“I just know a little first aide,” he says. His fingers glide over and around my ankle. He checks my wrists next, his hands lingering near mine. He helps me to my feet, and I almost trip again, but he holds my waist, and keeps my steady. We are so close, a few inches apart, but we aren't touching. Why aren't we touching?
You're engaged, remember?
“You're fast,” I say.
“Only as fast as the person I'm with,” he says.
“Pervert.”
“Miss Summers, your mind is in the gutter.”
“Right.”
My eyes narrow. He grins, that million dollar smile lighting up his gorgeous brown eyes. “Surely an engaged woman wouldn't think about fucking someone besides her fiancé,” he says.
“Don't flatter yourself,” I say. I stand up and put my weight on my ankle. It smarts a bit, but it isn't totally horrible.
“Are you sure you're okay to walk?” he asks.
“We can run.”
“No, you might have twisted it. We're walking,” he says.
“Fine.” We're walking. It will take longer, and I'll talk to him longer, and I'll be around him longer. Maybe that will get this desire out of my system.
Or maybe I'll give in to temptation. That is what I usually do.
“Want me to put a word in with Ryan about your audition?”
“He'll kill you if he finds out you're flirting with me.”
“Miss Summers, that's an awfully serious allegation,” he says, his smile wide.
“Uh-huh.”
“Besides, you're flirting back.”
I try to come back with some reasonable excuse, a claim that I am not flirting, that I am not interested, that I would never, ever, ever do anything to hurt Ryan. But all I can do is sadly restate the facts: “I'm engaged.”
“I'm well aware of that,” he says, eyeing my bare ring finger. “We're only friends.”
“Do you flirt with all your friends?” I ask.
“No,” he says. “Only the friends who correct my grammar.”
“And besides, you're a good guy. You wouldn't pursue an engaged woman.”
“What gave you the idea that I'm a good guy?” he asks.
“Would you?” I ask.
“Hypothetically?”
“Hypothetically.”
“It would depend on the woman. How much I liked her. How much…Well, I don't want to make you uncomfortable,” he says.
“Try me.”