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“It’s a nice place,” he says behind me.
That’s when I spot a notebook on the coffee table. “What’s this?” I ask. It’s open on a double-page spread with what looks like lyrics.
He sighs and lets me take it.
“That is my futile effort of songwriting over the last few months.”
“Sing it for me?” I ask.
He looks me dead in the eye. “You want me to serenade you?”
I shrug. “Yeah, it would be nice.”
He shakes his head. “Maybe one day, Doc.”
“Why? Hasn’t writing been going well?”
“I don’t know. Ever since Cascade, really, it just hasn’t been flowing. Every time I sit down and try to write, it just doesn’t happen, and then whatever I do make is terrible.”
I nod. I understand. It sometimes happens to me with studying. I can have the perfect set up, have been for a walk, have a coffee, a water, and a soda all within reaching distance, and sit down, and nothing happens.
“What about if you stop trying?”
“Great idea. I’ll just lie here and rot for the rest of my life.” He flops onto the couch to demonstrate. His T-shirt rides up as he does, revealing a strip of tattooed abs. My core tightens at the sight of them.
“I know how I work, Doc. I don’t sit around waiting for a lightning bolt. I go out. I live. I feel something. Then I write before it wears off.”
“Okay.” I drop onto the couch opposite him, tucking one leg beneath me. “What usually makes you feel something?”
His gaze lifts to mine.
“Sex.”
Heat flickers through me before I can stop it, and judging by the slow shift in his expression, Cal sees every second of it.
“Right,” I say. “Very artistically rigorous.”
“Extremely.”
“And here I thought songwriting required talent.”
“That too.” His eyes dip briefly to my mouth. “But sex helps.”
I hold his stare. “Are you asking for assistance?”
His eyes flare with surprise. For one second, Callum Fox is genuinely caught off guard. His mouth curves up into a smirk.
“Are you offering? You’re my tutor. You should know better than to offer extracurricular support.”
“I didn’t offer anything.”
“No?” He leans back, spreading one arm along the sofa. “What if I was?”
My pulse jumps. He’s teasing. Probably.
The problem is that his eyes don’t look particularly amused anymore.
I cross my legs and pretend the movement has nothing to do with the sudden ache between them.
