I Wish You Were Mine (Oxford #2)(11)

He shrugged. Objectively he knew a penthouse on Park Avenue was “amazing.” But he rarely paid enough attention to care. “Yeah. It’s nice.”

“Nice?” Mollie muttered as she moved toward the floor-to-ceiling windows that faced the twinkling lights of midtown Manhattan. “Who’s your decorator?” she asked.

His decorator? Jesus. “No clue. I had someone make sure all this shit was here when I moved in.”

“Ah,” she said.

“You managed to dump an awful lot of meaning into that one syllable.”

She tilted her head and considered him. “Why did you really ask me to move in?”

He groaned. “Mollie, you’re killing me. Drop it.”

“I will,” she said quickly, coming toward him. “I just…you were really just being a nice guy? No agenda?”

“You mean am I planning to install a camera in the guest bathroom and watch you shower? No.”

He meant it sarcastically, but the thought of Mollie naked in the shower, suds running over her lithe body…

“Madison’s my sister.”

Just like that, his arousal went from simmering to nonexistent. Mention of his ex-wife had a tendency to do that.

“Yeah,” he snapped. “I’m aware.” I’ve been more aware than you know.

Her eyes searched his face. “Don’t you miss her at all?”

Jackson poured himself more whisky he didn’t need and refused to answer.

Mollie let out a long sigh. “I figured.”

“Figured what?”

“That you asking me to move in was some misplaced attempt at getting back at Madison for leaving you.”

Whoa, what? Jackson moved toward her, his fingers wrapping around her arm. Hard. “That’s bullshit.”

Her blue eyes locked on his. “Is it? You’ve been avoiding me for months, and yet the second I’m within arm’s reach you want to be roommates? You can’t tell me that Madison wasn’t all tied up in your motives on that one.”

“The hell she was,” he said, his grip tightening. “I’m not the sort of * who sits across the table from one woman while thinking about another. I was thinking about you.”

Her lips parted in surprise, and belatedly he realized how that sounded. He released her arm and stepped back. “I just meant that you’re my friend. I’ve got the extra space. Either take the offer or don’t, doesn’t matter to me, but for the love of God, can we stop f*cking talking about it?”

Mollie blew out a breath and ran a hand through her tousled hair. The lighter color looked good on her. So did the shorter cut and the sexy waves. He always remembered her as having long brown hair that she wore in a boring braid, but the blond…

It was hot. Mollie was hot.

Jesus, man, get a grip. No wonder she’d shot down his offer to move in. She probably saw him as a stodgy big brother, and meanwhile all he could think about was pulling her toward him, peeling that dress off her, and—

“How long were you thinking?” she asked again.

He blinked as his thoughts scattered. Was she actually considering it? And why the hell did he feel so giddy?

“For as long as you need,” he said simply.

Mollie scratched her nose. “I don’t like clutter.”

He gestured. “Do you see clutter?”

Her eyes scanned the room. “And I have a lot of clothes now. And shoes. Shoes are my thing. I have a shoe thing.”

He gave a slight smile at her babbling. “The guest room at the far end has a walk-in closet.”

Mollie put a hand over her chest and stepped backward. “Stop. That’s my weakness, and you know it.”

Jackson lifted an eyebrow in challenge. “You want to see?”

Mollie chewed her lip, and he felt a strange satisfaction at seeing her caught in turmoil. Mollie had seemed so confident, so sure of herself and everyone around her. He liked that he could put her off balance, just a little bit. Because God knew she’d been knocking him off balance all night.

“Madison would kill me,” she said quietly.

He met her eyes. Held them. “Do you care?”

It was a big question—a bold one. And from the way she looked at the floor, he could tell that she knew he wasn’t just asking about Madison’s feelings on the roommate situation. He wanted to know how much his ex-wife still had her claws into Mollie.

“She’s my sister,” Mollie said in a small voice that Jackson wasn’t used to hearing from her.

She’s also a bitch, Jackson added silently. Aloud he said, “Come on, Molls. You’re always rambling about how Madison looked out for you in those early days. How she practically raised you, blah blah blah.”

“Because she did,” Mollie said, just a bit testily.

Jackson wondered if Mollie had noticed her own use of the past tense. Wondered if, despite her knee-jerk defense of her sister, she knew on some level that Madison had long stopped being the selfless older sister that Mollie remembered from her childhood.

“If Madison wants what’s best for you, don’t you think she’d want this for you over a pet tarantula and cabbage?” he asked, using his whisky to gesture toward the gleaming kitchen.

Mollie chewed the inside of her lip. “I shouldn’t. I can’t.”