The receptionist sitting behind the counter drops the pen he’s holding, and the phone glued to his ear almost slips from his grasp as his jaw hits the floor.
“I am going to need to call you back, Henry. There’s a…well, someone important is here and I’m sure his time is worth a lot more than yours.” He slams the phone down on the receiver and beams up at me. “How may I help you, dear?”
“Good morning…” I glance down at the nameplate on his desk. “Eric. I’m here to see Denny.”
“Denny?” He purses his lips. “Ah, yes. Miss Andrews?” He leans forward, moving the pen between his fingers with curious, excited eyes. “Are you on her appointment book for the day?”
I quirk a brow. “I’m not, but I have a feeling I can talk you into making an exception for me.”
He laughs, tossing the pen onto the calendar covering his desk and pushing his chair back to stand. “You’d be right. I’ll take you to her.” He struts around the desk. “Follow me.”
Eric leads me down a hallway filled with fingers clacking against keyboards, shouts for more coffee, and a flurry of people bustling from desk to desk.
Tucked away in a corner in the back of the building, Denny’s head is bent over her laptop, her eyes glued to the screen.
It reminds me of college, the two of us working on the school paper together.
I’d have to talk my dick down every day watching her work her magic in that computer lab. It didn’t matter that she ignored me every chance she got; that never stopped me from watching her every moment I could, because watching Denver was pure gold.
She loved working on the paper, loved the chance to get creative, to voice her opinion while still giving the facts. She was a master at it, a far better writer than I ever was.
Wearing headphones, she’s completely absorbed in whatever’s on the screen in front of her, so she doesn’t hear us approach.
Eric waves a hand across the screen and she nearly jumps out of her seat at the unexpected interruption.
“Dammit, E!” she shouts, hitting the space bar and pulling her earbuds out. She glares up at him with annoyance. “It’s a good thing I’m wearing a panty liner—I just peed a little bit!”
He chuckles. “Sorry, but you have a guest.”
Finally, she spots me standing behind him, and her face pales.
I can’t help but serve her my famous grin. “Morning, Den.”
Groaning, she drops her head into her hands and mutters, “Eff you, universe. Eff you.”
She takes another moment to compose herself before looking back up and smiling sweetly—it’s false sweetness, by the way—at Eric.
“Thank you for bringing him over here. I’ll take it from here.”
He turns to me and sticks his hand out. “It was great meeting you, Mr. Clark. I’m a huge fan of your baseball pants.”
“Eric!” Denny admonishes.
I burst into laughter and shake his hand.
“Thank you for the compliment. It was great meeting you. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you a lot in the upcoming weeks.”
His perfectly groomed brows shoot into his hairline as he looks between me and Denny.
“And why’s that, Mr. Clark?”
“Didn’t you hear? Denny and I are a thing now. We’re—”
“You ass!”
Denny launches out of her chair, clambering around her desk—I’m certain she hits her hip on the corner—and covering my mouth with her hand.
“Not. Another. Word,” she instructs through clenched teeth.
I laugh against her palm.
She gives Eric another falsely sweet smile. “Thanks, Eric. So much.” Her words drip with sarcasm. “I’ll let you know if we need anything else.”
The receptionist shakes his head and laughs, heading back to his station, probably not wanting to be witness to Denver maiming me.
I can’t blame him. For someone so tiny, she sure can pack a punch.
Denny returns her attention to me, hand still covering my mouth, eyes ablaze.
“I will murder you in your sleep, Shepard Clark. I don’t give a shit if you’re some hotshot baseball player or not.”
I lift a brow in response.
“Don’t test me. Tell me you’re not going to test me.”
I dart my eyes down to her hand.
“I don’t trust you. Shake your head up and down if you promise not to test me.”
I do.
“Good. Now—”
Before she can finish her sentence, I dart my tongue out and lick her palm, laughing as she wrenches it away in disgust. She groans and wipes her hand against her jeans.
“I am so going to get fired for murder.”
“Just fired? Not jail time?”
“If it goes to trial, I’ll just explain how obnoxious you are. I’m certain I’ll be able to sway several jurors in my favor.”
“Not if the jury is mostly women.”
“Those poor, delusional women.” She wipes her hand on her jeans again like she can’t get rid of the feel of my tongue against her skin. “Why are you here, Shep?”
“Dress shopping.”
“Excuse me?”
“For tomorrow. Our date.” I sigh. “Don’t act like you forgot. I know you’ve been counting down the hours.” I glance at the watch on my wrist. “We’re down to thirty-three now, in case you were wondering.”
“I’m not going shopping with you.”
“Oh, but you are. I need to make sure you don’t embarrass me with your…eccentric outfit choices.”
“First of all…” She holds her finger up in my face.
I bite at her.
She grimaces in poorly disguised disgust. “Can you not keep your mouth to yourself?”
