Do You Take This Man (29)
Lear turned slowly. “Did I hear you correctly? Are you actually asking for help?”
I rolled my eyes. “Forget it. I’ll wear the shirt over the dress.”
“I’m just giving you shit,” he said, motioning for me to turn. “I’ll unzip your dress.” His voice was normal, maybe even playful, but I still closed my eyes against the sound of those words from his lips, because I’d had fantasies of him ripping a dress from my body. He rested a palm on my shoulder and fiddled with the hook before dragging the zipper down my back slowly, the sound and vibration a subtle reminder of his mouth. As he pulled it down, I had a moment wondering if he was checking out my butt and then remembered it was caked in mud. “There,” he said, stepping back. His hand fell from my shoulder, the pad of his thumb ghosting down my spine as it fell away.
“Thank you,” I said before pulling the shirt over my head and pushing the dress to the ground in a way everyone who went to middle school with breasts knows how to do. I tossed the dress in with the shoes. They were probably both ruined anyway. “I’m done,” I said, picking up the bag from the concrete.
“Wow,” he said, taking the bag from me, his eyes not leaving my body.
“What?”
“I’ve just never seen you dressed down. You look nice.”
I scanned his words for sarcasm. Finding none, I just glanced away.
“Sorry, uh, it’s unlocked if you want to climb in. I’ll stow this back here.”
I hadn’t realized I’d been cold, but sliding into the car and closing out the rain and the wind, I was comfortable, despite my bare feet. A second later, Lear climbed in the driver’s side and started the car, fiddling with the touch screen. Immediately, warm air blew onto my toes.
“You’ve got a little mud on your face. Hold on,” he said, reaching across my lap. Though he couldn’t see me, my eyes went wide in surprise, but he didn’t touch me. Instead he opened the glove compartment and pulled out a package of wet wipes. “Here.”
“You’re more prepared than my friend who has a toddler,” I remarked, taking the wet wipe and pulling down the mirror.
“Thank you . . . ?” He signaled, despite there being no cars, which made me suppress a grin as he pulled out onto the highway.
I cast a glance at my car, which would hopefully not be washed away by the time a tow company could contact me. “It’s a good thing.”
“Just part of the job.” He didn’t say more, and we drove in silence.
“Thank you,” I finally said, breaking the bubble of background noise. “You didn’t have to be so nice.”
“I don’t think making sure you weren’t stranded in a ditch really qualifies me as nice,” he said, reaching for the touch screen. His gaze flashed to me before returning to the road. “But it’s no problem.”
I looked out the window, the rain pelting down. I hummed along with the song, letting my mind wander. “Lear,” I said, slowly turning my head. “Is this the soundtrack to Hamilton?”
“Yeah. So?” He gripped the steering wheel and didn’t look at me. “It’s good.”
“I know. I just didn’t expect you to be listening to musicals.”
“There’s nothing weird about it. It’s a wildly popular show.” His tone hardened, and the defensiveness was kind of cute.
“Not weird.” I laughed. “If anything, it humanizes you.”
“You were thinking of me as nonhuman?”
I took in his profile, the half of his face nearest me illuminated only by the ambient light from the dash. “Sometimes.”
“Has anyone ever told you you’re kind of mean?” The question might have hurt were it not for the corners of his lips tipping up. The little baby smile highlighted the cut of his jaw, and I remembered with sharp clarity what it felt like to touch him.
“I’ve been told that my entire life.” I bit my lower lip, taking in his face again. Lear had a good body, but he was handsome, even more so when the cocky swagger front he put up crumbled. I had the most nagging urge to reach for his thigh. The few times I’d touched him, there’d been a spark between us, and I still felt the ghost of his touch up my back from when he’d helped with my dress. “I can be nice sometimes, though.”
His expression was one of surprise before adjusting back to aloof, which made me want to make him lose control a bit. “I don’t know if I believe that.”
I shrugged and looked back out the window, letting the familiar songs from Hamilton comfort me as the warm air on my feet kept the chill away. “Maybe that’s for the best.”
“Probably,” he said.
The idea of a no-strings thing with him was ridiculous. Not only did we work together, but he was my mentor’s friend. Still, when he agreed, my chest squeezed. Lear Campbell could have been my new Corey minus the struggling YouTube channel. I studied his profile and imagined he would be good at uncomplicated, that he might be down for something fun. I needed to think through the idea and decide if it was worth it. I could be nice sometimes, but I was rarely impulsive. The rest of the drive, I weighed out pros and cons in my head.
Chapter 16
Lear
I WAS ALMOST at my place across town after dropping RJ at her apartment when I heard the buzzing from the floor in front of the passenger seat. The rain pounded on my window and lightning flashed across the sky. This fucking day will never end. After spending most of the drive in awkward silence, I’d dropped off RJ at her place, watching with far too much interest as she sprinted from the car to her door, holding my umbrella in one hand and her clothes and bag in the other. She lived in a four-story apartment building in a nice area of town and had waved awkwardly once she got inside the security door. I would have waited for anyone to get in safely, but I wouldn’t have watched anyone else’s body so closely.