He raised his eyebrows inquiringly.
“You could’ve helped instead of just watching me.”
“Oh, because you would have loved me to barge in and manage that situation for you.”
He was leaning his forearms on the window, infuriatingly nonchalant, a smear of paint on his neck.
Having a comanager was a lot less useful than I’d expected. He just distracted me, did the things I wanted to do before I did, or did things I didn’t want done at all. I’d shown him my updated profit-and-loss calculations yesterday and he’d said, “Yeah, these match mine,” though he’d not even told me he was going over the accounts. And it had taken meages.
Folded my arms and looked at him through the window, taking a deep breath and reminding myself to play nice.
“I’ll go tidy the space where you guys wanted to put those new picnic benches,” Red said, scuttling toward the barn door as the tension thickened.
“You’re right, actually,” I said to Jones once she’d left. “Idoprefer you just spectating. You can stay out there and keep your thoughts on how I manage Galoshes to yourself.”
OK, so, not mybestplaying nice. But nobody else was around to see, so felt safe to let a little snark out.
“I didn’t say anything about how you manage Galoshes.”
Grabbed the broom and started sweeping the floor—just needed todosomething, really. Jones stayed where he was, leaning on the windowsill.
“Not walking off midconversation this time?” I shot at him.
“I thought you told me to stay out here and spectate.”
Glanced at him as I attacked the shop floor with my broom. There was amusement on his face now. He leaned his chin on one hand, waiting for a comeback I didn’t have.
Fine, I thought. You want to watch? Then watch.
I leaned the broom against the potato sacks and shrugged out of my jumper. Underneath I was in a tight cami and low-rise jeans, the ones that cling to my hips. My skin prickled as I turned my back on him again. I wasn’t cold. It was the brazenness of it, I think. Ostensibly there was nothing wrong with what I’d done—nothing indecent about what I was wearing, and it wasn’t exactly seductive, was it, sweeping the floor?
But it didn’t feel like that. It felt like I was saying, “I know you’re watching me, waiting for me to put a foot wrong. So look at me, then. Look at me on my terms. Look at me the way I keep finding myself looking at you.”
Jones said nothing, but he didn’t move away, either. My skin seemed to fizz. Suddenly every move I made felt deliciously deliberate. I’ve played to the male gaze plenty of times in my life—sucked myself in, hitched myself up, been the beautiful thing a guy wants to see. This wasn’t that. It was about where the power lay, I think, and my intention.
There’s something in the way Jones looks at me. That intensity I’ve been trying to find a name for. It’s as if he really sees me, instead of just looking—and he’s calling bullshit every time he meets my eyes.
It’s unnerving. It puts me on edge. But it’s kind of thrilling, too.
So I was playing, I think, when I shrugged out of my jumper. This time I wasn’t going to duck away or dodge his gaze, I was going to make it mine.
There was no sound but the sweeping of the broom. Heard him breathe in, just once, when I bent to shift a couple of crates. Anunsteady two-part inhale that went right to the core of me. My heart thumped, but still I didn’t give him my attention. I just held his.
He didn’t move off until Red came back in, chattering about the plans for the picnic benches, and the spell seemed to break. She didn’t react at all to the sight of me, which reminded me how ordinary it was to be sweeping the floor in old jeans and a strappy top.
Crazy, really, because for a moment there, I felt the sexiest I’ve felt in a very long time.
From:Charlie Jones
To:Charlie Jones
Subject:Day thirteen sober
I don’t know if I’m strong enough to do this.
I’m inside the Isle of Ormer pub, the Pirate’s Den. I’ve got a lime and soda and my laptop.
I underestimated how challenging this would be. It’s thesound, that warm pub hubbub. And the smell…lager sourness, the hint of old woodsmoke…fuck, it’s genuinely agonizing resisting the urge to buy a drink. When did I get this bad? How did it happen? I thought these emails were a weird idea to start with, but right now typing this out is pretty much the only reason I’m not at the bar.
