“C’mon. We have work to do.”
Her nose crinkles. “Work?”
I take her hand and guide her back into the paint booth. When she sees our project, she bursts out laughing.
“We’re painting a Barbie Jeep?” I nod. “Oh my God. This is amazing.”
“You’re happy?”
“So, so very. What color?”
“It’s for Willow.”
“Pink, then.”
“Sí.”
Seraphine bounces on the balls of her feet. “I’m excited, but I gotta be honest, I’ve never sprayed before.”
“Do not worry, mariposita, I will teach you.” I pop the first button on my shirt. “I just need to change first.”
“Do you want me to turn around?”
I shrug, and continue unbuttoning my shirt. Her pupils dilate as I shrug out of the fabric. “Do you like what you see?” I ask, knowing damn well she does.
“You’re…beautiful.” She slaps a hand over her mouth. “I mean handsome. Sexy. So good looking it hurts.”
Stepping into her, I pull her hand away from her face and place it on my bare chest, directly over my heart. “A man can be beautiful, too. And the fact that you think I am—that you like how I look—it means something to me.”
I drop my voice an octave, and drag her hand down the hard line of my abs, so it rests at the waist of my jeans. “It does something to me.”
She sucks in a shuddery breath and dips the tip of her pinky beneath the material of my jeans. I laugh lightly and step back. “Now turn around.”
“Spoilsport,” she grumbles, but with a smile on her face.
“It’s for me more than you,” I tell her as I step out of my jeans.
“What does that even mean?”
I pull on the coveralls and step up behind her, burying my face in the crook of her neck. “I mean, seeing you react to me, to my body, makes it hard for me to resist you.”
“Maybe I don’t want you to resist me.”
“It’s only our first date.”
“I’m a modern woman,” she says, but her voice wobbles.
“You may be, but I’m a gentleman and want to treat you right, so that when I finally do stop resisting you, you’ll be so ready for me, you’ll beg.”
She whimpers and squirms against me—a sure-fire sign that it’s time for me to step away. “Now, let’s tape this thing off, yeah?”Chapter TwentySeraphineIf someone would have told me my first ever date would take place in a garage and that I’d be painting a Powerwheel, I would have laughed.
But now that it’s my reality, I couldn’t imagine anything better. Who needs dinner and a movie when you could have this?
“First, we need to tape off anything we don’t want painted.”
Mateo demonstrates on the first faux-doorhandle before setting me free on the second.
“Now, we mix.”
I rub my hands together in excitement. “I’ve always dreamed of painting.”
Mateo wags his brows. “Then let’s make your dreams come true.”
He drags me over to a metal table in the corner and begins explaining the mixing process. “Since we are painting plastic, we will need to do two coats of adhesion promoter. You think you can handle that?”
“Do I do it like spray paint?”
“Yes. I would shoot it with a gun if it were a full-size vehicle, but since this is…” —he pinches his thumb and forefinger together— “pequeño—little, we will use this.”
He passes me the can and I give it a good shake before spraying all of the exposed plastic.
I step back after the first coat, turning to him for approval. “Very good,” he murmurs before starting me on the second coat.
“Now we need to lay down our base.” I hang on his every word, thoroughly entranced. “Since we’re doing candy, we want a metallic base—the more metallic, the better.”
He mixes the base, loads the cup, and motions for me to join him. I figure he’s going to have me watch, but to my surprise, he presses the paint gun into my hands and moves behind me. “We want the PSI at twenty-nine and we’re going to spray from about six inches back. Smooth and fluid, yes?”
I take a deep breath, nod, and pull the trigger. The first coat goes on… well, it goes on roughly. Shooting paint from a gun is totally different than spraying with a can.
But Mateo doesn’t seem too concerned. “I’ll help you with the next coat.”
“How long do we have to wait?”
“Fifteen minutes.”
“What will we do while we wait?” I bat my lashes and bite my lip, hoping like hell I look alluring and not like a fool.
If the heated look in Mateo’s eyes is anything to go by, I nailed it.
“I can think of a way or two to pass the time.”
“Oh, yeah?” I ask, my voice breathy.
“Yes.” He leans in and skims his lips over mine in a ghost of a kiss. “We can mix the control coat.”
“You tease.”
“It isn’t teasing as long as you deliver, and, mariposita, I will deliver.”