Page 40 of Heated
“Any smart business partner likes to know her contract end date.”
“Fine. New Year’s Eve. Start the new year a free woman.”
I gape at him. Honest-to-God gape.Yes, it’s a little over three months. But it’s three months.Withhim. Pretending to behis.
“Why?” I ask. “The retreat is a little over three weeks away. Why aren’t we calling it quits after that?”
“And how would that look to my coworkers, to the partners of the firm? Exactly like what we are—a fake couple who came together solely for the purpose of the retreat. No, Zora. I’m playing the long game. They’ll announce the new partners about a month after the retreat, and I’ll need you for at least a month after that to make this look authentic. Then we can quietly break up, claiming ‘We just wanted different things.’”
I swallow a sigh. Okay, I could do that. I mean, three months of being in his space, inhaling his scent, calling him mine when he isn’t, afraid this house of cards will tumble under the slightest breeze seems like a long anxiety-ridden time, but it’s doable.
Hell, he could’ve said a year.
I nod and stretch my arm toward him. “Deal.”
Cyrus hesitates for the briefest moment before wrapping his hand around mine, squeezing lightly, and abruptly releasing me. I start to frown but at the last second catch myself. No curiosity when it comes to this man. That’s my new rule.
“I was going to order dinner, but since you ate, would you like dessert?” he asks.
My stomach chooses that moment to gurgle, reminding me and anyone within a five-mile radius that I left before Mom could serve up peach cobbler and butter-pecan ice cream.
“I take that as a yes?”
“A gentleman would’ve ignored that,” I mutter.
He shoves up from the couch. “I’m no gentleman. We’re both aware of that fact.”
As he strides from the room, I briefly close my eyes, but that’s a bad, bad idea, as my mind provides in vivid, exquisite detail howitbelieves just howungentlemanly he is. Beginning with how he would tangle one of those big but incongruently elegant, long-fingered hands in a woman’s hair and shove her to her knees ...
A searing blast of heat surges through my veins, converging between my thighs. Leaving me hot and wet. Because that woman in my head has dark natural curls, and as she tips her head back to look up at him and await his next instruction, she wears my face ...
Shooting up from the couch as if my ass is on fire, I follow behind him.
Friend. He wants a friend. Not a friend with benefits. Not that I’m offering that. Because I’m not.
Good God, girl. Who are you trying to convince?
Shut up, heffa.
I’m losing it. I’m calling myself out, and I’m losing it.
Cyrus leads me into a kitchen straight out ofArchitectural Digest. I instantly fall in love, and cooking isn’t even my ministry.
“This is lovely,” I murmur, brushing my fingertips along the marble countertops. “This room must be one of your favorites.”
He pauses next to the island, studies me. Then slowly dips his chin. “Yes, it is.” Another pause. “It’s actually the room that sold me on the house.”
“I can see why.” I scan the unique wine closet, beautiful countertops, top-of-the-line appliances, airy spaces, eating nook, fabulous island ... “Is that pie?”
“Dutch apple.” He moves to the cabinets and pulls down two small plates, then retrieves forks from another drawer. “Do you want a slice?”
“Don’t play with me. Do these hips look like I turn down pie?” I slap them for good measure.
He draws short, dishes and utensils in hand, his gaze dropping to my waist. And it stays there. The air catches in my lungs, and I’m afraid to move. To shatter this moment where that blue gaze strokes me as if the denim covering me has disappeared and nothing separates him from my skin but space.
A second later, he drags his gaze upward, meeting mine, and the breath that lodged in my throat expels on a low, harsh puff. Before, I’d compared his eyes to the blue heart of flames. But I hadn’t seen them alit, burning. I hadn’t been seared by them.
Until now.
