Her abrupt change apparently got his attention. He tilted his head to the side. “Why?”
“Because I give to give, not to fix what happened on an internet video.” She leaned forward, elbows to her knees, sifting her fingers through her now not-so-curled curls.
“Can’t we do both?” She might be mistaken, but he’d forgotten to use the caramel tone in his voice that time. Oh, he may have been handling her, but she had three kids—she knew a thing or two about recognizing manipulation techniques.
April shifted, mentally grasping for the peace she’d found earlier. “Itfeelswrong.”
His expression turned distant before he resettled back in the present. “Sometimes things that feel wrong can still be right.”
Well, true, but also, “Sometimes things that feel wrong are also wrong.”
Jack set his now empty cup on the wide armrest of his chair, but he didn’t move his hand away from it. He stroked the handle between his thumb and forefinger, and April could’ve sworn she felt that touch of his fingertips on porcelain against her own skin. Everywhere on her own skin. This time the breath she inhaled was not mindful.
“You have a platform, yes?” he asked.
She nodded, refusing to watch his fingertips seduce the handle of her favorite yoga mug any longer.
“It’s a decently sized platform, right?” he asked.
She nodded again. Totally failing because her eyes trailed back to the seduction of her mug. He’d moved on to tracing the stick figures with the pad of his index finger.
This was inappropriate, these thoughts. This whole thing.
Nip it in the bud, April.
Either he sensed her watching his love affair with yoga stick figures with his touch, or he was simply done. In any case, his hand rested beside the mug, not tracing anything but mesmerizing her all the same.
And that really shouldn’t have been such a bummer for her.
Which meant, maybe she really needed to get out with a man who might actually trace his fingertips over her skin. Someone in her league, who wasn’t also her brand manager. Someone definitely not Jack.
“All I’m suggesting is that we take your platform and we use it to bring attention to a worthy cause—something that really matters to you,” he said. “I’m feeling like a family yoga night with proceeds benefitting your favorite cause will be a good start.”
“And as a bonus, my good intentions help scrub my reputation?”
She continued to stare at his hand, waiting to see what it would touch next. What the lucky object would be.
“Now you’re getting it.” He snapped his fingers together softly and, dear goodness, she jumped.
Once her heart rate settled back to normal—not relaxed, but normal—range, she raised her eyes to the sky and said, “It still doesn’t feel right. I know the real reason we’d be doing this and it would be a charade, not philanthropy.” Her voice rose in tone as she spoke. “It wouldn’t be from the depths of my heart, it’d be because I wanted something in return.” She made a conscious effort to rein in the frustration, finishing with a quiet, “That’s literally the antithesis of charity.”
“You’re complicating something that’s really pretty simple.”
“You’re complicating something that doesn’t need complicating.”
Jack laced his fingertips and rested them behind his head. This was a good thing, because then April wasn’t following them with her gaze like Mayonnaise on Jack.
“Okay. Let’s pause. You’re getting upset…” Jack said, which was the truth.
“I am.”
“The foot thing helped you relax before,” he said to the sky.
She frowned. “What foot thing?”
“The thing with the grass?” He released his right hand long enough to point to the grass before he put it right back behind his head. “The toe-foot thing you did when you first sat down.”
“The grounding?”
