His smile turned wicked, and I went over to the small kitchenette to get him out of my direct line of sight. That didn’t help much, because his words had me turning back around. “I didn’t tell him much about it at all. He might think—and I have no idea where he got this idea—that it was a bet that I made out drinking the other night.”
Leaning back against the counter, I frowned. “You lied to him?” That didn’t sound like Eli. He loved being able totruthfullymake Roman nuts.
“No.” His eyes were dancing, clearly pleased with frustrating Roman. “I just lied to someone else, and they told him what theythoughtwas the truth.”
“Eli!” I wasn’t even sure what to say.
“Oh, it was only that nosy UPS driver who stays entirely too long in the lobby. He was coming in as I was leaving Preston’s office, and his eyes nearly popped out of his head.”
The UPS guy was supposed to stay up front in the extremely PG lobby, but he always found convenient excuses to wander back into the rest of the building. He wasn’t creepy, exactly, just very quiet and watched everything like he’d stumbled down the rabbit hole.
“Roman stormed by wanting to know what the hell was going on, and I just walked off. So the delivery guykindlyfilled him in.” Eli looked a little like a dictator who’d just invaded Europe. It was kind of disturbing.
“You are insane.”
He grinned. “Yep.”
Shaking my head, I tried to turn the conversation around to something…less creepy. “I’m not taking you out to eat naked.”
“Oh, you’re taking me out?” He slowly straightened but didn’t get up. He just let his legs fall to the side of the bed and gave me a sexy smile. He’d been posing in front of the camera for too many years, because it didn’t look fake and ridiculous. “I’ll get dressed up for a date. Clothes and everything.”
He was going to make me crazy. If anyone needed a Dom and a sound spanking, it was Eli. “You asked me out. It should be my date.”
“No takebacks.” Finally standing, he flashed me a grin and started walking toward the door. He let his hips swing back and forth, knowing exactly how sexy he looked. “I have clothes downstairs. I’ll meet you at the back door in five minutes.”
“That’s fine. Should we see if anyone else wants to go with us?” I wasn’t sure if more of an audience was a good idea or not, but reinforcements felt like a good idea.
“Sure. I’ll see who’s still hanging around.” He turned and posed against the frame of the door, grinning. “You worked so late, you might be stuck with just me.”
“That’s a frightening thought, Eli.”
He just laughed and turned to prance down the hallway, no doubt with his ass swaying back and forth. “You know you love me.”
That wasn’t the point.
Shaking my head, I headed for the bathroom with only one thought going through my head.Please don’t let Eli make Houston bonkers.I told myself that it was only a couple of hours on Friday and would be fine, but even I didn’t believe it.
Eli was going to make Houston nuts.