“I—”
Denny holds her hand up. “You know what, don’t tell me. Anyway, how dare you judge my fashion sense! It’s…it’s…”
“Awkward? Confusing? Basically nonexistent?”
“No!”
“No offense, Den, but I ran into you last week while you were wearing brightly colored yoga pants, a sweater that was about four times too big, and no bra.” I lean down. “And by the way, I was so happy to see that your nipples were enjoying my eyes on them.”
A surprised gasp escapes from her lips then her breaths grow labored. She’s rattled. She likes that my eyes were on her.
I liked it too.
Collecting herself, she crosses her arms over her chest like she’s protecting it from my prying eyes, which is pointless because she’s unfortunately wearing a bra today. I already checked.
“It was the middle of the night!” she reasons—or attempts to.
“All I’m hearing are excuses. Besides, us shopping together means your dress and my tie will match.”
“I could always text you a picture.”
“You still have my number?”
Her attention falls to the floor as she stammers through an uncertain, “N-N-No.”
I can’t tell if she’s stammering because she’s lying or because she’s ashamed she deleted my number.
I have never wanted somebody to be lying so badly in my entire life.
“I still have yours.”
Her bewildered gaze finds mine, searching to see if I’m being honest.
I am.
I haven’t used it in…well, years, but I have it. I still have all our texts too.
Technology is kind of amazing in that way. Nowadays, you can save texts from years past, hold on to the memories of before—you know, before you turned your own life into shit with your insecurities.
There were moments when I wanted to delete her from my phone, from my mind—because of my own shame, nothing to do with her—but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.
Erasing her wouldn’t erase my mistakes, no matter how hard I tried to make that happen.
“I have all our texts too,” I confess, still holding her stare.
Her pupils grow, and I swear I’ve melted the ice around her
heart by at least an inch.
She licks at her lips, her eyes dropping to my chest as she says, “I’ll go shopping with you, Shep.”
8
Denver
I should have insisted on taking my own car.
As it turns out, when it comes to Shepard Clark, I’m still the biggest idiot around.
“What are we doing here? I can’t afford this store.” He pulls his steel gray truck into the parking lot of a high-end store about an hour south of where we live. “And on top of that, you never said we were going so far away. I have a job to do, you know. I didn’t even tell anyone I’d be gone so long.”
“You really think your boss will be mad if you’re out shopping with me?”
“You say that like you’re someone special.”
He side-eyes me with a shit-eating grin. “You know I am.”
“They make medicine for that, you know.”
“For what?”
“Your constipation. Being so fucking full of shit all the time has to start hurting after a while.”
His boisterous laugh echoes as he pulls into a parking space. He slides his baseball cap off and tosses it onto the dash, running a hand through his messy hair. “Get your ass inside, Andrews.”
We climb out of the truck and trudge into the store I cannot even remotely afford to shop in.
“Welcome to Landry’s,” says the saleswoman who opens the door for us. “What brings you in today?”
Shep hitches his thumb back toward me. “Miracles. We need to make miracles happen.”
I sigh. “Are you going to annoy me forever?”
He spins around, smirking. “Quit pretending like you hate it—and me.”
“No.”
“You didn’t even look!”
“Because I don’t have to. It’s not the right color.”
I stand before him in a pale yellow dress that I think looks stunning.
He doesn’t. Again.
Why is he always so judgy about dresses?
I groan. “You have shot down literally every single dress I’ve tried on, which has been like fifteen. How much longer are we going to have to do this?”
He sits there with one leg resting on the other, a bored expression plastered on his face as he scrolls aimlessly through his phone.
His eyes, though—they’re giving away his pleasure.
He’s enjoying every single second of this torment.
Bastard.
“I’ve told you ten times: try this stack on and we’ll be good to go.”
“I am not letting you pick my dress for me. It’s bad enough I’m letting you pay for it.”
“You’re seriously still upset I’m buying you thousands of dollars’ worth of very fancy dresses that you get to keep forever?”
“Yes,” I say stubbornly.
“You can barely say that with a straight face.” He points to the mound of fabric beside him. “Try them and we can leave.”
“And if I hate them? Then what?”
He sighs. “Then we can still leave.”
I march over to him, snatch the dresses up, and tuck myself away in the dressing room for the millionth time this afternoon.
I shoot my boss another quick text, letting him know I’ll be even later than expected, and then I send my intern one too, apologizing for abandoning her with the mountain of work I have to do.
Neither of them give a shit because I’m with the Shepard Clark.
Ugh. Spare me.
I somehow manage to wrangle the zipper down—I am not inviting Shep in here to help—and pull the first dress off the hanger.
It’s black and boring and I really don’t want to try it on.
Surprise overcomes me when I slide the dress on and glance at my reflection in the mirror. It fits like a glove, accentuating my curves in ways I didn’t know a garment could for people who aren’t Blake Lively or Eva Mendes.
