So I push the thought down. I shove it into the darkest corner of my brain and focus on the dirty dishes. I should wash the forks first. Then the mugs. Then the oversized platters. I am a woman of discipline. I am a professional. I am definitely not thinking about my boss’s bone structure.
I last about ninety seconds before my traitorous eyes drift back to him.
He’s finished with the wrapping paper and has moved on to the table, wiping it down with a dishcloth. He moves methodically, with a quiet, efficient rhythm that’s oddly mesmerizing. His shirt sleeves are pushed up, and his forearms flex with every swipe—not in some obnoxious way, but just thenatural, functional movement of a man doing a job. I find myself fixating on his hands. They’re broad, his fingers splaying across the wood as he leans his weight into it.
And then my brain—that treacherous, hormone-addled organ—starts wondering, against my will, what those hands would be like in bed. Would they be rough and commanding? Passionate? Or would he be the kind of guy who’s careful, sweet, and almost unbearably gentle? Would he—
I nearly drop a mug.Stop it, Annie.
I must be ovulating. It’s the “Great Biological Trick.” During this window, my pheromones go rogue and my brain decides to implement a temporary “hotness” filter over the entire world. The mailman? A god. Ernie the homeless man? A misunderstood romantic lead. The guy at the bodega who hasn’t ever gotten my bagel order right? Suddenly, he’s smoldering. My body is essentially a traitor, flooding my system with a cocktail of hormones designed to override my common sense and make me do something that would require a very long, very awkward apology.
I am currently a victim of my own biology. That is the only logical, peer-reviewed explanation for why I am standing here, elbow-deep in lukewarm dishwater, staring at my employer’s backside like it’s a national monument I’m trying to memorize for a history exam.
Leo Roussos has a great ass. It’s an objective, undeniable truth. It is a fundamental constant of the universe, right up there with the speed of light and the sky being blue. Whether he’s in the dark denim he’s wearing now, the sharp, academic khakis he favors for Columbia, or—god help my weary soul—the gray sweatpants he wore that one Sunday morning when I arrived twenty minutes early? It’s a masterpiece of tailoring, even when there’s no tailoring involved.
I can’t even be mad at Denise anymore. Half the preschool moms probably have a support group dedicated to “The Professor,” and honestly? I can’t even judge them. I’m currently the treasurer.
“Annie?”
I snap my head up so fast I nearly give myself whiplash. He’s looking directly at me, his head tilted at a curious angle that causes a single, dark curl to escape the gel and graze his eyebrow.
Oh, hell.He caught me. He definitely caught me staring at his glutes. I am a predator. I am the creepy nanny. I should just pack my things and move to a remote island where the only residents are goats and people who don’t have eyes.
“Do you like it?” he asks.
My throat is suddenly the Sahara. I swallow hard, but my voice still comes out in a high-pitched, pathetic squeak that wouldn’t sound out of place in a Disney movie. “What?”
He gestures vaguely toward the record player, where Tommy Dorsey is currently middle-swinging his way through my dignity. “The music. Do you like it?”
The relief is so violent it’s a wonder I don’t collapse right into the dirty dinner plates.Thank you, sweet sweet universe. I owe you one.“It’s…it’s okay. You know. For jazz.”
“‘For jazz’?” He echoes, a playful glint in his eyes as he leans against the counter. “Not a fan of it, huh?”
“Not typically, no.”
He chuckles—a low, resonant sound that vibrates in the space between my ribs. It’s infinitely more distracting than the music. “What’s your usual speed, then? If I’m going to curate the soundtrack for our late-night domesticity, I should probably know the repertoire.”
“Alanis Morissette. Nirvana. The Cranberries. A little Counting Crows when I’m feeling particularly angsty.” I shrug,trying to look like a person who isn’t currently obsessed with his bone structure. “Normal stuff.”
“I can get down with Alanis,” he says, his voice perfectly serious.
I actually burst out laughing. “Really?I’m sorry, but I didn’t exactly peg you for an Alanis enthusiast.”
“And what, pray tell, did you peg me for?”
“I don’t know. NPR in the car. Maybe some brooding classical cello suites while you’re grading papers and drinking your nasty tea that tastes like dirt.”
He grins—a slow, wide grin that feels like a secret being shared. “I contain multitudes, Annie.”
“So I’m seeing.”
“And for the record,” he adds, pushing off the counter and moving a step closer, “I do listen to NPR in the car.”
“Aha! There it is.”
“I’m a cliché, I know. I accept it. But I can also appreciate a good, visceral, angry breakup anthem.”
“Alanis doesn’t just sing breakup anthems,” I say, rinsing a plate with more intensity than it requires. “She’s a spiritual experience. She’s the patron saint of feminine rage.”
