He took a step closer, the corner of his mouth lifting. "You know, ever since we met, I've been curious if you take orders as well as you give them."
Her smirk was instant, and her gaze dipped to his mouth before landing squarely back on his. "Depends on the orders." She let her fingers graze down the front of his shirt, light as a tease. "But I do learn fast when there's a solid benefits package."
"I deliver excellent benefits," he said, dead serious but with a grin threatening to break through.
Piper tilted her head. "Playlist rights on the drive there? Full creative control."
His answer came with zero hesitation and a flash of excitement. "Deal." His voice turned husky. "Though, fair warning: if you keep looking at me like that, we might not make it through the first song."
CHAPTER 14
41 DAYS UNTIL ANNA & DRAKE'S WEDDING
PIPER
Zach's loft shouldn't have surprised her. But, like everything about him, it did.
From the outside, Wild Sacks HQ was exactly what you'd expect. An industrial grandpa of a building sandwiched between shiny condos and edgy restaurants.
But inside—after Zach keyed them in like he was opening a secret lair, nodded to a mural with his company's logo of a super-buff squirrel wearing underwear with acorn nuts on them, and marched her up concrete stairs straight out of a gritty cop show—it turned into a whole different beast.
His apartment was peak industrial nonsense with raw brick walls that looked like they'd witnessed a hundred failed startups.
And yet. The man had pulled it off.
His kitchen was legit, not a breakroom, and the living room looked lived-in, not like a waiting area.
Functional, sure. Masculine, obviously. But not at all the frat house disaster she'd braced for.
"Well," Piper said, taking it all in, "this is not horrifying."
He laughed, tugged off his jacket, and slung it over the back of the sofa. "I do try to keep the murder-aesthetic to a minimum."
Since she was wildly committed to her reputation as a responsible adult, she sent Shelby a heads-up that she was still with Zach. Then she kicked off her heels gently, and lined them up by the door.
She couldn't exactly lose a shoe and have to pull some covert Cinderella act later, probably in front of the world's most judgmental cat.
"Do you have a cat?" she asked.
He shook his head. "No. Why?"
"Absolutely no reason at all," she said as Zach strolled to the fridge, grabbed two cans of lemon-lime sparkling water, and came back.
"How long have you lived here?" she asked.
"Since I got a loan to buy the building, I couldn't keep paying rent." He shrugged. "It can be annoying when work is right outside my door, or I've got the flu, and the employees still know I'm home. There are zero boundaries—but it works, you know?" He held out the sparkling water, and she accepted it because it was one less decision she had to make.
"Thanks," she said.
He gestured at the couch. "Sit anywhere."
She collapsed onto the sofa with a groan. She wouldn't be shocked if there was a Piper-shaped dent left behind when she finally got up.
Zach joined her, carefully giving her space. Not nuzzling, not making quippy banter, not even a suggestive twitch.
Just two people marinating in the afterglow of half a dozen almosts and one definitely illegal kiss.
The long moment stretched into two. No music, no TV, only the pensive glug-glug of the fridge and the two of them just existing together.
