Page 14 of Hammered (Dad Bod Contracting 1)
What to say to that? I have no idea. Flirting is so much harder than it sounds…than it should be…than I remember it being. Because at what point does it stop being flirting and start being overtly hitting on him, or him hitting on me? Do I want him to hit on me? Should I use my ol’ womanly wiles? Bend over just a little to allow a bit of cleavage to spill out? Or stretch to get something from a high shelf so my shorts ride up a certain way? Or should I just play it straight and see what happens?
I have no idea what to do next.
Do something. Say something.
“That’s a big hole,” I blurt, and then immediately wince. “I mean. Um. You widened it a lot.”
He smirks. “Yeah, well, it’s a big window, so you need a pretty sizable opening.” He winks at me. “Don’t worry, though, I always measure three times and cut once. It’ll fit like a glove and look like a million bucks.”
“It looks great so far. There’s so much more light in the kitchen now.”
Really? It looks great so far? It’s a hole in my wall. I growl under my breath at my own stupidity and start pulling out the fixings for dinner. I put some frozen ground beef in the fridge yesterday, thinking I’d make myself a fancy dinner tonight—I have some red and yellow peppers, and some minute rice which, for a single lady, counts as fancy, these days. I try to ignore Jesse as I brown the beef, but it’s not easy.
I feel his eyes on me every single moment. My fridge faces the window, so when I go to retrieve the peppers from the crisper drawer, I have to bend over. It’s a nerve-racking experience. Do I keep my knees together? Should I just crouch? Crouching would be unnatural and awkward. Why did I put these in the bottom-most drawer? I have to bend way over to get them. What’s he doing back there? I don’t dare look—if I look, it’ll be obvious that I’m after his attention. I bet my butt is going to look huge when I bend over. God, this is dumb. Just get the peppers and be done with it, you silly woman.
I’ve never been so self-conscious about doing something as simple and everyday as bending over to get something out of a fridge. But I can feel his gaze; I can feel him watching me. I guarantee he’s not missing a single jiggle or shake as I move around the kitchen preparing this meal. I just wish I knew what he’s thinking. Does he like women built like me? Or is he one of those guys who goes for the stick-thin, fitness model type? If that’s the case, I’m out of luck, because that’s never been me, even at my fittest. Even when I was in the gym three or four days a week lifting and running and doing yoga, I always carried a little extra around the bust, waist, and hips. That extra hit me my senior year of high school and never really left, no matter what I ate or how I worked out, and eventually I just accepted it along with the label “curvy girl.”
I just wish I knew how Jesse likes his women.
I lean over, open the drawer, and pull out the bag of peppers—and I feel the shorts riding up. I feel them sliding between the cheeks of my butt, and I feel the air on my backside, telling me there’s quite a lot of bare skin showing, and that it’s probably obvious what I’m not wearing under the shorts.
I hear a soft groan from behind me, which shifts abruptly into a cough, and when I straighten, Jesse is red in the face.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says, his voice hoarse, his eyes darting everywhere except my face. “I’m—just—um. Sawdust. Choked on some sawdust.”
There’s no sawdust in the air at all. Was that groan I heard before he started coughing one of appreciation and desire? A girl can dream.
I start dicing the peppers, pausing to stir the meat every now and then, and keeping an eye on the rice as it boils. I’m halfway done with the peppers when Jesse comes back inside. He critically examines the opening, measures it, measures the window again, and then nods to himself.
“Time to mount this bitch,” he says, half to himself, half to me.
My eyes widen, and I almost cut my finger off as I shoot him a glance. “Excuse me?”
He blinks, and then pales. “Ah—um. I—the window. I’m going to install the window now…is…what I meant.”
“Oh.” I stand there at the counter, awkwardly holding the knife in one hand and a yellow pepper in the other. “I thought you were talking to me.”
