Page 27 of Hot and Bothered
“Sometimes I don’t always feel that way.” He looked uncomfortably sheepish. “When the work is really challenging, or when I just can’t get something right, I always feel like I’m never going to be good enough.”
“I think you’re amazing,” I said effusively.
A faint flush graced his cheeks. He must have been the type who didn’t take compliments easily.
“Thanks,” he murmured. “I’ve been dealing with a tricky bit for this illustration. That’s why I’m working on it every spare minute. I keep re-doing it over and over again.”
“What’s tricky about it?” I asked.
“I’ve got to draw a woman in another one of those badass poses,” he said. “It’s hard to get the limbs to look natural and with the right proportions. It’s not like drawing a fruit bowl where the subject is right in front of you, or drawing something that isn’t real, like a dragon where I can make it look however I want. Drawing real people is hard because everyone can tell when it looks a little off.”
“Want me to pose for you?” I joked. “I can be your fruit bowl.”
Evan tilted his head at me, scanning me up and down.
“You do have the right proportions,” he said with a sly smile. “Think you can make a pose like you’re defeating a dragon?”
I chuckled, but Evan’s smile stayed on his face.
“Wait, you’re serious?” I asked. “You want me to pose for one of your drawings?”
“Why not?” he said. “You’re the perfect reference model.”
I eyed him suspiciously. “This isn’t some trick to get me naked so you can draw me like one of your French girls, is it?”
Even as he burst out laughing, his eyes flared bright with an alluring glint.
“If I got you naked,” he said with a simmering heat beneath the words, “it wouldn’t be because of some trick.”
My cheeks turned hot.
I knew what Evan sounded like when he was amused, when he was being serious, when he was showing sympathy.
I’d never heard him like this before. I’d never heard that velvety smooth way his tone lowered to a near murmur, as if revealing secrets meant only for my ears.
I’d thought Evan was sexy before, but this took me beyond that. That voice, that sly smile, that glint of heat in his eyes…
My insides turned equally heated, throbbing with a sweet, unfamiliar ache. This was another new sensation. Another feeling I’d never experienced before.
My eyes dropped to his lips, watching them part as he inhaled a breath. My throat went tight with anticipation. I wondered how pillowy soft those lips might be. I wondered how they would feel pressed against mine. I wondered—
“So?” Evan asked. “What do you think?”
It took my mind a second to re-route my thoughts. Right. The posing thing. The book cover thing.
I blinked and swallowed to wet my dry mouth.
“Sure,” I croaked. “Sounds fun.”
“Great!” He stood and pointed at me with the stylus in his hand. “Go get showered and dressed, and put on the tightest clothes you own.”
I nearly choked on my tongue.
“I’m assuming Lizzy didn’t loan you any leather pants?” he asked.
“Uh.” I blinked. “No. She did not.”
“We’ll have to go with yoga pants, then.”
