“Because you said Tucker chewed up everything.”
I picked up a picture frame from the counter and studied the photo of Jason in thick winter clothes, smiling with his dog. A snowy backdrop as far as the eye could see spilled out behind them. Not my favorite shot of him. I liked the ones where I could see more skin. I set it down hurriedly as he opened the door of his room.
God, he was easy to look at. I felt my face flush. Again.
When he’d walked into my kitchen, my body had turned on like a house coming out of a two-year-long power outage. Everything switched on until the entire place was lit and all the appliances were running. Heart, cheeks, lungs, eyes, the tips of my fingers, the butterflies in my stomach, ringing in my ears, weakness in my knees. All alive, all buzzing with electricity.
He looked from me to the picture frame. “That’s in Minnesota,” he said, leaning on the counter, his arm almost touching mine. I swallowed hard. He smelled good. Really good. Something crisp and clean, like pine and fresh laundry. It made me want to lean in and take a deep breath.
His luggage sat in the small sitting area, and a guitar case rested on a bench by the tiny table. It reminded me how short a time he’d actually been back. He’d flown in, had about an hour to himself, then had gone to meet me.
“Aren’t you tired?” I asked, peering over at him. “You just got off a fifteen-hour flight.”
“I can sleep just about anywhere. I got enough rest on the plane.”
He leaned well inside my personal bubble. I think he did it on purpose. I could actually feel the heat coming off his body. My conservative side, the side that couldn’t forget I’d been engaged to another man, wanted me to take a step back. But the side that suspiciously sounded like Kristen ran out of breath yelling at me to hold my ground.
I held my ground.
I was single and was allowed to feel like this. I was permitted to flirt and get butterflies when another man stood too close. And I was definitely getting butterflies now.
“Are you here permanently? In LA?” I asked, trying to keep my voice from betraying my reaction to his nearness.
“For the moment. They wanted me here for the soundtrack I was working on. My recording studio’s here, and it was just easier to coordinate everything with me living locally. Plus, it puts me close for the events I have to attend.”
“What events?”
“Well, there’s the movie premiere,” he said. “And I went to the Grammys.”
“You went to the Grammys?”
“Yeah, it was kind of a broad industry invite that I got in on,” he said dismissively. He looked at my lips. “So, do you like my place?” he asked, somewhat distantly, talking to my mouth.
“I didn’t know what to expect. I thought maybe there’d just be a hammock between some trees or something.”
He laughed and his piercing blue eyes creased at the corners. I hadn’t anticipated those eyes. There were some things photos just couldn’t do justice to.
“When my label moved me to LA, they included housing. But I like my trailer. My agent, Ernie, offered a spot on his property. He’s got a gym in the pool house and I have free run of the laundry room.”
I smiled. “This place is a compound,” I said. “Those are what? Thirteen-foot gates? Are you sure you don’t want to ride out the zombie apocalypse here?”
He laughed. “I’ll give you the gate code in case you want to drop by.” He nodded to the back. “Come see the bedroom.”
I was interested in seeing the whole place. He let me go first and I stood just inside the door and looked around. No bedspread, only gray sheets and a soft-looking blanket folded down at the end. He must sleep hot. Lord knew he put off enough body heat.
Simple beige curtains hung on the windows, and a cell phone charger was plugged in on the nightstand. The room smelled like him, and being in such a personal space made my heart flutter a little. It was weird to talk to someone so much on the phone and then realize he was a real person with nice smells and a bed.
Jason had come up behind me, and he leaned into the room with his hands over his head on the door frame. “Look, I got you in my bedroom on the first date,” he teased, and I glanced over my shoulder and shot him a look.
“Is that where Tucker sleeps in his little dungeon?” I pointed to a crate wedged between the bed and the wall.
He chuckled. “I wonder how he’ll take being back in his crate now that he’s been spoiled by sleeping with a beautiful woman for so long.”
I turned to him. “Are you just going to flirt shamelessly with me now that you’re on this date that you wanted so much?”
“Of course.” He grinned.
The room was small, and with him hanging in the doorway, I was backed up to the mattress. With his hands over his head like that, his arm and chest muscles pushed against his T-shirt.
He had the most amazing body. He wasn’t bulky. He was lithe and toned and he stood easily a foot taller than me. He filled the room with his presence, even from the door.
My eyes flickered down. The bottom of his shirt had ridden up, and I could see a line of hair running down the middle of his stomach into the top of his jeans. My breath hitched, and I looked back up at his face quickly, hoping he hadn’t noticed my wandering eyes.
His amused expression told me he had.
It didn’t escape me that an hour ago I had been completely opposed to meeting him anywhere other than Starbucks, and now, if he took half a step forward, I’d have to sit on his bed.
I cleared my throat. “So, what if I hadn’t agreed to this date?” I asked, looking up at him.
He gave me a mischievous eyebrow. “Then I was going to go with my backup plan.”
“Which was what?”
“Same as my original plan, only with more subterfuge.”
“Subterfuge?” I tilted my head.
“Yeah. I was going to take you on the date anyway, let you call it an appointment, and never tell you it was a date the whole time.”
I laughed.
He nodded over his shoulder. “Come on. Let’s go eat.”
* * *
Jason wanted me to pick where we went, so I took him to a hole-in-the-wall Mexican place I liked down the street from my house. A red-boothed, small restaurant with trumpet-heavy ranchera music playing over the speakers and paintings of matadors on the walls. They gave us a quiet booth in a corner at a table with a sombrero hanging above it.
“I figure you haven’t had Mexican in a while,” I said. “Australia probably isn’t known for its carne asada.”
A busboy slid two ice waters in front of us.
“We don’t have very good Mexican food in Minnesota,” he said. “It’s one of my favorite things about LA.”
“What else do you like about California?”
“Well, the dog-sitters are hot,” he said, winking at me over the laminated menu.
I narrowed my eyes at him playfully as I pulled my vibrating cell phone out of my pocket. “Oh no,” I said, looking at the screen. “I have seven missed calls from Kristen. Hold on, it might be about Oliver.” I must have not felt it going off when I was in Jason’s truck. I pressed the phone to my ear. “Kristen? Is everything okay?”
“Please tell me that you googled Jason.”