It’s conservative with no cleavage showing and long sleeves, so there’s not much that screams sexy until you come to the diamond-shaped cutout on each hip. It’s enough to make the dress suggestive, but not enough to take away from the classy look.
As much as I hate to admit it, Shep was right. This is the perfect dress.
“I’d do me,” I say with a shrug.
“I’d do you too. Now get out here and show me how right I was.”
Sighing, I push open the curtain and step out.
Shep sits forward. He moves his eyes over me in a painfully slow perusal.
Hunger—it’s there in his gaze as he pushes up from the chair and stalks toward me with purposeful strides. My heart rate is soaring higher and higher with each step, so loud I’m certain he can hear it as he comes near.
He doesn’t stop until he’s just a few inches from me.
Cinnamon. He smells like cinnamon. I fucking love cinnamon.
“It’s my gum,” he says, and I realize I’ve said it out loud.
Shit.
I don’t realize he’s reached out to me until his fingertips graze softly over my exposed hip, the touch causing me to jump.
“Does it hurt?”
“Huh?”
“The bruise—does it hurt? I saw you hit your hip on the corner of your desk when you attacked me.”
I glance down at where his fingers are resting against my skin, and for the first time, I notice there’s a purple mark forming.
He’s right, I did hit my hip, but I was so caught up in the moment that I didn’t care. Then during the hour-long car ride here, I was so focused on trying not to stare at him in his insanely hot baseball cap that I stared at my phone the whole time and forgot my hip was throbbing.
“I forgot about it. I didn’t realize it was starting to bruise.”
“You’ll have to save this dress for one of our later events so it can heal.”
I find his gaze again and turn my face toward his. He’s no longer staring at my hip. His swirling green and brown eyes are locked onto my own.
“You look beautiful, Denver.”
There’s something in the way he says it, something that grabs at my heart and tugs on the strings. I don’t know if it’s the way he uses my full name—something he hardly ever does—or if it’s the fire in his eyes that’s sending his words straight into my chest.
“I…”
My lips are his sole focus now.
I could recite the phone book for him and I don’t think he’d ever look away.
Worse? I don’t think I’d want him to.
“How’d you know?”
“What?”
“How’d you know this dress was going to be the one?”
With reluctance, he draws his eyes up to mine.
“If you think for a second that while you spent the last five years hating me, I’ve been blind to your body…” His hand trails down my hip, dipping way too close to my ass.
God do I hate that I want him to keep going.
“To these curves…” He moves his touch upward, his fingertips teasing me at the base of my back. “To your sheer fucking beauty…”
Light, feathery touches dance up my spine. Goose bumps break out along my skin, though I don’t think he notices.
I don’t realize he’s inched me closer to him with each dance of anticipation along my body until I feel his arousal pressed against my thigh.
His fingers curl around my neck, the touch hard and soft and everything I never knew I wanted, particularly from him.
“I’m not blind, especially when it comes to you, Bucky.”
I watch as his mouth descends toward mine, and I do nothing to stop him.
“Oh, miss! That one is stunning! The young man has a good eye. He—”
The saleswoman pops up out of nowhere just before our mouths make contact.
Thank god.
“Oh my, I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt, Mr. Clark. I-I—”
Shep pulls away, unwinding his arm from around my back, and I miss his warmth more than I’ve ever missed
anything in my entire life.
I take three healthy steps away from him, smoothing down the front of my unwrinkled dress, and try to get my breathing back to normal, refusing to look over at him for fear I’ll try to climb my way back into his arms.
Treacherous body.
“It’s fine, Annabelle.” He runs a hand through his hair and clears his throat. “We’ll take this one.”
“And all the ones in the room, too,” I add.
I don’t have to look at Shep to know he’s grinning victoriously.
I flip him the bird and he laughs.
Annabelle, unbothered by our antics, claps her hands together and says, “Splendid! I’ll get everything rung up.”
She disappears to the front of the shop again, leaving us drowning in the sexual tension.
Finally, after what feels like hours, I muster the courage to look at Shep.
He’s watching me, eyes still starving for me like I’m his prey, and I want to be caught so badly.
Before I do anything I’ll be sure to regret, I dart back into the dressing room, yanking the curtain closed between us.
He laughs, and for the first time in a long damn time, I hate Shepard Clark just a little bit less.
9
Six years ago, October
Shepard: I still can’t believe we pulled it off.
Denver: Dodged one hell of a bullet AND they’re both happy. We’re basically gods.
Shepard: Me, maybe. You, not so much.
Denver: You’re right—goddess.
Shepard: Of what? Nerds?
Denver: Shep…
Shepard: Kidding, kidding.
Shepard: I saw your photos from last night. I don’t think that dress was quite right for you.
Denver: Gee. Thanks so much.
Shepard: Don’t get me wrong, you still looked hot, but it wasn’t a perfect ten.
Denver: That doesn’t help.
Texting (The Complete Series Page 70
