Fix Her Up (Hot & Hammered #1)(48)

She scowled at him.

His mouth twitched. “Not enough.”

“Oh, get out of here,” she grumbled, shoving him away.

“Just right,” Travis called on the way to his truck, throwing a smile back over his shoulder that almost melted her into the pavement. “Drive safe, baby girl.”





Chapter Fourteen


Travis had an ulterior motive for asking Georgie to get a drink while she was still wearing her clown suit: it would be a lot easier to keep his hands off her in a shapeless polyester tent. Unfortunately, she’d texted him that she’d gone home to change, so he’d been waiting in the restaurant parking lot for twenty minutes with a mounting sense of doom, wondering if she’d show up wearing the skirt again. The one she’d wiggled out of in his bedroom before he’d thrown her down and humped her to an orgasm. He’d been thinking about sliding his hands beneath that skirt way too often lately.

Including right now.

Had the camera given him an excuse to get a little closer to Georgie than he should? Probably. Without that safety net sitting fifty yards away, he probably wouldn’t have risked tipping her chin up so he could clean the makeup off her face. Not kissing her had been a battle, camera or not. He’d found himself wanting to lean in and demand to know what was inside her head.

Was she over the crush?

Yes. The answer was obviously yes. He’d been around plenty of women with an affinity for him and none of them called him on his bullshit like Georgie. None of them challenged or motivated him. When a woman wanted a man, she flirted, right? There was a dance involved. She sure as hell didn’t come right out and propose he teach her about the adult arts. Didn’t that imply she would use those lessons . . . elsewhere at some point?

Travis realized his hands were strangling the steering wheel and forced himself to let go.

Yeah. There was nothing to worry about in terms of Georgie’s past crush. He was not the boy she’d watched from the bleachers. Or the man she’d watched hit home runs from her living room floor. He was a three-dimensional asshole and completely wrong for her—a girl who aspired to start a family and make magic memories.

He was completely wrong for anyone.

Travis tipped his head back, resting it against the driver’s seat. He was walking a dangerous line here by pretending to date Georgie. They needed to make it convincing in public, but not in private. He could not compromise on that, no matter how much he was tempted to do otherwise. And fuck, he was tempted. Might as well admit it. She could turn him on in a goddamn clown suit. As if that wasn’t enough to scare him, since being reintroduced to Georgie the adult, he’d run the gamut of feeling protective, possessive, and straight-up missing her.

But there was a game plan. He just needed to stick to it. Most importantly: to not sleep with her if they ended up alone. In fact, he needed to avoid being alone with her at all costs. No reason to tempt temptation itself. If he could keep his pants zipped for a couple weeks—tops—he’d be Mr. Wholesome and land himself the commentator position. And he could walk away without worrying that Georgie had grown attached.

Done.

Travis swallowed a lump in his throat and checked his mirror. The reporter in his blue Honda lay in wait a few parking spaces away, most likely thumbing through the pictures he’d already captured of Travis and Georgie. They were in it now. No turning back. If they hadn’t already set every tongue in town wagging after the birthday party, they would as soon as they walked into the restaurant together. He’d intentionally chosen the Waterfront because it was the busiest spot in Port Jefferson and had been since his youth. With an eatery in back and a bustling bar in front, it catered to young and old. With the sun setting on Saturday night, everyone would be meeting at the Waterfront for a quick dinner and a few drinks, before pub-crawling their way to a Sunday hangover—a Long Island tradition.

Headlights bounced off the interior of Travis’s truck. Georgie’s car.

Travis opened the driver’s-side door and climbed out, turning to lean up against it. By Georgie’s third attempt to back into a parking space, Travis was shaking his head.

He was prepared to question why she didn’t simply pull in headfirst, but the words died on Travis’s lips when Georgie came into view. No skirt this time, but he felt that low stirring in his belly regardless. Maybe even stronger this time around. She’d traded her clown suit for a loose summer dress and sandals that crisscrossed up her legs and tied below the knee. Hair that she’d hidden beneath an orange wig earlier was in a braid that sat on one shoulder. As she drew closer, he noticed a light sheen on her lips that made him think of bites taken from fresh fruit.

Every inch the sweet girl next door . . . until he let himself notice her tits. Kill me now. They’d been pushed up and separated and put on display in the V of her dress. Why couldn’t he look at her body and remain objective? He’d never had this problem before. Much of his life had been spent crossing paths with gorgeous women, but this one made him feel like his clothes fit wrong.

A young guy walking past her in the parking lot did a double take. After tugging an earphone out of his ear, he said hello. As in hel-lo.

“Hi,” she said back, slowing to a stop and looking at the man with an oblivious expression. “Did you need something?”

Clearly shocked that his skeevy hello had earned him a positive response, the guy backed up like a dog who’d spotted a stray treat. “Now that you mention it—”