Tempting (Inked Hearts 1)

Kaylee looking up at me with those doe eyes, her hands on my skin, her body curled into mine—I can barely resist that when we're vertical.

If we're horizontal?

Fuck this. I shake my head. Skip right over thoughts of baseball and action movies, straight to shop finances.

We're signing the papers tomorrow. Making it official.

But there's more to take care of. We need to hire an extra hand. Or two. And Ryan is refusing to even consider it.

The man hates change.

I grab Kaylee's gift and pull on a t-shirt. Force my thoughts to the shop. To salaries and profits and per hour rates. To schedules and how much more we could make if we plugged a few gaps.

Fuck, I should have paid more attention in high school. Taken some business classes at SMC. Something. I was too busy proving I didn't give a fuck about anything to care about the things that mattered.

I move into the hallway.

Kaylee's door is open.

And she's there, sitting up on her bed, in a thin cream tank top and deep blue boxer shorts with white bicycles on them.

I press the door shut behind me.

I let my eyes roam her body. Her strap is falling off her shoulder. Her top is clinging to her tits. Her nipples are hard.

She presses her knees together. Plants her palms on her soft thighs. Her nails—painted Bruins blue—dig into her skin.

She looks up at me. "I haven't seen much of you."

"We're busy with contracts. And clients. We need to hire help."

She nods. "What kind of help do you need?"

"Another artist."

"Not my expertise."

"If Leighton decides to apprentice, we'll need someone to take her job."

"You want me working the front desk?"

"Why not? You're there all the time now." Not lately. She's avoiding me as much as I'm avoiding her.

"Because—" She draws a circle around herself with her hand. Turns to show off her bare shoulders, one at a time. "I'm unadorned."

"Guys would fall over themselves trying to convince you to ink up. They'd get their work done at the shop so they could flirt with you." Which is a good reason to discourage her. I want to deck Dean whenever he flirts with Kaylee and I know he's only doing it to fuck with me. If it were some other guy, one who wouldn't think twice about treating her like a cum-dumpster? Fuck, I'd break my hand within a month.

"What if I said yes?"

"As long as I do the work."

"Yeah?" She scoots back on her bed and lowers herself onto her back. "You trust yourself?"

Trust myself with my hands on her skin? Fuck no. But— "More than I trust anyone else."

She turns toward me and props up on one elbow. "Maybe I can help convince Ryan. If there are numbers supporting it. Math isn't my best subject—"

"You got an A minus in Calculus."