Page 24 of Matched By Mistake
“Yes! I need each of those five-by-seven canvases put on the tables at the spots I’ve set up. Then I need the water pots filled. Do you mind?”
“Not at all,” he said, getting straight to work. The music she had streaming in the shop was a funky mix of top forty songs from the last decade. Something he desperately tried to focus on instead of the image of Maggie, which he couldn’t get out of his head.
She had her long black hair worn down this evening and it curled over her shoulders and down her back. Which he had noticed when she’d turned and he realized the dress she had on was backless. He had fought to tear his eyes from her bare tanned back. The skirt of her dress started right at the small of her back and was a pencil-type skirt so it hugged her butt and hips in a way that made him want to groan.
“Finished yet?” she asked, turning to find him standing there staring at her.
“No. I was just wondering if you had a pitcher to fill up the water pots?” he asked. Lame. He was coming up with dumb reasons for standing there when what he really wanted to do was lock the front door, take her hand and pull her into the back room and into his arms.
Something he’d told her he wouldn’t do. Which he suspected was why she was standing there with her lips slightly parted as if she was begging for a kiss.
“I do. Let me get it for you,” she said, turning and walking away from him, her hips swaying with each step.
She reached the sink at the back of the room and then bent over from the waist and opened the cabinet underneath it. His cock stirred and he realized that he might not mind losing if it meant that he got to put his hands on her waist and draw her back into his own body. He took two steps toward her with his hands extended.
“Aha,” she said, standing and turning to him again. “You can use this one.”
He dropped his hands and tried to appear chill, but since his blood felt like lava in his veins and all he could see now was her ass and all he could think about was taking her from behind, it was difficult, to say the least.
She held the pitcher out to him, and her face wore an expression that was a little too innocent.
“You know what you’re doing to me, don’t you?”
She shrugged, pursing her lips a little at first. “What? We agreed to do these public dates.”
“And I said I wouldn’t touch you, but damn, Mags, you are making it very hard for me to keep my vow.”
“Am I?” she teased. “Glad to hear it.”
“Minx. Fine, if that’s the way you want to play it, I’m game. We’ll see who breaks first,” he said.
“I think it’s going to be you. I don’t lose,” she said, handing him the pitcher as she stepped closer.
Barely an inch separated their bodies and he felt the heat of hers wrapping around him and the scent of her jasmine perfume. This close he could see the flush of desire on her cheeks and see the quickness of her breath.
She wanted him. Was it really worth winning not to take what he wanted?
But he knew it was. Nothing worth having was easy. He could play this game with her. And as much as he felt the knife’s edge of desire, he knew that anticipation would make it even hotter when they came together.
He leaned in closer to her and her head tilted to the side the way it did when he’d last kissed her and he moved even closer but didn’t allow his mouth to touch hers.
“Thanks.”
She swallowed as he took the pitcher without touching her. He pivoted on his heel and walked back to the table where she had the supplies lined up, very aware of her eyes on him as he walked away.
He was still hot and horny but he felt as if she knew he’d come to play and that he wasn’t one who lost, either.
He finished putting out the supplies she’d asked him to as couples started arriving for the lesson. She gestured for him to join her at the front and he saw they’d be seated very close together at a table for two. Perfect.
Seven
Her dress-sexy-make-Jericho-hot plan was working, she could tell, but she hadn’t considered the fact that Jericho was definitely the kind of man who had more than a few tricks in his playbook. Luckily it wasn’t her first rodeo, and as she flirted with him and came close but never touched him, she was reminded of how much she loved this part of dating.
The slow tease that came with being with a man she wanted but hadn’t decided she was going to sleep with. She’d known that the last two years she was ignoring a critical part of herself but for so long it had felt safer to do so. Not any more, she thought. Never again would she let a man steal this from her.
The class was going well, too. She’d only introduced the wine nights this summer after doing some market research and also because she’d wanted to take advantage of the social part of the k!smet app. She saw notorious social media influencer Zach Benning and his wife, Lila, in the back and noticed Zach was streaming the class, which she thought would be a big boon for her business.
For the class she’d been demonstrating a very simple landscape design that was perfect for beginners. She looked over at Jericho’s canvas. Dang. He was definitely not a beginner. She’d asked them to use a reference drawing that she had projected on the walls around the room so that no matter where someone was seated, they’d be able to view it.
