What am I getting myself into exactly?
It’s a surprise,he said. I’ll see you in the morning. Goodnight, Chloe.
A knot wove in my stomach, but I wasn’t sure what else to say.
Night
My doorbell rang at ten AM sharp. I took a last look in the mirror at the front before grasping the doorknob and swinging the door open.
Gavin stood on the other side, glancing down the hall, holding two coffees in his hands. The grey sports jacket he wore had brown pads on the elbows, and he wore a band tee that looked well-worn. His brows were furrowed as he looked to the next apartment.
“Sometimes I forget it’s nearing July, but then I see decor like theirs on the door and—“ He finally looked at me, and his words trailed.
Those eyes traveled over me so deliberately that I shifted and leaned my weight into my opposite hip, raising a brow at him. I wasn’t even dressed in any spectacular fashion.
“—and I… I…” He swallowed and looked at me directly in the eyes. “Hi,” he said.
“Morning, Gavin,” I said, trying to ignore my ears heating.
The last time he had been at my door, though on the other side of the country, he’d had me pressed against it, his hands beneath my skirt. And judging by the look on his face, he was remembering it too.
His tongue darted out over his lips quickly. “Ah… brought you coffee,” he said, extending his right hand to me.
I smiled at the nervousness on his face and took the drink. Our fingers brushed, prompting that feeling to stagger long after our hands had parted. I opened the door a little wider.
“Would you like to come in? I just need to grab my purse,” I said.
“Ah… yeah.”
I left the door open and walked to the couch where I’d laid my purse. Gavin whistled behind me as the door closed.
“This place is…”
“Cold?” I suggested.
“I was going to be nice and say modern,” he said, and I met his gaze over my shoulder.
“‘Nice’isn’t necessarily a word I would use to describe you,” I said. I plopped my purse on the bar and looked through it, ensuring I had my wallet and phone charger. “It’s okay. You can call it what it is. Tyler isn’t a fan of colors in the home, or pretty much any personal interior details. I think he just wants to keep it as close to a model home as possible for when he sells it. You should have seen the look on his face when I tried to put up a photo in the hall there.”
“How long have you lived here?” Gavin asked.
“A little over a year. We moved in when Designare Fusion opened up offices and hired employees. This place was one of Tyler’s properties that he already had, so it was easy to make the move.”
Gavin ran his hand over the top of one of Tyler’s tinker toys on the end table. “Where are your things?”
“What things?” I asked.
“Everything from your apartment,” he said.
“What, like my blankets and picture frames? They’re in storage a few blocks over.” I pushed my bag onto my shoulder, and I had to look twice when I saw how he was staring at me.
“What’s wrong?”
“Does your fiancé have cameras hidden in every inch of this place?” he asked.
“Um…” I glanced around us, my eyes darting to the corners of the room, to the plants, and then to my open computer. “I don’t think so. Why?”
“And he’s gone for the week?”
