Page 33 of Worth Every Game
JACK
Isit back to watch Elly clearing away the mess. The food.Why did she make such a fuck ton of it?Was it an accident?Maybe she meant to leave some for me. Maybe she was thinking about me coming home from work…Hmm.
I like that idea.
Shit. It’s her first night and she’s already messing with my head.
She begins cleaning the surfaces with a cloth and spray she found under the kitchen sink. As she moves, that little mini-skirt flaps around her thighs. It’s so short that I can almost see her underwear as she flounces around, her toned legs flexing with each step. A throb of desire pulses in my groin.Christ, I shouldn’t be staring like this.
How am I going to endure three months of this temptation?
Better aroused than annoyed, though. What with Lydia showing up, and Elly questioning me about Mum’s damned photos and then leaving all her crap all over the kitchen with no intention of clearing up, my mood was on the cusp of souring.
But with a woman as attractive as Elly flitting about my kitchen, making everything tidy again, flicking her mountain of blonde curls off her face as she works, being in a bad mood for long seems impossible.
She bends over to put a pot back in the cupboard, and I catch a glimpse of her underwear. Pink, a little lacy. Heat shoots through me like liquid fire.Damn, that’s a short skirt.I have to force myself to look away, but a second later my eyes are back on her and that tiny skirt.
I love it. The skirt can stay.
She glances over her shoulder at me, shooting me a look as though she knowsexactlywhat I was just thinking. “Are you going to help, or are you just going to watch?”
Just like her to call me out. I take another mouthful of the delicious food and swallow it down, not breaking eye contact as I say, “Watch.”
Her frown deepens, and she turns fully to face me, putting aside the pot she was holding.She's annoyed.“I’m really grateful that you’re letting me live here, but I want to make something very clear too.”
“Okay…” I say, inviting her to continue.
“We’re housemates,” she states in a no nonsense tone that has me sitting a little straighter. “So if I cook, you clean. And vice versa. You’re probably not familiar with the arrangement, but that’s how it works.” She glances at the ceiling, as if she’s considering her words. “Although, if you buy the food, and I do the cooking, then we can clear up together. That’s fair. We share the load.”
It’s on the tip of my tongue to make a joke about how much I’d love her to share my load, but I sense it wouldn’t go down well. And I don’t want to piss her off more, because she’s clearly slaved away in this kitchen for hours, and she didn’t have to do that. The least I can do is help.
“All right,” I concede.
She claps her hands, seemingly satisfied with this outcome. “Good. Because I’m not your slave.”
My slave? Why does that sound so good? And also, did she read my fucking mind?
I huff a laugh, but she leans back against the kitchen counter, which makes her breasts pop in that little jumper she’s wearing, and suddenly nothing seems funny anymore.
I’m too distracted to give her an answer. There’s a fire behind her eyes, and she shakes her head at me, as if to say, ‘what are you looking at?’ She’s waiting for some response, but I can’t remember what she said.
I gather my now-empty plate and approach her at the counter until I’m an arm’s length away. Her gaze drifts up my torso, her head tipping back a little to look up at me. When her eyes lock onto mine, electricity sparks through me like she’s lightning and I’m made of metal. Every cell in my body brightens, and suddenly, we’re a high-voltage circuit.Connected.
I know she feels it too because her eyes widen, and she tries to shift back as if she can snap whatever force has us bound, but she’s already pressed up against the counter and has nowhere to go.
I reach around her to put my plate in the sink, but the movement brings us even closer until I can smell that citrus scent of hers.
She stiffens, and every scrap of my awareness is focused on that motion, and for some incomprehensible reason, I freeze too.
We’re locked in, our faces far too close, my forehead almost tipped to meet hers, our breaths mingling by the sink. Romantic’s not the word for it. Fucked up and sexually charged might be somewhere in the right ballpark.
“Jack?” She breathes my name as though she’s trying to call my awareness back, but it doesn’t work. I’m too busy staring at her, my gaze skimming over her face like I’m taking an inventory. Eyes, light blue. Chin, angular. Delicate. Like a pixie. The cupid’s bow on her pink upper lip; her nose, small, pointed; cutest nose I’ve ever seen, with a little piercing on the side that, on anyone else, I’d fucking hate, but on her it looksperfect. And all that curly blonde hair.I want to tug on it.I’m taking it all in at a million miles an hour. I must look half-deranged.
She’s so pretty. Beautiful, even.
“What are you doing?” Her voice is so soft I can hardly hear it.
The question brings me back.What am I doing?Having some kind of dick-and-brain meltdown because we stood a fraction too close?