Page 74 of Trust Again

I was visiting her at her new job at the steakhouse.

“I sent my professor the wrong attachment,” I explained.

“Naked photos?” Sawyer asked and started polishing one of the glasses on the sink.

No, not naked photos, but at least one sexy scene in which Tristan and Mackenzie had danced together rather erotically. And he had whispered suggestively in her ear.

Oh, God, I’d never be able to set foot in the writing workshop again, let alone in the university. I’d have to transfer. And move away. Probably to Portland, where I would run into Rebecca and Nate every single day.

“Aaargh.” Again I lowered my forehead to the counter.

“Don’t be that way,” Sawyer said. “Show me.”

Before I knew it, she had grabbed Watson and turned him around.

“Okay, now I understand how you feel. But on the other hand…” She scrolled through my draft, and I didn’t stop her.

By now I’d given up trying to stop her. So far she’d been really cool about the fact that I wrote erotic lit. She’d even read two of my novels and said one of my protagonists had really turned her on. It was one thing for me to read such reactions in reviews and messages online. In real life, hearing this made me turn bright red, despite the fact that I was actually pleased. Besides, I was getting really fond of Sawyer. She was better than okay.

“Look, there’s not even a sex scene in here, Dawn,” she said and pushed Watson back toward me. “Stop talking yourself into thinking that what you do is somehow dirty. If you keep on like this, I’ll hide raw eggs in your bed and photograph you secretly when you lie down on them.”

I pressed my lips together to keep from grinning. “Okay. Sorry.”

She gave me a nod. “Next time just be careful what you send. Problem solved. Except… Is your professor hot?”

“What does that have to do with anything?”

Now Sawyer raised one eyebrow. “You have a lot to learn, Dawn. Seriously, you really shouldn’t have to ask such a question, as a sexually active person.”

I put my glass down on the bar. “Sexually active? How old are you, sixty?”

Sawyer grinned. “Aren’t you seeing Spencer later?”

In a flash I turned red. “We’re just cooking together.”

“Mhm. Cooking.” She tossed me another look that made my cheeks blaze even hotter.

“You’re impossible!”

“I hope you and your kitchen are ready for me!” I said as Spencer opened the door for me that afternoon.

He had on a white shirt that made him look tanned, and dark jeans covered with white smudges, which told me he’d been working on a sculpture. He looked me up and down, and when his eyes settled on the load of shopping bags in my hands, he gave me one of his big grins.

“What the…” He stepped aside and I headed past him, straight into the kitchen, where I set the bags on the counter.

Then I took off my jacket and hung it in the closet. By the time I got back, Spencer was already unloading the groceries.

“What are we making?”

“Pasta primavera” I said, standing next to him.

“That sounds kind of sexy.”

I looked at him sidelong. “What the hell is sexy about pasta primavera?”

He briefly glanced at me, then looked back into the shopping bag and smiled. “The way you say it. Pretty sexy.”

It was hard to come up with a good answer to that, so I just shook my head and placed the zucchini and eggplant in Spencer’s capable hands. I turned up the flame on a big pot of water and started chopping onions and garlic.