Page 10 of Strictly Business

“Ok,” Brook says, ticking her points off on her fingers as she goes. “Yes, I’m me. I’m not a Goddess but thank you anyway. Yes, you’re you. You are not pudgy. You are gorgeous and you have lovely big boobs and hips that guys want to touch. It works for me because I am confident. We just need to work on your confidence.”

I sigh and shake my head. It’s not my confidence that’s the problem. I’m not so much not confident as I am a realist. I’m not one of those girls who thinks they are hideous - I just think Wyatt is out of my league and he is.

CHAPTER7

Serena

The waiter comes back with our drinks, and our starters, I think that is a good thing because it’ll give me a break from Brook trying to get me to be sexy when I’m not. I’m not wrong.

“Hey,” Brook says to the waiter. She picks up a mushroom and bites it in a rather suggestive manner. Then she nods at me. “If you were sitting opposite her and she did that to you and maybe ran her toe up your leg beneath the table and then said ‘oops’. Would it turn you on?”

“Brook,” I hiss, feeling my face burning up.

“Oh, don’t be embarrassed,” she says. She turns back to the waiter. “Just hypothetically. She’s not trying to get you to go out with her or anything. She has her sights set on this guy and she doesn’t know how to show him she’s interested. Serena, do what I just did with one of those potato skins.”

“No way,” I say and shake my head.

“Oh, go on. Don’t be a bore,” Brook says.

I hate it when she says I’m a bore. It usually means I won’t go along with another of her bright ideas, but it still hurts. I sigh and pick up a potato skin. I look at it in a way I hope is sexy and then I look in the waiter’s eyes and nibble on the potato skin. Instant regret seizes me as it burns my tongue and I make an ahh sound and grab my drink.

“It’s ok. You don’t have to answer,” Brook says with a sigh and the waiter practically runs from us.

“So maybe when you try this on Wyatt, you use cold food,” Brook says.

“Or maybe I just wait and see if he shows any interest in me,” I say. “And not traumatize him like I have that poor waiter.”

“See, with some guys that could work, but not with Wyatt,” Brook says.

She announces it like it’s a fact and I have to know how she’s so sure.

“Why is that?” I ask.

“Because he’s friends with your dad Serena. He is not going to expect a young, gorgeous woman such as yourself to want to date him unless you make it clear,” she says. “Just your age alone makes you way out of his league and he knows it.”

“Wait. Are you seriously saying that Wyatt will think I am the one out of his league? Honestly Brook, you haven’t seen this guy,” I say.

“I’ve seen a hundred Wyatt’s,” Brook says. “Show him that you are interested, and he will be so grateful for the attention that he will be putty in your hands.”

“I’ll try,” I lie.

I nibble on a potato skin and think for a moment. I don’t want to lie to Brook but she won’t let this go until she thinks I am going to let Wyatt know I like him, and I have no intention of doing that because like I said to her earlier, it’s too embarrassing.

“Yes,” Brook says, clapping her hands together and making me jump. She grins and nods. “You’ve got it.”

“Got what?” I ask.

“The sexy nibble,” she says.

“Oh. I was just a million miles away,” I say with a laugh.

“Well do that when you next see Wyatt. And you can’t possibly say that will be embarrassing if he doesn’t take the hint. Just tell him the same thing as you just told me – you were a million miles away and not paying attention to what you were doing,” she says.

That’s not her worst idea, but I still think it would make working together pretty damned awkward afterwards if he told me he wasn’t interested and I asked why he randomly said that and he says I was eating my lunch in a sexy way and I say nope, I was just a million miles away. God it would almost be worse than me just saying I like him and him rejecting me.

“Right. Enough about me. Tell me about your date last night,” I say.

Brook doesn’t hold back. She tells me every little detail, even down to how she had to fake an orgasm in the end because he wasn’t doing it for her, and she was getting sore.

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