When Life Happened by Jewel E. Ann
Chapter Thirty-Eight
“Ineed to call my mom.”
Levi turned toward the door to his office and slid his pencil behind his ear. Since their long, sleepless twenty-four hours in Malibu weeks earlier, he’d had trouble focusing on work again. The bikini-clad Parker posed in the doorway to his office didn’t help. His dick jumped to attention, sending not so subtle messages to his brain. They both needed a break from the monotony of drawing.
“Is your phone dead?”
“Look at me.”
His eyes snapped from her cleavage to her face. “I am.”
“My face.” She gestured to her eyes with her index and middle fingers.
“I’ve been working for four straight hours, you’ve been lounging by the pool, and now you’re standing there all sweaty and nearly naked, but I’m supposed to look at your eyes? Not fair, babe.” His eyes returned to her breasts.
“I’ve been here for almost a month. There’s a good chance I might stay a bit longer. She’s a wreck because I have no job and I’m living with a guy who she doesn’t know. I think she suspects you kidnapped me.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, head cocked to the side. “A good chance you might stay a bit longer?”
“Maybe.” She smirked.
“Come here.”
“No way. I’ll lose my bikini. You’re giving me that look.”
He chuckled. “What look?”
“That look you give me before my clothes end up on the floor and me on my back.”
Levi adjusted himself. “You don’t like that scenario?”
Parker dropped her chin and looked up with flirty eyelashes batting at him. “You know the answer to that. I just need to say something before the clothes come off.”
He adjusted himself again with little relief because he was running out of room for adjustment. “Absolutely, but just to be clear … the clothes are coming off?”
Rock. Hard.
“Don’t they always?”
“Three days last week—”
She rolled her eyes. “You mean my five-day menstrual cycle? By the fourth day, you had your way with me in the shower.”
Painfully hard.
“Say what you need to say.”
“I’m going to email my résumé tomorrow. You tell me where. You make the call. I’m ready to climb that ladder, even if I have to stand on your back to reach the first step.”
“I changed my mind.” Levi drummed his fingers on his leg. “I like lazy mornings with you in bed. Coffee on the balcony, talking about how you think you can ‘kick my ass’ at volleyball, even though I’m taller. I like lunch in the kitchen and post-lunch sex on the sofa. I like working my ass off all afternoon while you reorganize everything in this entire place a hundred times over before you head to the pool on the roof for the remainder of the afternoon. I like the click of your high heels on the stone floor, usually around six, knowing that you’re starving and wearing something that will make me fall off this stool. I like taking you to a new restaurant every night and how you tear half of my clothes off in the elevator when we get back home.” He shrugged. “I like this life. You getting a job would ruin it. Nope. Not going to be any part of that terrible idea.”
Parker’s head jutted forward, jaw reaching for the ground. “Are you serious?”
“Dead. If you wanted a job, you should have spoken up the day we discussed it. I’ve rescinded my offer. Sorry, babe. Now…” he crooked a finger “…get over here. Let’s check out that tan line of yours.”
She blinked. Waiting. Of course, she knew five—ten minutes tops—was how long it took to know if his words were truth or a shit lie. It didn’t stop Levi from enjoying every second he could until his stupid conscience vomited the truth. His ability to hold out in the name of a good joke had improved over the years with practice.
“You’re a selfish little rich boy.” Then sometimes she went on the offensive. He loved that game too.
“Agreed. Bikini … are you removing it or am I?”
“Levi Joseph Paige, if you’re serious, then the only thing I need to tell my mom is what time my plane will arrive in Des Moines.”
“I love how you not only ball your hands when you get mad but you curl your toes too.”
Parker glanced at her feet and relaxed both her fingers and toes. Then she narrowed her eyes at him. The stare-off. Another favorite of his. He narrowed his a bit too; that usually made her grin against her will after a few seconds.
No grin. It was more of a smug smirk. She pulled the ties to her top letting it fall to the ground. Then she slid off her bikini bottoms and sling-shotted them at him. They landed on his drafting table.
“Are you going to give me a name? Then are you going to make a phone call?”
The girl clearly didn’t know the rules. She played dirty. So dirty. Levi wasn’t a pathetic schmuck ruled by his penis. Until … the girl.
“I’ll message you the email address and make a call first thing tomorrow morning.”
A huge, gloating smile stole her entire face. He unfastened his shorts as she prowled toward him.
“See…” her eyelashes fluttered “ …that wasn’t so hard, now was it?”
The girl had no idea how extremely hard it was … but she was about to find out.
*
Two days laterParker called her mom.
“I’m ready to disown you, Parker Joy. No job. You’re living with some guy I’ve never met. And you’ve been ignoring my texts and phone calls for the past week. You could have been dead in a ditch and I would have no idea. How do you think that makes me feel? Someday, young lady, you’re going to have kids, and I hope they hate you as much as you hate me.”
Parker grinned, eyes closed, head back on the lounge chair by the roof-top pool. She had her earbuds in so the two other residents a few feet down couldn’t hear her crazy mom going off on her typical rant.
“I have an interview in two weeks.”
“Please tell me it’s in Des Moines.”
“Phoenix.”
“Parker. You’re killing me. Is that what you want?”
She laughed. “I’ll say something to Levi. I’ll tell him he needs to take me home for a visit. You’re going to love him.”
“Do you?”
Parker’s smile grew even bigger. “Yes.”
“Are you sure it’s not just infatuation? Or maybe you’re high on your little rebellion and you’re mistaking that high for love because he’s been your partner in crime.”
“We’re not robbing banks, Mom. Can’t you be happy for me?”
Janey sighed. “I’m trying, but it’s hard because I hate worrying about you, but it’s impossible not to when you’re so far away. And what about the house? Piper and Caleb are closing on their house next week. Are you selling the farmhouse? Renting it? This is something you and Piper need to discuss before she has a baby consuming her time.”
“I know. I will.”
“When?”
“Jeez, soon. I said I’d talk to Levi about making a trip back there.”
“I miss you.”
Parker rubbed her eyes. “I miss you too. I’ll call you soon.”
