Jaime’s eyebrow rose. “If I have to explain it to you, then it’s been way too long.”
Darcy jammed her fisted hands under her arms. “He’s my tenant.”
“He’s smokin’ hot.”
“Looks aren’t everything, Jaime.”
“When he looks like that and is giving off signals that every tower in the next five towns can read? Yeah, that’s when you pounce. Like now. Or better, when the store’s closed and you’re alone.”
“There are cameras!”
“Not everywhere and you know where the blind spots are.”
“Jaime.”
“What? You think the bedding department hasn’t been violated six ways to Sunday? Please.”
“And that would be six of the many reasons why I wouldn’t do that.” Darcy shuddered. Working in a department store was never boring, that was for sure. How many times had she run people out of the dressing rooms? It might have been hot in the movies to make out in the little confined spaces but the reality of it? Ugh. Not so much.
Jaime lowered her voice. “You need someone to put you up against the wall and give you a good orgasm.”
Her eyes widened as she looked around. “You did not just say that.”
“I did. Look, my Michael may not look like the god of Christmas trees and ornaments but he knows how to make me scream. And you are overdue. Why don’t you just see what happens? If it doesn’t amount to anything, who cares?”
“I have to live next to him.”
“I know for a fact that you can pretend to like just about anyone, Darcy. You haven?
??t killed Gary yet.”
She tipped her head back. It wasn’t a good idea. At all. She tugged the sleeves of her sweater down, hiding her hands. “How about you go on break?”
Jaime sighed. “You can avoid it all you want, babes. But you know you’re interested. I’ve watched you watching him all day.”
“Nosy much?”
“Looking out for my girl,” Jaime corrected. “Have some fun. All you do is work and go home. What’s wrong with having a little fun with Christmas boy?”
“Because he’s Christmas boy. He loves it. I can’t stand it. I’ll strangle him with a string of lights when he tries to convince me to decorate at my house.”
Jaime laughed. “So you’re thinking about him in your house, huh?”
“Oh, shut up.”
Ben loaded the last of his purchases into the back of his truck. If he did this for real he’d have to look into buying in bulk. He’d made a pit stop at the computer store for another board. He’d modified one to run the lights at the house, but needed a bigger circuit board to control all the different strings of lights he’d needed to use at the store. The tree was fucking huge. And he’d need to play around with the program to make it work.
He’d made sure that each layer of lights on the tree was even so he could make a few different patterns. And because he was a glutton for punishment, he’d tagged a song out of his personal playlist. A non-holiday tune to make Darcy smile.
Masochist was the word of the day.
Christ, he went out of his way to get her to smile. How fucked was he? She was his landlord, for God’s sake. Hadn’t he learned anything with Jess? He’d done the roommates deal to save money and they’d broken every rule about being friends. Hell, they’d christened every room a dozen times. They couldn’t get enough of each other at first.
At first.
Then came reality. Living with a woman was hard. The compromises to live with a friend were hard enough. He’d had roommates for most of his life, but living with a woman and becoming intimate was completely different. Bad habits came out, shitty days couldn’t be ignored, and if he wanted to just work on sketches and be in his own space, he was the bad guy.
No.