Page 51 of Dirty Player
The ride had been quiet and tense, neither of us speaking minus the directions I had to give him.
I’d had one hand on the door handle to make my quick escape, but when he dropped that bomb, I turned to him.
“Maybe you’re right to run,” he said and scrubbed a hand down his face. “Maybe it makes me a bigger prick than you think I am to make it so you can’t.”
“You consume everything, everyone around you. I don’t want to disappear in your shadow.” I looked at Stamped, the first thing to have potential to be all mine, the first thing in my life. “I’m just out of a five-year relationship. Rebounding maybe?” I shook my head. That wasn’t what this was turning into, at least for me, and I didn’t want to cheapen it. “I don’t know what I want right now.”
I didn’t miss the teasing tone in his voice. “I think you like when I consume you.”
I flashed him a look over my shoulder, part annoyed, part scared, equal parts amused. “You know what I mean.”
He pulled his eyes off me to the front door of Stamped. The windows were covered, but the metal sign out front had been hung before the game yesterday. It was polished and perfect, giving a sense of what was inside. And behind those covered windows, I was really freaking proud of what I’d done in a week.
“Maybe you’re right,” he finally muttered. “But I’d still like you to give me a tour of your place. Show me what you do.”
“Why?”
He gave me a shrug, looking as uncertain.
“Fine.” I dug my keys out from my purse and opened the door. “But no making fun of my stuff.”
The beauty of an online store was that I got to have my anonymity. No one bought anything from me because I was the sister of an NFL player. The downside was that I never saw anyone’s reactions when they bought my jewelry and fell in love with it. Were they as thrilled as they pretended in their thank you notes I received or were they just being polite?
Seeing Oliver walk through my small store as I opened the door and led him through made my pulse race in a way it hadn’t yet around him.
I’d always had Beaux’s support. It was what we did for each other. I’d made decent money in college selling to other college students. I made decent money now with my online-only store, in addition to making simple items in bulk and selling them to online boutique clothing stores like Modern Vintage.
Yet seeing Oliver Powell walk through my building, glancing through the display cases and running his fingertips along the edge of the glass like he was afraid to leave a smudge, created a lump in my stomach..
“You make all of this?” he asked, staring at some simple, thick bracelet cuffs. “How?”
I cleared my throat and walked to him, setting my purse near the register counter on my way. “In the back. I have a workroom where I design and make everything.”
“Show me.”
I looked at the clock on the far wall. That space was personal. And a disastrous mess. Letting Oliver into that sacred space of mine would show him more of me than I wanted to reveal.
I didn’t answer. I stared at the door that led to the workroom and private restroom. That lump in my stomach grew larger.
“Shannon?” Oliver asked. “Can I see it?”
It was a tipping point to something I didn’t fully understand. I would essentially be baring myself to him, not my body, but my soul and all my innermost desires…if he could see it through the chaotic mess I lived in.
He walked toward me, his presence growing larger and heavier until he was next to me. From the corner of my eyes I could only see his profile, the way lines popped and appeared at the outer corners of his eyes when he ran a hand through his hair and exhaled harshly.
“I’m guessing this is how I felt when you saw me with Ralph and Winne.”
I laughed before I could stop myself. “Stripped raw? Vulnerable?”
I couldn’t look at him. My palms were sweating and my pulse was racing.
“I didn’t know why I wanted you there, then you were and I didn’t know what the fuck to do about it.”
Another harsh laugh fell from my lips. I swiped my mess of a hair off my neck, which burned under his seeking gaze.
I nodded once, understanding what he was saying in a way I didn’t think anyone else could.
He held himself away from people—whether from his past or maybe because of his notoriety, I didn’t know.
