Page 66

His gaze raked across her. “That thing’s like an appendage, and somehow not what I was looking at.No. I didn’t.”
Whoa. What?
Stunned from whatever this rollercoaster was, she turned and pulled the twenty-four-hour coffee shop’s door open, walked in, and sat down as Bishop went to the counter. What exactly had he meant by that? What else could he mean?
His tuxedo creases showed wear from the day’s and night’s hours on the job, but that did nothing to dampen how absurdly attractive he was. The two garage girls had been right. He was hot with a tight ass.
Tearing her eyes away from him, she realized they were in anall-organiccoffee shop. There were a half dozen national chain coffee shops within a stone’s throw from here. She knew them by heart, having blogged about them on a fairly regular basis, questioning the carcinogen levels of their additives. Had he picked this place on purpose? She glanced out the window and saw they had parked adjacent to a coffee shop with a MADE HOT AND FRESH sign glowing in the window before he’d carried her across the street.
He’d chosen this place on purpose.
“Hey.” He approached the table. “I didn’t check in and status update my GPS coordinates. Thought you should know how most normal folks roll.”
“Ha, ha. Very funny.” She rolled her eyes, shaking her head. A cascade of her meat-scented hair fell over her face. “God, I’ve got to strip out of this dress and get in a shower.”
Bishop was silent, but his face wasn’t.
Shower. Naked. Sex.The words were written all over the color in his face and the hunger in her eyes. There was something addictive about his protection, about how he claimed to know best and thendid, about how he wanted to take care of her. But it wasn’t just an act. He’d literally carried her like some sort of pothole-saving kamikaze street-crosser.
His chiseled jaw set and didn’t budge, and his green eyes were pools of emotion. It seemed as though they always warmed when she made him angry, when she irritated him, when she turned him on…
Right now, they were very, very green. And her heartbeat matched the fast pace of the deepening hue. For all of her concern that what she felt was one sided, his eyes said otherwise.
“Don’t look at me like that, Ella.” His words rumbled so quietly that they scratched across her senses.
He’d said it so quietly that she felt the rumble of each word graze down her neckline. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize, either.” He pulled out a chair, dropping into it.
“We’re here for more coffee?”
Bishop shook his head. “Almost.”
She hadn’t realized he had something tucked under his arm until he put it on the counter. “Go change.”
“Um, what?” She studied it. “You bought me a T-shirt?”
“I thought it might help. If the dress is holding on to the smell, then ditch the dress.”
“This is a thousand-dollar dress.” Or something like that.
“Andthisis a twenty-dollar shirt. Put it on. No one cares what you’re wearing anymore, babe. You’d be beautiful in a trash bag, so who cares?”
“Bishop, that’s…”
“Go change. Heels and an oversize shirt. Kinda hot, if you ask me. But I’m not a Bloggie red-carpet dude.” He leaned back, balancing the chair on two legs. “We’ll grab a cup of coffee beans to go. I’m pulling out all my tricks tonight. We have an hour’s drive out of town, so might as well get as comfortable as you can. Right?”
Ella stood up, clutching her new shirt. His thoughtfulness gave her a moment of heart pangs that she didn’t want to admit, and she pecked him on the cheek. “Thanks.”
He leaned into her, and she let her lips linger, dragging them against his cheek.
The air zipped and zapped. She wanted him to turn his head, to let his mouth linger against hers again, and not because he wanted to make things even. But they were in the middle of a coffee shop and, together, they smelled like the dinner-scented auditorium. Though that was starting to be forgettable…
“Go change, Ella.” Bishop turned her around and patted her upper back.
Damn. Cringing, she backed away, disgusted with herself. Flirting with him again! And shut down again!
Yes, there’d been a look. But so what! Or maybe she’d dreamt it. He couldn’t have been more clear. She was work. He loved his job, and Bishop was the opposite of her entire world. Yet with each footstep away from him, she dreaded the space.