Page 61 of Face Off
“We didn’t have a lot of money when I was growing up, but there were always puzzles around. The first time I put one together, my brain went quiet. I focused on what was in front of me, and… I don’t know. I always feel relaxed when I do one. Which I realize sounds so fucking stupid. I’m a thirty-year-old man who?—”
“The things that make us happy are never stupid. That’s how I am with plants,” she says. “Plants and flowers and gardening. It’s a way to turn my mind off.”
“Really? I’m going to have to introduce you to Reid later. He loves plants too. You can be botany enthusiasts together.”
Her laugh is loud, and I puff out my chest. Stand a little taller like a smug bastard, because I’m finally getting somewhere with Emerson, and that boosts my pride.
The woman has more walls up than a castle. She’s determined to keep people out, but I’m dead set on getting in.
“I need to figure out what I want to grow while I’m here.” She pivots and walks down the hall. “Winter in DC is harsher than California.”
“Not nearly as harsh as Michigan, though,” I say, and she stops in her tracks. “I finally watched your tapes. I found some of your high school clips too.”
“Only took you a month.”
“Better late than never, right? You were good, Red.”
“Am I not good anymore?”
“You are. Just not as good as me,” I joke, and she flips me off with a middle finger painted in red nail polish. “My room is the one on the right.”
“Is there some sort of curse on it? If I go inside, will all my clothes come off?”
“That would be a cool party trick, wouldn’t it?” I crowd up behind her and turn the knob on the door. Her breath catches, and I wait for her to elbow my stomach. To tell me to get lost. When she doesn’t, I move an inch closer to her. “Your clothes aren’t going to come off,” I say low in her ear. “I know how to be a gentleman.”
Except, all I’m thinking about is her spread out on my bed.
That fiery hair all over my pillows and her fingers gripping the sheets. My hands under her thighs, dragging her toward me, and my head between her legs.
It doesn’t feel very gentlemanly.
“Good. I’d hate to have to cut off your dick. Women everywhere would be so disappointed.”
“Are you trying to see my dick, Hartwell? You could’ve just asked.”
I swear her ass brushes against the front of my pants, and I start reciting the presidents backwards in my head so I don’t get hard while she’s pressed against me.
“No,” Emerson says. “I prefer men who actually know how to use their stick.”
“Professional stick handler, remember?” I say, and I sidestep away from her. I need to clear my head. “You can go in.”
“Thanks for the permission.” She tugs at her skirt again and walks into my room. I do my best not to stare at her ass. “Wow. This is not what I was expecting.”
“What were you expecting?”
“Three women in your bed. Bras everywhere. Sex toys on the floor and a sex swing hanging from the ceiling.”
I grin and scratch at the taco tattoo on my arm. “Sorry to disappoint. This building’s been restored, so a sex swing might make the whole roof collapse in.”
Emerson puts her hands on her hips and surveys the bed. Her attention shifts to the doors out to the balcony and the floor-to-ceiling windows that show off the night sky. She hums when she opens my closet and rifles through the jerseys and shirts and suits.
“You have a signed Mario Lemieux jersey?” She yanks it off the hanger and holds it up to her chest. “How much did you spend on this?”
“Nothing. I met him at an event benefiting Hodgkin’s lymphoma a couple years ago, and we started talking. At the end of the night, he gave me the jersey and told me how much he appreciated the awareness I was helping to raise for the disease. I’ve thought about auctioning it off for charity, but he was my idol growing up. The little boy in me can’t let it go, and I’d rather write a check anyway.”
She pulls the jersey away from her body and slips it back on the hanger. Her eyes drag from the clothes to me, and she bites her bottom lip again.
“I think I might have been wrong about you,” she says quietly. “At least some parts of you.”
