Page 10 of The Billionairess
Evidently satisfied with her first piercing, he rolled his stool around to the other side of her chair, so he could access her other ear. Likely trying to distract her from what he was about to do, he asked her, “So, what do you like to do forfun?”
She hated it when people asked her that because she never knew what to say. Telling them that she worked all the time and that she truly enjoyed it made her sound like such a loser, but she didn’t really have a lot of time for fun outside of the office. “I like to eat chocolate,” she blurted out before chastising herself for responding with such a sillyanswer.
“Me too,” he chimed in, kindly refraining from making her feel lame for being unable to come up with a hobby other than scarfing downsweets.
She desperately searched her mind for something witty to say about her hobbies while he cleaned and prepped her ear. She was appalled when she heard her rebellious mouth blab the truth. “Actually, I like to recreate scenes I find on Pinterest with the #NailedIt hashtag. I have a whole YouTube channel dedicated to my failed attempts to follow the instructions and duplicate things peoplepost.”
“Oh, it’s an ironic ‘nailed it,’ huh?” He nodded with comprehension. “Howfun!”
His praise seemed sincere, so she decided to gush a little bit about her odd hobby. “It is! I’ve made cakes that were supposed to be cute baby animals, but turned out like frightening demon creatures. I tried to ombre my fingernails and hair color to match once. The nails turned into a gloppy mess and I had to have my hairdresser pull an all-nighter to fix my hair for work the nextmorning.”
He was grinning down at her, surprise alight in his eyes. “I would have neverguessed.”
“It’s sort of an odd pastime, I guess,” she admitted, before adding, “I had to find something that I could do alone when I’m too tired to work, but too awake to sleep.” She immediately realized that she had revealed too much about her pathetic and lonely existence, but it was too late to suck it back in now. Wanting to redeem herself, so that she didn’t look like a total loser to him, she quickly added, “My site has tons of followers. People seem to loveit.”
“I bet they do,” he responded kindly. “I would probably get a kick out of it too because one of my favorite things to do is look through the horrific tattoo fails that get postedonline.”
“No regerts!” They both exclaimed it at the same time, referring to the most famous tattoo fail that had made the rounds online. Both of them tipped their heads backed and laughed. It was the first real laugh she had enjoyed in longer than she remembered, and it feltfantastic.
Feeling inspired, he pulled up a site on his phone and began scrolling through. Whenever he found a funny one, he shared it with her. They both chuckled at the ridiculous tattoos… everything from unrecognizable animals, to misspelled words, to unintended secondmeanings.
“Do you have any tats?” she asked him when he set his phonedown.
“None as epic as those,” he quipped, before adding, “But yes, I have a giant phoenix on myback.”
“Let me see it.” Her eyelids felt heavy as she said the words. It came out as a demand, even though she hadn’t intended for it to sound like anorder.
He looked down at the floor, as was his way. “That wouldn’t be professional,” he respondedquietly.
Not willing to take no for an answer, Selena flirted with danger. “I showed you mine.” She was daring him to acknowledge seeing her naked upperhalf.
He raised his gaze to hers, desire swirling unguarded in his eyes. “Mine isn’t nearly as fantastic as yours, I can promise youthat.”
His words made her feel giddy. It was the first time he had acknowledged that he too felt the heat sizzling just under the surface between them. She sucked in a breath when he lifted his black tee shirt over his tight, tanned abs and swept it over his head before turning around to show her hisback.
She couldn’t help but notice how his broad shoulders tapered into a vee at his waist, but the commanding presence of his tattoo quickly drew her attention. The magnificent fiery winged bird taking flight off his shoulder blades was truly astonishing. “It’s gorgeous!” She exclaimed, unable to stop herself from reaching out to lightly graze her hand acrossit.
She felt his spine stiffen and heard his breath hitch at her touch, so she was surprised when he quickly put his shirt back on and turned allbusiness.
“We better get that other ear done,” he said brusquely, so she nodded and wondered what had so quickly changed hismood.
