My feet move before I have a chance to think this through.
I grip the door handle. “Stay a while?” I rasp out.
She looks up at me, those deep brown eyes studying my own. “I really should go home.”
I can only nod, opening the door as I step back and out of her way.
Fuck.
She crosses the threshold, her phone in her hand.
Should I offer to take her home?
Would that be more weird? More like a hookup. Which this absolutely was not.
I was looking out for her. For my crew.
I clear my throat and force a platonic smile on my face.
“See you on shift, Cap.”
I open my mouth to respond, and nothing forms. Saving me the embarrassment, she closes the door and disappears from my apartment, only leaving her scent and my racing heart in her wake.
This man is fucked.
Well and truly gone down with the ship.
Schmiddy pulls the rowing machine at a slow, steady pace as his focus stays stuck on London’s ass as she runs on the treadmill. I push the bar up over me from the flat bench one more time.
One more rep before I roll of this piece of gym equipment and string Schmiddy up by his fucking balls for ogling his subordinate.
London dips her head, her hands landing on her hips as she huffs through another mile of her run. Sweat beads, running over her collarbones before disappearing between her?—
Fuck.
I’m no better than Schmiddy.
I press the bar up again.
My arms burn, my chest heaving with the exertion.
“Shit!” London jumps off the machine and paces a small circle.
She gasps for breath, swallowing.
Schmiddy’s up off the rowing machine before the next heartbeat falls. “I got you, sweetheart.”
Bile rises as his hand sweeps her hair from her neck.
She slaps him away. “Don’t fucking call me sweetheart.”
My brows track toward my hairline as she closes the space between them. Schmiddy grins, still unaware he’s about to get his ass handed to him. Idiot. Sleazy, ignorant idiot.
London’s eyes narrow. “Touch me again and I will have you pinned to the floor by your balls.” She glares at him, her finger pointing to the floor.
And damn, you have to believe the woman with that much fire. Nothing like the soft, polite London who was in my apartment a few days ago, cuddled up to Petal on my bed.
My body comes alive at the thought.
