“But I don’t want to make himuncomfortable.” I could see that going badly.
Gray sighed. “Maybe talk to his friendthen? The one who was in the coffee shop. See what he thinks.”
“Oh.” That might work. Eli was more of ahandful than I would be willing to date no matter what his gender, but Lanesaid he was a good friend. Hopefully, a good enough one that he would honestlylet me know what would be best for Lane. “That might work.”
Or it might go terribly wrong…I’d heardenough Eli stories to realize that.
Chapter 14
Lane
“Oh, your sexy man is here.” Eli sigheddramatically and wiggled in his seat.
Rolling my eyes, I threw my balled-up strawat him. “Hands off, he’s mine. Besides, you have your hands full already.”
Eli grinned. “I can still look, though.Besides, I’ve been locked up for days, and I’m at that constantly horny phase.”He leaned back in his chair trying to look pathetic. “I even flirted with theUPS man this morning.”
“Did Roman see?”
Eli nodded. “Of course, I’m going to hearabout it for days.”
Those two had the oddest relationship, andI wasn’t going to even try to guess Roman’s reaction. “What did he do?”
Eli smirked, looking very pleased withhimself. “I actually didn’t realize he was behind me. He just smacked my assand said if I liked being caged that much, he’d leave me in it for a few moredays. The UPS guy just about fainted, but he didn’t complain. I can’t decide ifhe was picturing himself as me or as Roman.”
The UPS guy that was enthralled with everythingto do with Leashes and Lace. So it was impossible to tell what he reallywanted. “One of these days that poor guy is going to have a heart attack.”
Eli shrugged. “He either needs to step upand admit that he’s curious about it or become a little bit more subtle.”
“Because we’re only allowed one drama queenand you already have that slot taken?”
Eli looked at me like I was his star pupil.“Yes!”
I was saved from any more of Eli’soversharing as Wilder walked up to the table. He leaned down and gave me a kisson the cheek. “Did the shoot get finished quicker than you expected?”
I shook my head. “We had to reschedule. Theshipment was missing a couple of key pieces and Roman didn’t want to stretch itout over two days. We should be able to do it tomorrow afternoon. It’s going tochange our plans, though. I don’t think the movie’s going to work. Sorry.”
Wilder shrugged and his hand came out tocaress over my head. “That’s all right. We can hang out earlier. Then I cancome to the shoot, if that’s okay with everyone. We can go out to dinner afterward.”
He said it like it was no big deal, but Ifelt my heart skip a beat. I wasn’t even sure why the idea of him coming was sonerve-racking. I hadn’t been able to narrow down my worries to one specificthing. It might have just been simply the fact that I’d never had a boyfriendor lover watch me at work.
Other models had brought their significantothers in occasionally, and it was never a problem. Hell, with the shit betweenEli and Roman, we’d gotten used to having the heat and drama around thatcouples sometimes brought into a room. If Wilder had been the crazy drama type,then some of the other models might’ve had an issue. But he always radiated acalm strength that I thought they would be comfortable with.
I must’ve sat there silently for too longbecause I felt Eli kick me under the table. Trying not to jump at the pain thatradiated up my shin, I nodded. “That sounds good. Maybe we can see the latermovie instead, unless you want to get some work done.”
We’d originally planned on hanging outearlier in the day so he could make some progress on his projects in theevening. He had a few sketches he needed to work on for some new tattoo clientsand there were a few illustration jobs that he was looking at putting in a submissionfor.
Wilder shrugged. “If I can stay morefocused tonight, I might be able to get some of the work done.”
Eli couldn’t resist. “What were youdistracted by?”
Wilder didn’t seem to mind the teasing,though. He just gave me a heated look and then grinned at Eli. “I think thatshould be obvious. All I got done last night was a dozen sketches of my sexystalker.”
Heatstarted torise up my face, but I leaned into the hand that had come back up to cup mycheek. “I wasn’t even there, so I can’t be held responsible for yourimagination.”
Wilder’s smile turned wicked. “Oh, but youcan. You were supposed to model for me so I could sketch you the other night.Instead, youdistractedme, so it is your fault.”
“What kind of sketches?” Eli was like alittle yappy dog who’d heard the wordtreat.
