Page 5 of The Do Over
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He fell asleep almost immediately because the next time he opened his eyes was when Sophie was shaking his shoulder. He peered at her through half-lidded eyes. She was hovering over him, and her eyes were fixed on his face.
Jack couldn’t ignore how deja vu the scene looked.
“Sorry. I should let you sleep some more, but we’ve gotten to the house. You can go in and lie down. I’ll handle everything out here.”
Sophie left the car.
Jack shook the sleep from his eyes and got out seconds later as she was getting her bag from the passenger seat.
“Is there anything that needs to be handled?” He asked, not liking the idea of having her drive the thirty minutes and then taking care of everything else. Jack wasn’t sure if she arrived today, but she must have done a lot…with the wedding and all.
Besides, her mother was the reason why he wasn’t thinking about the million ways to put Aidan to bed.
Sophie shook her head.
“I doubt it. I was going to park the car properly and go inside, see if we need to turn the heater on, reduce the temperature, and deal with drapes and stuff. I don’t think so, though. My brother’s fiancée has to be the most meticulous person I’ve ever met.
She came to get me from the airport today, despite her busy schedule.”
So she got here today, Jack noted. All the more reason why he was going to oversee all the things she just mentioned. He stretched out his hand.
“I’ll deal with the car. Can I have the keys?”
“No,” Sophie started to protest.
“You drove here,” Jack argued. “It’s only polite that I deal with the car. You also need rest, too.”
Sophie didn’t argue with that, but the brief contact when her fingers touched his as she handed him the keys was enough to have Jack intentionally inhaling.
“Thank you. To be honest, I think I’m going to pass out as soon as my head hits the pillow. That’s if I even get my body on the bed. I might be asleep before I end up there.”
“Then go in,” he urged. “As much as I'd be happy to deal with the car, I don’t want to have to haul your body into the house.”
She laughed, then dipped her hand into her bag and threw him something that he caught deftly.
“That’s your key. I don’t want you sleeping in the car either.”
Then she turned around and made her way to the house, which was a simple flat that sat between two other identical ones—although they were good feet away from their lodging. Theirs was also painted green.
The house was the third thing on his mind, though.
The first was how Sophie looked so good in the jeans as she walked away, and the second was how he was going to stay with her for the next two weeks without the thought of doing the things he shouldn’t ever do, constantly barging into his mind.
Jack spent enough time outside, even after he had dealt with the car, trying to clear his thoughts. Once he was sure that there wasn’t anything inappropriate about Sophie there, he walked to the house.
Surprisingly, she was seated in the living room, wearing baggy sweatpants and a graphic t-shirt. Her legs were folded under her. He saw her, but she didn’t seem to notice him since she had earphones in her ear and was hunched over her tablet, scrolling furiously.
She looked good.
Very good.
The kind that he, if he had any sense, would only look at once and head the other way to the door on the right that had his name on it. But Jack wasn’t that smart, and it had been a long time since he stopped to admire a woman, close to two years, that he stood there and kept staring at her.
Until she seemed to sense that someone was watching her and turned in his direction. Caught, the only response Jack could resort to in a split second was frowning. However, he didn’t know that he was frowning yet.
“Uhm,” Sophie seemed to look a little unsure. “Is everything okay?”
