instinct was yes, because wine also loosened me up. But then I realized I didn’t even need it. Looking into my stalker’s brown eyes put me at ease. Or maybe it was his pecs. Or his abs.Yum.And I didn’t want anything to dull my senses tonight. I wanted to remember every minute of this night perfectly. I shook my head.
“Want to watch Billy Madison?”